Criminalia

The Pappenheimers were an itinerant family from Bavaria. Accused of murder and practicing black magic by just one person, a known thief, the family was tried and executed for having been instruments of the devil. Their trial was of one of the most well-publicized witch trials in German history, and it also exhibited sadistic accounts of torture.

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Georg Honauer was maybe a scientist. He was maybe a goldsmith. He was definitely, a fraudulent alchemist in the service of Frederick I, Duke of Württemberg. And when he couldn't fulfill the sensational promises he made -- turning 2 tons of iron into 2 tons of gold, the duke ordered his execution. Welcome to Criminalia, where all that glitters is not gold.

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Imagine one day your local pharmacist is arrested and accused of drinking the blood of infants and flying on the back of a goat to an orgy involving the devil. From the 14th through the 18th century, there were some wild superstitions about witches. The first witch to confess to riding a broom was a man: Guillaume Edelin. But it was Matteuccia di Francesco who was the first accused and tried for flying.

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More than 500 years after his death, Heinrich Agrippa is considered one of the most influential occult philosophers of the early modern period. But not everyone in his lifetime was pleased with his theories and experimentation. While his work was denounced as heretical, it, and the work of fellow alchemists, laid the foundation for what we now call chemistry.

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Agnes, also known as Mother Waterhouse, was accused of bewitching to death William Fynne. In the bigger picture, she was accused of using witchcraft to cause illness -- and her 18-year-old daughter was accused of the same crime. Agnes was hanged for a crime you may not guess, becoming the first woman executed for witchcraft in England.

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A man named Stedelen was accused of practicing witchcraft between the years 1397 and 1406, in Switzerland. His was one of the earliest trials for maleficium and diabolism in Europe, and for certain, in Switzerland – at least according to the historical record. 

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For centuries according to the historical record, it was midwives who were most often prosecuted for witchcraft. Often in the historical record, midwives were written of as, quote, "unwomanly." And of course not assuming all 16th --century midwives are alike, many were considered suspicious for such things as being unmarried, or for their sexual behavior. Ursula Kemp made a living as a midwife -- and that made her a good choice as a scapegoat.

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Season 5 is going to be all about witchcraft and alchemy, and the fate of many who practiced such things – or, who maybe didn't. And just like we always do, we'll look at the lives and motivations of some of women and men who were accused of using the so-called 'black arts' throughout the centuries.

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One of the problems with uncovering the real stories of pirate legends is that there isn't always much historical evidence about many of them, especially if they never were captured or put on trial. If there is evidence of their lives, the stories often – but not always -- have been embellished. Embellished or not, though, they did all have interesting stories. Among the pirates, we did definitely had our favorites – as we're sure you have, too.

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Charles Vane has been described as good, but unlucky, in his career of piracy during the Golden Age of Piracy. He's often spoken of as being one of the most skilled pirate captains among his peers, which included men such as Blackbeard and Black Bart. He was also known as a cruel and ruthless pirate who tortured and murdered his prisoners. And as captain, he preferred punishing his crew with extreme tortures. And he was unrepentant of his life as a pirate.

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