Enchanted: The History of Magic & Witchcraft

Antitheatrical writers in early modern England compared the actor’s transformation into a character to a kind of illicit magic. In response, playwrights like William Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, and Ben Jonson created a body of plays that treated the conjuror’s circle as a mirror of the theater. This episode brings you a story of magicians, witches, and the spectacles they conjured: the story...

How did a sixteenth-century criminal record give rise to one of Scotland’s most famous legends? Whether an enchanter, a prophet, or a hero who spoke truth to power, his story would be remembered and retold, transforming the real man into a mythic figure. This episode brings you the story of Highland second sight, the historical "Dark Kenneth" (Coinneach Odhar), and the legend of the Brah...

Death wasn’t the end for ancient Egyptians; it was a gauntlet. The soul faced guardians, gods, the weighing of the heart against the feather of Ma’at, and the ever-present threat of Ammit waiting to devour the unworthy, with only magic to guide the soul to the Field of Reeds. This episode brings you the story of the afterlife, the Duat, and the most sophisticated collection of funerary spells the...

In an early medieval Constantinople filled with pagan artifacts and dark histories, one man's writings would reveal a world in which sorcery, religion, and politics were inextricably intertwined. This episode brings you the story of a scholar, bishop, and savvy political survivor in an era of iconoclasm: the story of Ignatios the Deacon. Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben wit...

In the sixteenth century, witch trials were a fact of life. Women were being hauled before courts across Europe. Confessions were extracted under torture. Executions followed. Into this world stepped Johann Weyer, who looked at all of it—the confessions, the trials, the executions—and said that these women are sick, not sinful. They are patients, not criminals. And the men putting them on trial ou...

Albertus Magnus, the thirteenth-century polymath known as the Universal Doctor, had a problem. To some, he was the greatest natural philosopher of his age. To others, he was a dangerous sorcerer who built talking automatons, disguised himself as a midwife to learn forbidden secrets, and wrote books on summoning demons. Was Albertus Magnus a saint, or was he a sorcerer? The answer to this question...

In 1785, a scandal broke that would captivate all of Europe, destroy reputations, and help light the fuse of revolution. At its center stood three remarkable figures: an ambitious con artist who claimed royal blood, a desperate prince of the church, and a flamboyant mystic. This episode brings you the story of Count Alessandro di Cagliostro and the Affair of the Diamond Necklace. Researched, writt...

Picture masked figures appearing at your door on a dark winter's evening, their faces hidden behind soot and disguise, ready to perform ancient rituals of death and resurrection. This is mumming, a tradition stretching back centuries. From medieval Europe to its journey across the Atlantic to its dramatic transformation in modern Philadelphia, this episode brings you the story of Christmas mu...

Haunted dolls are a cornerstone of folklore and popular culture. Our enduring fascination with them may stem from the fact that they occupy the uncanny valley, where their lifelike resemblance to humans both captivates and disturbs us. This episode brings you the stories of Robert and Annabelle, two of the world’s most famous haunted dolls. Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben with...

On June 29, 1987, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the tomb of the late president, Juan Domingo Perón, was desecrated by a mysterious group calling itself “Hermes IAI and the 13," which led some to link the act to Perón’s former minister, known for his involvement with occult groups and mystical practices. This episode brings you a story of political intrigue, violent upheaval, and the occultist w...

Before microscopes and stethoscopes, before hospitals and modern medicine, there were the cunning-folk, who practiced a kind of magic woven into the fabric of daily life: practical, personal, and deeply rooted in community belief. A missing object, a run of bad luck, or an unrequited love were their concerns. This episode brings you the story of the wise men and women who worked in whispers and wh...

In the shadow of Puritan New England, where scripture, law, and community shaped every aspect of daily life, a different kind of visionary emerged. Drawing on European alchemical traditions, Hermetic philosophy, and Christian reformist ideals, he believed that nature itself was a sacred text, written by the Creator and waiting to be deciphered. This episode brings you a story of religion, medicine...

