# Research dossier

Run `c6d32fc5-2f7a-48ad-802d-cf2f7a1ccfe2`.

Asked as:

```
Why did European witch accusations shift from mostly men in early trials (Valais 1428, Russia) to about 80% women in the peak hunts (1560-1650)? Did misogynist demonology like the Malleus drive it, or local accusation patterns, and do popular claims hold up (nine million women, midwife hunts, Federici's capitalism thesis, property confiscation, Murray's pagan cult)?
```

This document is a **method transcript, not a verdict**. It records what was
asked, where this run looked, what it read, how each passage bore on each
competing explanation, and what it could not settle — in that order, so a
reader can perform the adjudication instead of being handed one. Nothing
below asserts that the run's conclusions are correct.

### TL;DR — provisional read

This is a navigation aid, not a new synthesis. It restates the first three
asserted findings in the run's own synthesis order and points to their audit
trail in §§6–13; it does not rank them by the ordinal score matrix.

#### Current read

- `fnd_9533748e4ea645c3_00` [observed; computed confidence: unknown] Across the pooled European record, women formed a large majority of witchcraft defendants in the 16th-17th century peak, with figures reported at \>70% Europe-wide, 70-80% for Europe and England, ~80% for those tried and executed in the XVIth-XVIIth centuries, 84% in Scotland, and 71-92% across the most intense hunting years (1570-1660), with men only ~10-15% of executions; the phenomenon to be explained is therefore real at aggregate level, but it is an average over a wide band, not a uniform rate. *Why that level:* 6 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 4 source(s) could not be traced to an origin.
- `fnd_5a646aa6269ed697_01` [observed; computed confidence: unknown] That aggregate conceals systematic regional variation large enough to break any single-cause account: Iceland ran ~10% female (20 of 22 executed were men), Muscovy, Normandy, Estonia and Russia were male-majority, Styria and Carinthia inside the Holy Roman Empire were male-majority, Finland ran 51% female (316/325), the Parlement of Burgundy 48% over 1580-1642, and some Scandinavian jurisdictions showed a slight male majority — i.e. several large jurisdictions sat at or below 50% female during exactly the decades when Germany sat near 80%. *Why that level:* 9 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 5 source(s) could not be traced to an origin.
- `fnd_e7538ab344e43e8c_02` [observed; computed confidence: unknown] H1's content premise is fully established: the Malleus and the demonological tradition it founded explicitly theorized women as the paradigmatic witch — frailer sex entrapped by the Devil, 'defective in all the powers of both soul and body', quicker to doubt in faith, the title itself feminine — the work argued witches were more often women and urged magistrates to adopt its procedures, Kramer's own confirmed trials at Ravensburg and Innsbruck targeted women almost exclusively, it ran 28 editions between 1486 and 1600 on Gutenberg-era presses, was accepted by Catholics and Protestants alike, and later German demonology never challenged the premise that women were more inclined to witchcraft. *Why that level:* 13 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 3 source(s) could not be traced to an origin.

#### In plain language

> European witch hunts shifted toward female defendants during the 1560s-1650s, but this varied widely by region. Local accusation patterns and court procedures mattered more than demonological books in determining who faced trial.

*Written by a language model from the findings below — the only prose in this
document a model composed. Measured reading grade: 13.7 (Flesch-Kincaid). This is above the eighth-grade level the note aims for; it is printed as written rather than withheld. It restates the findings; it is not evidence, nothing
cites it, and no stage of the research could read it.*

#### Evidence score

**13 findings asserted, unknown confidence — 14 / 100.**
0 independent origin(s) behind 13 asserted finding(s); 14 recorded stress attack(s). Components summed to 15; counter-evidence was found, which caps the unknown band.

Components: corroboration 0/40 · provenance 0/25 · falsification 15/20 · saturation 0/15.

**Numeric probability: not estimated.** The score above is a stated transform
of the counts printed beside it, bounded so it can never outrank the computed
confidence level it reports. It is not a probability: this run has no
calibrated priors or likelihood model, and the `++`, `+`, `0`, `-`, `--`
matrix is ordinal and cannot honestly be converted into a percentage. A reader
who rejects the weighting still has every count it was made from.

