In the 13th century, radical spiritual changes took place in Europe. Magic and witchcraft, one might say, have finally become firmly established, having lost their former, unstable, ambiguous position. Now witches and sorcerers have expanded their activities, more and more zealously fulfilling the covenants and requirements of their main leader - the Devil.
Now they did not hide and did not hide. Across Europe more and more disgusting stories of "eyewitnesses" were spread that numerous companies of sorcerers and witches regularly gather in sacred groves, on the nearest "bald" (treeless) mountains, where they conduct unholy rituals and ceremonies of insolent worship of the Devil.
This blasphemous mock parody of Christian church rites is called the "Sabbath". The first trial of the participants in such a gathering took place between 1330-11340. in the vicinity of the French city of Carcassonne, in the south of France, not far from Toulouse.
RITE OF BLACK MAGIC
These stories, which made God-fearing Christians stand on end, were overgrown with ever more horrifying and obscene details. The Devil himself allegedly ran everything on them. After a series of obscene rituals, all the participants in this crazy night celebration, seized by an irresistible lust, indulged in mass sin. All this insane orgy was accompanied by frantic dances of the devil-admirers, intoxicated with drug settings. They are said to have treated themselves to pieces of flesh from babies killed in the sacrifice.
WITCH HOLIDAY
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During such a mind-blowing frenzy, the Sabbath participants confirmed the effectiveness of their earlier agreement with the Devil on all its points.
They defiled Christian relics, spat on the cross, spewed all kinds of blasphemy against Christ, swore allegiance to Satan. At such gatherings, the initiation rite was also held, that is, the admission of new members. When initiating a beginner, he is first asked to suck the drool from the mouth of a huge toad, and then kiss it on the belly. Then there is a thin, poor man, one skin and bones. He will need to be kissed on his bare ass, and after such a red kiss, the convert completely forgets his former Christian faith. A large black cat emerged from behind a mysterious statue, and everyone present kissed his ass. After which the candles were extinguished and an obscene orgy began. Finally, a man appeared, the upper part of which, with its blinding brilliance, eclipsed the sun, and the lower one resembled the fur-covered legs of a goat with cloven hooves and a tail.
There are a dime a dozen such descriptions in the vast literature on witchcraft, but according to modern demonology, the best description of the Sabbath is given by the famous Russian poet and writer Valery Bryusov in his prose book The Fiery Angel.
Here are some examples:
There the women leading me stopped, and I saw that it was Someone sitting on a high wooden throne, but there was no fear in me, and I managed to quickly and clearly examine his image. The seated one was huge in stature and up to the waist like a man, and below like a goat, with wool; the legs ended in hooves, but the hands were human, as well as the face, dark-red, like an Apache, with large long eyes and a short beard. It seemed to him that he looked no more than forty years old, three horns definitely rose from black curly hair: two smaller ones in the back and one large in front. A crown was worn around the horns, apparently of silver. Naked witches put me before the throne and exclaimed: - Master Leonard! This is new!
- Welcome, my son. But do you come to us of your own free will?
I replied that it was of my own free will, as it should be, to answer me. Then he asked me questions about which I was warned and I do not want to repeat here and step by step I performed the entire blasphemous rite of the black novitiate. This was followed by two statutory velkhany. For the first, he extended his hand graciously to me, and for the second, he got up, turned his back to me, and his tail, as long as a donkey, rose above me, and I, playing my role, bent down to the end and kissed the goat's butt. When I performed this ritual, Master Leonard exclaimed:
- Rejoice, my beloved son, accept my sign on your body and wear it
- Rejoice, my beloved son, accept my sign on your body and wear it forever and ever, amen!
And, bending his head towards me, the tip of a large horn touched my chest, I experienced the pain of a prick and blood came out of my skin.
Immediately the witches clapped their hands and cried out with joy, and Master Leonard, all on the throne again, uttered those fateful words for which I appeared before him:
- now ask me for everything you want and your first desire will be fulfilled by us …
… Soon I found myself among the crowd, rejoicing, as if at a feast on Midsummer's Day or at carnivals in Venice.
WALPURGIS NIGHT
In Germanic medieval mythology, there is a day of obedience to Saint Walturgy, who died on the night of April 30 to May 1. This day was considered the day of the nationwide "gathering" of all witches for a grand Sabbath, who, on what - on a broomstick, on a stick, on a grip, or even on the hump of a goat - flocked to the famous magic mountain Broken. There they began to celebrate noisily along with all kinds of iniquity.
Initially, they are looking for miraculous herbs, in particular, the mandrake root, which, according to legend, was filled with special magical power that night. Then their magic began.
With their magic spells, they tried to prevent the timely arrival of spring, to destroy early sifting, to send damage and disease to people.
In the villages adjacent to the mountain, local peasants themselves performed magical ceremonies in order to drive away witches with their help.
They burned effigies of witches at the stake, walked from house to house with planted torches, rattled rattles, rang church bells. Later, the day of May 1 became the holiday of spring.
INQUISITORS 'Fiction
There are many points of view about how such covens took place, and whether they even existed at all. Of the theories of specialists in the field of white and black magic, two can probably be distinguished.
First, the idea of a coven, or secret gathering of witches, was unknown until the 12th century.
Thus, according to the prominent American demonologist, author of the unique "Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology," D. P. Robbins, "this idea was fabricated in the XIV or XV centuries. Its" inventors "were mainly the inquisition ".
Secondly, it would be nice to analyze how such an idea could have arisen at all. Some scholars - historians say that the idea of the witch's Sabbath was suggested by the night gatherings of medieval serfs.
These impoverished, downtrodden, disadvantaged people sometimes actually secretly gathered at night to dance (such village dances still exist today) to have fun and rest after a day of hard, essentially slave labor and relax a little. By themselves, such meetings had absolutely nothing to do with witchcraft or with any other form of occultism.
Most likely, all these terrible, amazing debauchery sabbats arose in the inflamed brains of cruel inquisitors, whose hands were constantly itching in order to commit lawlessness and arrange bloody massacres of innocent people.
This was the essence of the activity to which they devoted themselves entirely.
A mockery over a rite
“I wish! I wish! I wish! May the king and his heir keep my friendship forever! May the queen remain barren and may the king leave her for me! Let the king and my family grant me everything I wish!.. Let the king dissolve his marriage with the queen and marry me! - so lamented his mistress Françoise de Montespan, abandoned by King Louis XIV, during the divination.