Witches of Denmark

Fascinating People Fascinating Places

Daniel Mainwaring

Documentary, Society & Culture:documentary, History, Society & Culture

5 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 17 June 2022

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Witches have existed in Denmark since primitive times. Though in the past, many were categorized as “cunning folk” since they were concerned with good deeds rather than ill. But in the late 16th century, anyone carrying around runes, whipping up potions, or practicing traditional folklore suddenly found themselves in danger. King Christian IV, developed a preoccupation with all forms of witchcraft. His definition included practically anything religious or spiritual outside of conventional Lutheranism. What followed were a series of witch hunts that saw huge numbers of innocent people burnt at the stake. In this episode I investigate the witches of Denmark. Their origins, their practices, and how the good were for a time treated differently from the bad. Audio from Pixabay — Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/daniel-mainwaring5/message

Transcript

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0:00.0	Fascinating people, fascinating places.
0:03.0	G'd aye, and welcome to the Dan Mainwearing podcast.
0:07.0	This is where we talk to and about the famous and the infamous,
0:11.0	the celebrated and the obscure, the well known and the In the spring of 1590, a violent storm erupted on the North Sea, somewhere between Scotland and Scandinavia.
0:43.0	Trapped in the tempest was a convoy of 16 wooden vessels,
0:47.0	one of which carried an important cargo,
0:50.0	the King of Scotland and his Danish queen.
0:53.0	Miraculously, the ship survived the tempest and limped into harbour at Leith.
0:59.0	But neither the royal couple nor the admiral of Fleet, were happy simply to have survived.
1:06.4	They felt someone was to blame for their near-death experience, and were not talking about
1:11.3	the BBC Weatherman, Michael Fish.
1:14.0	Their suspicions were darker, and of the variety that stretched credulity,
1:19.0	not to mention any reasonable concept of justice.
1:22.0	This storm was the work of the devil and it sparked a wave of
1:27.1	bloody and cruel witch hunts that caused terror through the kingdom of Denmark and inspired a second equally devastating period of persecution throughout Britain.
1:38.0	In this episode, I investigate the witches of Denmark.
1:50.8	According to the Saxon chronicler, Widdicand, Denmark formally embraced Christianity at the
1:57.2	command of Harold Bluetooth, whose name was inspired by a rotten fang rather than a cellular device. He was a Danish king who ruled towards
2:07.1	the end of the first millennium AD. Christianity had made some inroads into Denmark a few hundred years earlier, but Wydkin tells us
2:16.6	that the God of the Bible was accepted as a God, but not the only God.
2:22.2	And in fact, there were numerous pagan gods who were viewed as being more powerful.
2:27.0	But this all changed when Harold decided to put the Christian God to the test.
	...

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