Papers by Francesca Matteoni
From the eighteenth century through to the abolition of public executions in England in 1868, the... more From the eighteenth century through to the abolition of public executions in England in 1868, the touch of a freshly hanged man’s hand was sought after to cure a variety of swellings, wens in particular. While the healing properties of corpse hands in general were acknowledged and experimented with in early modern medicine, the gallows cure achieved prominence during the second half of the eighteenth century. What was it about the hanged man’s hand (and it always was a male appendage) that gave it such potency? While frequently denounced as a disgusting ‘superstition’ in the press, this popular medical practice was inadvertently legitimized and institutionalized by the authorities through changes in execution procedure.
Folklore, Jan 1, 2008
The reality of the blood libel legend and accusations of ritual murder against Jews in medieval a... more The reality of the blood libel legend and accusations of ritual murder against Jews in medieval and early modern times has been widely discredited by scholars. They demonstrate instead the processes by which the exclusion of a perceived ethnical and religious enemy ...
Books by Francesca Matteoni
Chi è il famiglio della strega? Gatto, rospo, cane – oppure creatura grottesca, spirito demoniaco... more Chi è il famiglio della strega? Gatto, rospo, cane – oppure creatura grottesca, spirito demoniaco che stabilisce, attraverso il sangue, una relazione fisica con l’individuo. Questo libro si propone di guardare ai materiali dei processi per stregoneria dell’Inghilterra moderna, concentrandosi proprio sul ruolo del sangue nell’unicità della tradizione riguardo il famiglio e nel riconfigurare il corpo paradigmatico della strega – guastatrice, antimadre, a sua volta vittima dei complotti diabolici come dei rancori e dei terrori diffusi all’interno della comunità. Confrontando le idee consolidate dal dibattito religioso con le teorie popolari, le nozioni mediche con quelle magiche intorno a salute e malattia, la sostanza del sangue spicca come nodo conflittuale tra mondo dello spirito e mondo della carne, confine ambiguo tra il socialmente accettabile e la spaventosa alterità, per cui anche un piccolo animale domestico può mutarsi in una minaccia ultraterrena: forma tangibile del sospetto e della radicale fragilità umana.
Book Reviews by Francesca Matteoni
Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies, Vol 36, Issue 3 , Jul 2013
In his new, meticulously researched, book professor Barry collects six essays in the form of chro... more In his new, meticulously researched, book professor Barry collects six essays in the form of chronological chapters, focusing on the continuation of witchcraft and demonological beliefs during the period of their supposed "decline": the years between the English and the French revolutions (16401789). As the author clarifies in the introduction, he is not trying to reconstruct a reality behind the extraordinary events, but he is more interested in how the phenomena were "understood and experienced by those participating in them, and how and why people wrote about them, and with what purposes and audience in mind (p.3)." Exploring many kinds of written sources such as learned works, pamphlets, newspapers, trial records, but also personal diaries and letters, Barry
Folklore, Volume 124, Issue 2, Jul 17, 2013
Folklore, Volume 124, Issue 1, Apr 8, 2013
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Papers by Francesca Matteoni
Books by Francesca Matteoni
Book Reviews by Francesca Matteoni