#### Strongest directly cited passages

Selected only from citations attached to the findings above: traced origin
first, then the evidence hierarchy in force at render time, then ledger order.
A higher publisher tier does not repair untraced provenance.

- `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01` — origin untraced; tier: technical report; Trends&Statistics: Parlement of Burgundy 1580-1642 83 76 48%
- `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02` — origin untraced; tier: technical report; Trends&Statistics: Finland 1520-1699 316 325 51%
- `ev_c554d530c590_02` — origin untraced; tier: expert analysis; Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com: During the period of most intense witch-hunts between 1570 and 1660, women usually comprised between 71 and 92 percent of those tried and executed, including about 80 percent in present-day Germany, where more than half of all deaths occurred.

#### What would change or overturn this read

These are the run's recorded stress conditions, not guarantees that one new
fact alone would settle the whole question. See §13 for every attack.
- `stp_9e9eb4c9e27e3386_00` [survivorship_bias] targeting `fnd_9533748e4ea645c3_00` — The aggregated Europe-wide execution and trial totals over-represent formal judicial archives and jurisdictions with high recording rates such as Germany, England, and Scotland, while under-representing informal, summary, or peripheral village proceedings. **Recorded failure condition:** Archival survival is found to systematically skew toward female-dominated formal trials while undocumented summary lynchings or rural magistrate records in central and eastern Europe disproportionately prosecuted men.
- `stp_e070265d45c336c0_01` [measurement_error] targeting `fnd_5a646aa6269ed697_01` — Comparing jurisdictions using disparate legal stages—such as formal trial counts in Finland versus execution statistics in Iceland—treats differing levels of attrition as equivalent measures of gender prosecution rates. **Recorded failure condition:** Standardizing metrics to a single stage, such as formal accusation or indictment, eliminates the male majority in regions like Finland, Normandy, or Burgundy by showing male drop-off occurred predominantly before sentencing.
- `stp_0e2581983c5f2ad0_02` [source_dependence] targeting `fnd_e7538ab344e43e8c_02` — Asserting that post-Malleus German demonology uniformly maintained that women were more inclined to witchcraft relies on prominent canonical treatises while ignoring skeptical legal dissents, parish manuals, and regional judicial instructions. **Recorded failure condition:** Systematic sampling of German university legal consilia and regional judicial manuals reveals substantial elite pushback asserting demonic sorcery was equally practiced by men.

## 1. Research Question

What explains the shift in the gender composition of European witch-hunt accusations from predominantly male defendants in early trials (e.g., Valais 1428, Russia) to roughly 80% female defendants during the peak hunts of 1560–1650, and how well do the leading explanations (demonological misogyny such as the Malleus Maleficarum, versus local accusation dynamics involving neighbours, accusers, household conflict, age/widowhood, and the shift from heresy to maleficium prosecutions) account for this change and for the persistence of male-majority regions (Iceland, Normandy, Estonia, Finland, Russia)?

## 2. Scope

- **Population:** Individuals formally accused, tried, or executed for witchcraft (maleficium and/or diabolical heresy) in European jurisdictions, including both secular and ecclesiastical court defendants, accusers, and witnesses named in surviving trial records
- **Geography:** Europe broadly, with specific comparative attention to Valais (Swiss Confederacy), Russia, Ukraine, the Holy Roman Empire (German-speaking lands), France (including Normandy), Scotland, England, Iceland, Estonia, and Finland; claims about regions outside documented trial record sets are out of scope
- **Period:** c. 1400–1700, with early trials (1400s–1520s) distinguished from the peak persecution period (1560–1650) and late/declining prosecutions (1650–1700) treated as a secondary comparison period

### Out of scope

- Witch-hunting or witchcraft belief outside Europe (e.g., colonial North America, Africa, Asia), except as incidental comparison
- Modern (post-1700) revival movements, neopaganism, or contemporary witchcraft accusations
- Folkloric or literary depictions of witches not tied to documented legal/trial evidence
- Detailed theological history of demonology unrelated to gender-share outcomes
- Psychological or anthropological general theories of scapegoating not specific to the European witch-hunt record
- Economic history of early modern Europe except as it bears directly on the Federici thesis and confiscation claims

