ABSTRACT
The idea that female healers were often accused of witchcraft is an enduring theme of popular writing on the subject. The belief is sometimes accompanied by the claim that male medical practitioners encouraged their persecution. The idea that most women condemned as witches during the classic periods of witch persecution in Europe were in actuality unlicenced healers who were suppressed by the male medical establishment arose among feminist writers, historians and religious leaders. Witchcraft literature from the period of the persecutions indicates that the idea that witches murdered children was a widely held belief and undoubtedly a part of both learned and popular culture. Nagy discusses documented instances of women medical professionals and a number of cases of unlicenced women healers. A case study of the role of women sheds considerable light upon the topic of popular medicine.