In 1764, Fray Juan José Toledo, the priest of the mission church in Abiquiú, New Mexico, wrote a striking letter to the local magistrate. In it, he described an extraordinary spiritual crisis: a surge of demonic possessions affecting the women in his congregation. Viewed through the lenses of gender, colonialism, and religious conflict, this event emerges as a powerful moment of Indigenous resista...

In the summer of 1612, a woman named Alice Nutter walked to her death. She was not like the others who stood beside her on the gallows, gaunt women worn hollow by poverty. Alice Nutter was a woman of property in Lancashire, a woman of standing, and—most damningly—a woman who did not easily bow her head. This episode brings you a story of fear, injustice, and resistance in early modern England: the...

Morgan le Fay, the infamous enchantress of Arthurian legend, has worn many faces across the centuries: healer and villain, seductress and savior, sister and sorceress. Her story is often a mirror, reflecting the anxieties and desires of the cultures that tell it. This episode brings you the shapeshifting faces of Morgan le Fay. Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben with original musi...

In seventeenth-century England, astrology hovered at the edges of learned society. That is, until one man predicted the Great Plague and the Great Fire, both of which would strike at the very heart of London. This episode brings you the story of the English astrologer William Lilly and his legacy. Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben with original music by Purple Planet . Episode so...

In the summer of 1836, against a backdrop of economic instability and fervent religious revival, Joseph Smith, accompanied by his brother Hyrum, Oliver Cowdery, and Sidney Rigdon, set forth on a journey that would forever connect them to the notorious witch trials that took place centuries earlier in Salem, Massachusetts. This episode brings you the story of seer stones, witch trials, and the life...

A bishop, a scholar, and a moral arbitrator, Burchard of Worms was a man of many roles, but it's his monumental work of church law, the Decretum , that may reveal folk beliefs about magic that persisted well into the eleventh century. This episode brings you the story of The Corrector  and the folk magic of early medieval Europe. Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben with origin...

From ancient times to the present, cultures worldwide have celebrated the sun’s return following the winter solstice. In this episode, I bring you the story of the midwinter celebrations of ancient Rome, from Saturnalia to Sol Invictus and beyond. Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben with original music by Purple Planet . Episode sources Support the show EnchantedPodcast.net Bluesky...

Since ancient times Avernus, an ancient volcanic crater in the Campania region of southern Italy, has been the source of legend. In this special minisode, I bring you the story of Italy’s legendary gateway to the underworld. Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben with original music by Purple Planet . Episode sources Support the show EnchantedPodcast.net Bluesky/enchantedpodcast.net

If there is one thing every reader of fairy tales can tell you, it’s that you should never, ever venture into the woods alone. From the whispering willows to the ominous oaks, this episode brings you the stories of the trees that loom large in our collective imagination, exploring their sinister attributes and the cautionary tales they inspire. Researched, written, and produced by Corinne Wieben w...

In 1584, Reginald Scot, a little-known English gentleman farmer from Kent, published a work that would shake the foundations of religious and legal authority in Europe. At a time when witch trials were sweeping through Europe, Scot’s book was a rare and radical challenge to the powers that be. This episode brings you the story of Reginald Scot and his The Discoverie of Witchcraft . Researched, wri...

Despite the inscrutability of his writings and the fact that he was only one of a number of court astrologers advising Catherine de' Medici, "Serpent Queen" of France, Nostradamus’s prophecies have found a dedicated audience in the centuries following their publication. How is it that Nostradamus and his writings have such a lasting legacy? This episode brings you the story of Cathe...

In the last decades of the eighteenth century, Thomas Jefferson, principal author of the American Declaration of Independence, began collecting documents related to the history of the Colony of Virginia. Among them was a volume of early seventeenth-century case records from the Williamsburg Courthouse. During the American Civil War, retreating Confederate forces burned the archives in Virginia’s s...

As Europeans embarked on their colonial ventures in the Americas, they also forged new frontiers closer to their homelands. In Norway's far northern territory of Finnmark, settlers from the south moved into the ancestral home of the Indigenous Sámi people, and by the end of the seventeenth century, nearly five percent of the population had been tried for witchcraft. This episode tells the sto...