### Ambiguities the question recorded

- Whether 'drove' the shift should be read as primary causation, necessary condition, or merely correlated/contributing factor — this changes what counts as confirming or disconfirming evidence
- Whether regional trial-record samples (often small, non-random, and unevenly surviving) can support population-level gender-share estimates at all, or only localized claims
- Whether 'popular claims' (nine million, midwife hunt, etc.) should be verdicted against the best current scholarly consensus or against the original claimants' own evidentiary standards
- Whether shifts in recording practice (e.g., which courts kept records, what charges were logged) confound apparent shifts in actual accusation gender ratios

### Assumptions the question recorded

- Surviving trial records, though incomplete and unevenly distributed across regions and time, are treated as the best available proxy for actual accusation patterns
- The distinction between heresy-driven and maleficium-driven prosecution is treated as a meaningful and recoverable variable in the historiography, not merely a retrospective analytic construct
- Claims that cannot be checked against surviving quantitative or documentary evidence (e.g., due to lost records or inherently unverifiable scope, such as the full 'nine million' estimate's original sourcing) will be explicitly marked as unverifiable rather than adjudicated true or false
- Female accusers and household-level conflict are assumed to be a legitimate and recordable category distinct from top-down demonological influence, based on existing social-history scholarship on witch trials

## 3. Definitions

- \'Witch accusation' means a formal denunciation, indictment, or trial record naming a person as a practitioner of harmful magic (maleficium) or diabolical heresy
- \'Gender share' is measured as the proportion of named defendants recorded as female versus male in surviving court or chronicle records for a given trial sample or region
- \'Demonological misogyny' refers to textual arguments in theological/legal treatises (e.g., Malleus Maleficarum, 1487) asserting women's innate susceptibility to the Devil
- \'Local accusation pattern' refers to bottom-up dynamics: neighbour disputes, household harm allegations, age/widowhood status, accuser identity (including female accusers), and community-level social tension preceding formal prosecution
- \'Maleficum-based prosecution' is distinguished from 'heresy-based prosecution' (the latter tied to the Sabbat/pact narrative and diabolism)
- Each popular claim (nine million victims, midwife-hunt thesis, Federici's capitalism/primitive-accumulation thesis, property confiscation/profit motive, Murray's pagan-cult thesis) is treated as a discrete, separately verifiable historical claim requiring a verdict with supporting or refuting numbers where evidence exists

## 4. Methodology

### Evidence standard

The hierarchy below is **the one in force at render time**. It is a module
constant, not per-run state — no field on this run stores the ladder its
sources were ranked against — so this document can say which ordering is in
force as these words are written, and no more. Re-rendering an older run
after the constant changes would show that run the newer ladder.

| Rank | Tier | What qualifies |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | primary_data | Primary experimental or observational data: the dataset, trial record, or measurement itself, not a description of it. |
| 2 | systematic_review | A systematic review or meta-analysis that pools and appraises primary studies against a stated method. |
| 3 | peer_reviewed | A single peer-reviewed study, not yet pooled or independently replicated. |
| 4 | government_institutional | A government or institutional dataset or report published by the body that collected or regulates the data. |
| 5 | technical_report | A technical report describing methodology and results outside the peer-review process. |
| 6 | expert_analysis | Analysis by a named subject-matter expert, not independently reviewed. |
| 7 | quality_journalism | Reporting from a publication with a named byline, editorial process, and correction record. |
| 8 | industry_commentary | Commentary from an interested party writing about its own field. |
| 9 | anecdotal | A single first-hand account, not generalized beyond itself. |
| 10 | unsupported | Social media, or a claim with no stated basis at all. |

### How absence is written in this document

Three different absences look identical on a page. This document keeps them
apart deliberately, because a measured zero and an absent measurement are not
the same silence.

