Papal Omens
While everyone’s eyes were focused on the Ineffable Con and the Good Omens Graphic Novel over these past few weeks, our favourite Good Omens concept artist, Louis Ralph, has updated his portfolio with some yet unseen S2 photobashing work.
This piece, called ‘Burning’, depicts the surroundings of St Giles' Cathedral in Edinburgh skillfully transformed into Renaissance Vatican. The crowd gathered around the stake — including a very interesting instance of the long-haired bishop Crowley, in full black regalia with a mitra negra and a crosier, swapping sides with an earlier, slightly subdued version of the Globe Aziraphale — consists almost exclusively of members of the Pontifical Swiss Guard and the clergy, with the Pope himself overseeing the scene from a balcony in his traditional ermine-trimmed winter cape and camauro. All of them are witnessing a small miracle of unknown provenance: the blessing of rain falling exactly on the supposed witch and effectively stopping her trial by fire.
For those of you who have overlooked or forgotten the topic of the Good Omens minisodes cut out from S2 due to Covid restrictions, here’s the relevant quote from an official source pinpointing in time the full context of this particular artwork:
“Ones that we had planned as possible for Season 2 (that either didn't get written or didn't get filmed) included a Wild West one, a 15th century Papal one, an Arabian Nights one, and a 1960s American one with Crowley and Aziraphale female presenting. And we have the whole of human history as a canvas. But for now the ones you've got are all.”
For what it’s worth, the second half of the fifteenth century indeed saw a significant increase in the number of individuals, mostly poor and older women, who were hunted, charged, tried, and often executed as witches. The rise in condemnations was propelled by a series of papal bulls on the matter, the first from 1473, which attacked and condemned sorcery, thought to be practiced by witches. Popes of the first half of the fifteenth century issued bulls condemning witchcraft and magic as well, but not quite in the sense we think of today. And there’s one person we might consider as the source of the problem.
In 1484, a Dominican clergyman Heinrich Krämer (wider known under his Latin pen name Institoris) made one of the first attempts at prosecuting alleged witches in the Austrian Tyrol region. It was not a success: a professional barrister got involved, and Krämer expelled from the city of Innsbruck and dismissed by the local bishop as “senile and crazy”. So he did what senile and crazy men do best, even nowadays — he sat down and wrote a book in a desperate act of self-justification and revenge.
Not wanting to repeat the painful history from Tyrol, Krämer requested explicit authorisation from the Pope to prosecute witchcraft, together with another Dominican Friar Jacob Sprenger (believed by researchers to have had a personal feud with Krämer and trying to thwart his attempts locally). A papal bull Summis desiderantes affectibus was issued in 1484 in response to Krämer’s request, and two years later, his magnum opus was published.
Malleus Maleficarum (1486) made use of both falsified academic credentials and a new technology in the form of Gutenberg’s printing press to become an instant bestseller, second only to the Bible in terms of sales for almost 200 years. It appeared in 28 editions between 1486 and 1600 and was accepted by Roman Catholics and Protestants alike as an authoritative — albeit highly controversial among theologians — source of information concerning Satanism, and the preferable Christian response to this threat. The publication did much to spur on and sustain some two centuries of witch-hunting hysteria in Europe, promoting the implementation of Exodus 22:18: “You shall not permit a sorceress to live.”
Through the spread of Krämer’s depiction of a witch, the public outlook of witchcraft soon transformed from evil to properly demonic. Judging by Crowley’s presence at the scene, some demons were definitely involved, but not responsible for the human actions. If anything, a certain angel cheerleading an elderly friar wanting to publish a book seems like a likely explanation of this kerfuffle.
