Although it is a sin to conjure, nevertheless in Russia the "profession" of a witch inspired fear and at the same time respect.
They preferred to be friends with these persons. Or bypass. Away from sin, so to speak. And of course, each village, each village had its own attraction - a local witch or sorceress.
There is no doubt that those who were caught at the scene of the crime were dealt with quickly and cruelly when they caused damage or slandered crop failure. But nevertheless, under the article (in reality) "for witchcraft", official sentences were passed not so often. As for the church, it strongly opposed the "murder" of those accused of witchcraft.
Back in the first half of the 15th century, Bishop Serapion condemned the habit of attributing all sorts of troubles and cataclysms to witches and ruining them for it. And at the end of the 18th century, the Senate issued a decree prohibiting clergymen from even entering into investigative cases "about sorcery and magic." They were taken to a civil court.
THE WITCH FROM TEREBENEV
In 1899, a peasant woman, Marya Terekhova, was brought to the county investigator of a small town on charges of witchcraft. Terribly beaten, her fellow villagers brought her.
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Marya Ivanovna lived on the outskirts of the village of Terebeneva in the Zhizdrinsky district of the Kaluga province. Only by her patronymic no one called her: for those of the same age, she was just Marya, and for those who are younger, she was aunt Marya. Women often ran to her: some for advice, some for all sorts of women's affairs, and some just scratch their tongues.
Marya and her husband did not live poorly, but lonely. And they took as a worker a girl from a poor family, seven-year-old Sasha. Only the baby was more likely for a daughter.
Once, going home for a holiday, Sasha told her mother: when everyone fell asleep, Aunt Marya leaves the house, runs around the house and turns into a magpie.
She allegedly turns Sasha into forty. Then they both fly up the mountain and there, stripping naked, dance with other witches and brew a magic potion …
Parents, having heard the revelations of their daughter, rushed to Marya for explanations, which soon turned into threats. For Marya, her husband Antip stood up and pushed the girl's parents out the door. Then the couple turned to the headman for help. At first he wanted to send for the bailiff, but then advised him to go to the priest.
The priest, famous for his sanity, advised a radical remedy: flog the girl, and that's the end of it. “What kind of magpie is she pretending to be? - he admonished his parents. - Which mountain is it flying? What do you believe in a child's chatter! God did not give Marya and her husband children, so she entertains a strange girl with fairy tales."
However, heeding the requests of his parents, he agreed to scold the girl in church. But Sasha to go to church categorically
refused, but being nevertheless brought into the church by force, turned her back to the iconostasis. All the manipulations of the priest did not bring any visible result, the girl continued to insist on her own: she, they say, became a witch.
WHO ARE YOU, MARYA ARTIST?
The angry villagers threw their aunt Marya to the house. On the way, some grabbed a pitchfork, some a stake, some a shovel … Antip met them on the porch with an ax in his hands. And it would be murderous, if not for the headman. “We have no complaints against you,” he said conciliatoryly, “and we will not offend your wife either. Let him only admit that she taught the bad girl and conjured …"
Nobody objected to such an outcome of the case, and everything could have ended in peace if the simpleton Antip had not opened up: he, they say, is afraid of his wife himself.
Under the hot hand, she threatens to turn him into a stallion, then into a wild beast. The villagers roared with a dull noise: "So is the witch Marya or not?" The crowd swung towards the porch, but the headman again saved the situation. Understanding perfectly well who, in case of murder, will get the cap in the first place, he said: "Before you beat a woman, you need to make sure that she is really a witch."
And the way, they say, for this is the most sure - to lift her hem and look for her tail. The offer was accepted with enthusiasm, despite Antipas' assurances that he had been living with Marya for 20 years and had never seen any tail. The unfortunate woman was dragged out into the yard and “investigated” for a long time in front of all honest people. The tail, of course, was not found.
MARINA OBIDA
Sasha's parents, not satisfied with the village analysis, went to the nearest town for justice. There they were believed and recognized Marya as a witch. However, rummaging through the papers, they found out that, although the article for witchcraft exists, it is impossible to apply it in practice: there is no direct evidence of Marya's witchcraft.
And everything could have ended there. Well, the woman would have forgotten about her shame, about how two dozen men felt her soft spots, trying to find a nonexistent tail. I could even benefit from what happened: after all, the people were afraid of the witches. But no, obstinate Marya did not let go of the offense.
Realizing that the official authorities could not punish her, she began to threaten her fellow villagers with all sorts of troubles at the top of her voice.
Something was wrong, strange things began to happen to the quiet and previously unnoticed woman: she stopped going to church, became rude and unsociable. At any opportunity, she promised to spoil everyone …
And one day she agreed: some peasant, in response to threats, pushed her with his fist so that he knocked her to the ground. Hearing the screams of his wife, Antipus hurried to her aid and attacked the offender. The villagers seemed to be expecting a signal: people came running from all sides, and a terrible Russian fight ensued, in which it is very quickly forgotten who is beating whom and for what.
The beaten Marya (who, by the way, did not stop threatening) was tied up and again taken to the city. The participants in the massacre explained their own fingals and bruises to the investigator in a very peculiar way: the witch Marya averted their eyes, so they beat each other. The investigator started talking about punishment …
However, the next day Marya came to the village. The city official who came with her strictly punished such outrages not to be allowed anymore, promising that next time the instigators of the fight would be tried. Having listened to the official, the peasants decided with the whole world that Marya had bewitched the district authorities, and decided to deal with the witch themselves …
SCHOOLGIRL
The matter, however, did not come to this, since Marya disappeared without a trace. Even her husband Antip could not tell where she had gone. His anxiety - his wife, after all - was somewhat relieved by the girl Sasha. She approached him on the street (many fellow villagers saw this) and said: "Uncle Antip, my aunt Marya came to me in a dream today and asked me to tell him that she had completely left, and left everything that was hers …"
So, Marya Terekhova disappeared and, as they write now, "the investigative measures undertaken were not crowned with success." Sasha soon forgot about her childhood flights, about her witchcraft, and a few years later she even remembered this with a laugh, assuring that she had thought of everything.
Nevertheless, the older she got, the more wary her fellow villagers treated her. Since they began to notice various oddities behind her: then she washed, leaning over the threshold, then at dawn she walked naked around the house, then she collected some herbs on Ivan Kupala.
And 15 years later, the reputation of a witch was firmly entrenched in her. However, she was a prominent, affectionate and friendly girl, therefore they forgave her for witchcraft, especially since Sasha regularly treated the cattle, could speak pain and even return her husband to the family on a spree.
When she got married and left, the village people lamented: besides Sasha, there were no other "local attractions" in Terebenevo. So there was no one to heal the cows and educate the dissolute fathers of families …
Sergey BORODIN