- *"... has not run"* appears only where a field distinguishes it: the
  question, the landscape, the search strategy, the falsification report and
  the stress test are each absent until their stage produces one.
- *"This run holds no ..."* appears for every collection. This is weaker on
  purpose: **an empty collection cannot say** whether the stage that would
  have filled it ever ran. One empty value stands for two different facts,
  and nothing in this run's state separates them. That is a defect of the
  state, stated once, here.
- *"This run does not record ..."* appears where there is no field at all — a
  fact this pipeline never captured, rather than one it captured as empty.

### Searches

| Query | Kind | Site | Compiled from |
|---|---|---|---|
| why were most accused witches women | anchor | — | witch-hunt gender composition |
| Malleus Maleficarum women weaker faith misogyny | synonym_expansion | — | demonological misogyny, Malleus Maleficarum |
| male witches Iceland Normandy Estonia Russia | synonym_expansion | — | male-majority witch-hunt regions |
| Valais witch trials men heresy Vauderie | synonym_expansion | — | Valais witch trials |
| witch accusers women neighbours widows | synonym_expansion | — | local accusation dynamics |
| midwives witch hunt myth Harley | review_hunt | — | midwife-witch hunt thesis |
| nine million witches burned myth Gage | review_hunt | — | nine million witches claim, scholarly rebuttals of the nine million figure |
| Federici Caliban and the Witch criticism | review_hunt | — | Federici capitalism thesis, critical reviews of Caliban and the Witch |
| witch trials property confiscation Bamberg | synonym_expansion | — | witch trial property confiscation |
| Margaret Murray witch cult discredited | review_hunt | — | Murray witch-cult hypothesis, academic assessments of the Murray thesis |

### Subquestions

- `SQ1` — What was the documented gender composition of defendants in early witch trials (e.g., Valais 1428-1430s, Russia pre-16th century), and what proportion were male versus female?
- `SQ2` — What was the documented gender composition of defendants during the peak persecution period (1560-1650) across the specified regions, and how consistent is the ~80% female figure across different trial samples?
- `SQ3` — What is the timeline and content of demonological texts (e.g., Malleus Maleficarum, 1487) asserting women's susceptibility to the Devil, and how does their publication/dissemination timeline correlate with the observed shift in gender share?
- `SQ4` — What evidence exists linking the circulation, citation, or influence of demonological treatises to actual prosecutorial practice and sentencing patterns in specific jurisdictions?
- `SQ5` — What local accusation dynamics (neighbour disputes, household conflict, age/widowhood status, identity of accusers including female accusers) are documented in surviving trial records, and how do these patterns correlate with defendant gender over time?
- `SQ6` — How did the balance between heresy-based prosecution (Sabbat/pact narrative) and maleficium-based prosecution shift between the early and peak periods, and what evidence connects this shift to changes in defendant gender ratios?
- `SQ7` — What demographic, social, or economic variables (e.g., widowhood rates, women's legal/economic status, population structure) are documented as influencing who was vulnerable to accusation in different regions and periods?
- `SQ8` — What explains the persistence of male-majority defendant populations in Iceland, Normandy, Estonia, Finland, and Russia during the peak period, and do local accusation dynamics or demonological-text diffusion better account for these exceptions?
- `SQ9` — What are the documented points of disagreement among historians regarding the relative explanatory weight of demonological misogyny versus local accusation dynamics for the gender shift?
- `SQ10` — What evidence, if any, disconfirms or complicates the demonological-misogyny explanation (e.g., regions with high demonological text circulation but low female defendant shares, or vice versa)?
- `SQ11` — What evidence, if any, disconfirms or complicates local-accusation-dynamics explanations (e.g., regions with strong local conflict patterns but gender ratios not matching predictions)?
- `SQ12` — To what extent might shifts in recording practices, court jurisdiction (secular vs ecclesiastical), or surviving-record bias confound the apparent shift in gender ratios rather than reflecting a true change in accusation patterns?
- `SQ13` — What is the evidentiary basis for the 'nine million victims' claim, and what is the current scholarly verdict on its accuracy?
- `SQ14` — What is the evidentiary basis for the midwife-hunt thesis (that midwives were disproportionately targeted), and what is the current scholarly verdict on its accuracy?
- `SQ15` — What is the evidentiary basis for Federici's capitalism/primitive-accumulation thesis linking witch hunts to economic transformation, and what is the current scholarly verdict on its accuracy?
- `SQ16` — What is the evidentiary basis for the property-confiscation/profit-motive claim as a driver of accusations, and what is the current scholarly verdict on its accuracy?
- `SQ17` — What is the evidentiary basis for Murray's pagan-cult thesis, and what is the current scholarly verdict on its accuracy?
- `SQ18` — What remains unknown or unresolved in the historiography regarding the causes of the gender-share shift and the exceptions to it, given the limitations of surviving trial records?

### Retrieval rounds

- Round 1, the initial retrieval: 8 snapshot(s).
- Round 2, the falsification counter-search: 3 snapshot(s).

## 5. Current State of Knowledge

**This is not what the field believes.** It is where this run looked,
decided **before any source was read** — vocabulary to search with, places
to search in, and the kinds of review to hunt for. It contains no claim about
the world, and **no source backs any of it**. Nothing downstream reads it as
a claim either, so the worst a bad map can do is search badly.

### Terminology searched

- `witch-hunt gender composition` — also written `gender ratio of witch trials`, `gender share of the accused`, `male versus female witchcraft defendants`
- `demonological misogyny` — also written `misogyny in demonology`, `theological misogyny`, `women weaker faith doctrine`
- `Malleus Maleficarum` — also written `Hammer of Witches`, `Kramer and Sprenger treatise`
- `male-majority witch-hunt regions` — also written `male witches Iceland`, `male witches Normandy`, `male witches Estonia`, `male witches Russia`, `male witches Finland`
- `Valais witch trials` — also written `Vauderie`, `early Alpine witch trials`, `heresy-based witch prosecution`
- `local accusation dynamics` — also written `neighbour disputes witchcraft`, `household conflict accusations`, `widow accusations`, `female accusers`
- `midwife-witch hunt thesis` — also written `midwife hunt myth`, `Harley midwife critique`
- `nine million witches claim` — also written `nine million victims myth`, `Gage witch burning estimate`
- `Federici capitalism thesis` — also written `Caliban and the Witch`, `primitive accumulation and witch hunts`
- `witch trial property confiscation` — also written `profit motive in witch trials`, `Bamberg witch trials confiscation`
- `Murray witch-cult hypothesis` — also written `pagan-cult thesis`, `Margaret Murray theory`, `discredited witch-cult hypothesis`
- `maleficium versus heresy prosecution` — also written `shift from heresy to maleficium`, `diabolism versus harmful magic charges`

### Institutions named as places to look

- University of Edinburgh Scottish Survey of Witchcraft
- Max Planck Institute for European Legal History
- Historical Institute of the University of Trier Witchcraft Research Unit
- Wellcome Collection history of medicine archives
- Centre for the History of European Discourses

### Venues named as places to look

- Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft
- Journal of Social History
- Gender & History
- French Historical Studies
- History Workshop Journal
- Continuity and Change

### Kinds of review hunted for

- historiographical surveys of European witch-hunt scholarship
- meta-analyses of regional witch-trial databases
- encyclopedia entries on witchcraft persecution
- critical reviews of Caliban and the Witch
- scholarly rebuttals of the nine million figure
- academic assessments of the Murray thesis
- comparative studies of gender ratios across witch-trial regions

## 6. Key Findings

Findings this run could not settle are not here; they are open questions, and
§14 holds them.

### Findings that cite evidence

- `fnd_9533748e4ea645c3_00` [observed] Across the pooled European record, women formed a large majority of witchcraft defendants in the 16th-17th century peak, with figures reported at \>70% Europe-wide, 70-80% for Europe and England, ~80% for those tried and executed in the XVIth-XVIIth centuries, 84% in Scotland, and 71-92% across the most intense hunting years (1570-1660), with men only ~10-15% of executions; the phenomenon to be explained is therefore real at aggregate level, but it is an average over a wide band, not a uniform rate. Cites `ev_dc904403b24e_01`, `ev_dc904403b24e_02`, `ev_c554d530c590_02`, `ev_bf53a223765b_03`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02`.
- `fnd_5a646aa6269ed697_01` [observed] That aggregate conceals systematic regional variation large enough to break any single-cause account: Iceland ran ~10% female (20 of 22 executed were men), Muscovy, Normandy, Estonia and Russia were male-majority, Styria and Carinthia inside the Holy Roman Empire were male-majority, Finland ran 51% female (316/325), the Parlement of Burgundy 48% over 1580-1642, and some Scandinavian jurisdictions showed a slight male majority — i.e. several large jurisdictions sat at or below 50% female during exactly the decades when Germany sat near 80%. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_08`, `ev_c554d530c590_09`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03`, `ev_bf53a223765b_02`, `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01`, `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04`, `ev_c554d530c590_02`.
- `fnd_e7538ab344e43e8c_02` [observed] H1's content premise is fully established: the Malleus and the demonological tradition it founded explicitly theorized women as the paradigmatic witch — frailer sex entrapped by the Devil, 'defective in all the powers of both soul and body', quicker to doubt in faith, the title itself feminine — the work argued witches were more often women and urged magistrates to adopt its procedures, Kramer's own confirmed trials at Ravensburg and Innsbruck targeted women almost exclusively, it ran 28 editions between 1486 and 1600 on Gutenberg-era presses, was accepted by Catholics and Protestants alike, and later German demonology never challenged the premise that women were more inclined to witchcraft. Cites `ev_dc904403b24e_03`, `ev_8a5c677af125_02`, `ev_8a5c677af125_13`, `ev_8a5c677af125_14`, `ev_8a5c677af125_15`, `ev_8a5c677af125_16`, `ev_8a5c677af125_17`, `ev_8a5c677af125_19`, `ev_8a5c677af125_21`, `ev_8a5c677af125_22`, `ev_c554d530c590_03`, `ev_c554d530c590_04`, `ev_c554d530c590_06`.
- `fnd_cffd104faf5e1794_03` [inferred] H1's causal claim — that demonological diffusion was the primary driver of the ~80% female share — meets its own stated falsifier and must be rejected as the primary mechanism: Iceland had Christian pact-demonology introduced by Danish-trained clergy, two domestic witchcraft books (1627, 1630) and the Danish Witchcraft Act of 1617 imposed in 1630, yet executed 20 men to 2 women; the Parlement of Burgundy, in France, ran 48% female across 1580-1642; Styria and Carinthia inside the demonology-saturated Empire stayed male-majority; and Normandy, a French region, was male-majority. High textual penetration coexists with male-majority outcomes in multiple independent jurisdictions. Cites `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06`, `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01`, `ev_c554d530c590_09`, `ev_c554d530c590_08`.
- `fnd_58ceed68e23d74a3_04` [inferred] The timing and reception record compounds the problem for H1: the Malleus triggered no prosecutions where none had existed, its Italian publication was followed by a noticeable fall in witchcraft cases, the Inquisition denied it any authority and censured Kramer within years, the Spanish Inquisition in 1538 warned members against believing it, Wier published two book-length attacks in 1563 and 1582 offering a rival medical aetiology, and MacCulloch treats it as only one factor among popular superstition and Reformation tensions — so the literature was contested and unevenly authoritative rather than a uniform elite programme. The one correlational datum in its favour, that roughly three quarters of those prosecuted after publication were women, is bare temporal association across a period in which many other things changed. Cites `ev_8a5c677af125_07`, `ev_8a5c677af125_08`, `ev_8a5c677af125_06`, `ev_8a5c677af125_05`, `ev_8a5c677af125_20`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09`, `ev_8a5c677af125_12`, `ev_8a5c677af125_04`.
- `fnd_bd345674064aaf85_05` [inferred] The 'early male-majority baseline' that both H1 and H2 presuppose is itself unstable and the two sources disagree: Valais is estimated at two-thirds male, while Dauphiné 1424-48, pre-Malleus, was already 72% female among 250-plus tried, and a third account puts men at 'up to 40 per cent' in the first period. What separates them is evidentiary type — the Dauphiné figure is a count over a defined tried population, whereas the Valais split is an estimate resting on a chronicler (Fründ) who reported a conspiracy of '700' witches and 'more than 200' burned. Weight should follow the counted sample, which means the female skew partly predates the demonological corpus. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_01`, `ev_cd8d10389080_01`, `ev_cd8d10389080_02`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01`.
- `fnd_c400e7c659b51cab_06` [inferred] The heresy/pact framing does not by itself select for female defendants, which cuts against the framing-shift clause inside H2 as much as against H1: the Valais victims were charged with murder, heresy, sorcery and pact with the devil in a male-majority trial series of the 1420s-30s, and at Bamberg in the 1620s the full diabolic repertoire (Sabbath, intercourse with Satan, desecration) was extracted under torture from men and women of all ages and classes indiscriminately, including the official Georg Haan with his wife, daughter and son, and Johannes Junius with his wife. Cites `ev_cd8d10389080_03`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04`.
- `fnd_2ad70d0f4c23646e_07` [observed] The evidence favours H2 as the operative selection mechanism for who was named: most accused were denounced by members of their own community, the public talk or slander of three or four neighbours sufficed for arrest even of nobles and denunciation by five to ten qualified persons opened the way to torture, the accused were typically people with argumentative or antisocial reputations and over forty (60%+ in Scotland) with correspondingly longer histories of neighbourly conflict, a concrete case (Agnes Finnie, Edinburgh, accused 1643 after quarrels preceded her neighbours' illness, executed 1645) exhibits the dispute-then-misfortune-then-accusation sequence, in England most accusers and written complainants were themselves women, midwives worked alongside accusers rather than being targeted, and men characteristically entered the dock through kinship to an already-accused woman. Cites `ev_dc904403b24e_08`, `ev_dc904403b24e_09`, `ev_dc904403b24e_07`, `ev_dc904403b24e_10`, `ev_dc904403b24e_04`, `ev_cd8d10389080_04`, `ev_cd8d10389080_05`, `ev_bf53a223765b_04`, `ev_bf53a223765b_05`, `ev_bf53a223765b_08`, `ev_c554d530c590_05`. Causal claim, on: temporality, mechanism.
- `fnd_8c04c0215a11f8a2_08` [inferred] The male-majority regions are explained by local occupational and cultural coding of magic rather than by absent demonology, which is the strongest positive case for a local-dynamics account: in Iceland magic was viewed favourably and had become associated with men because convents and Latin schools admitted almost only men, and the statute banning ownership of magical books produced an unusually large number of male executions; in Muscovy (vagrants, immigrants, fugitive serfs, non-Christian outsiders) and Normandy (shepherds, priests, blacksmiths) the common thread among male suspects was that they were magical healers; and across Europe male cunning folk, Hexenbanner and benandanti were arrested on the belief that whoever knows how to heal knows how to harm. The same bottom-up logic that names quarrelsome old women in Scotland names literate or healing men where magic is coded male. Cites `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03`, `ev_c554d530c590_10`, `ev_c554d530c590_11`. Causal claim, on: mechanism, natural_experiment.
- `fnd_066b5506a41a5b1c_09` [inferred] Procedural and institutional structure, not text circulation, is the variable that best sorts the jurisdictions that disagree: Roman-law continental courts used public accusers, professional judges and torture while northern systems (Scotland partly excepted) required private accusers and barred torture; witchcraft was crimen exceptum in continental and Roman law, suspending normal safeguards; the Malleus was adopted by secular courts and repudiated by inquisitorial ones; and the Spanish Inquisition treated witchcraft as superstition rather than heresy and so rarely pursued it. These differences govern which denunciations could enter a court and how far cascades could run, and they track the regional gender spread more closely than demonological availability does. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_12`, `ev_8a5c677af125_23`, `ev_8a5c677af125_05`, `ev_8a5c677af125_06`, `ev_bf53a223765b_07`, `ev_8a5c677af125_09`, `ev_8a5c677af125_10`, `ev_8a5c677af125_11`. Causal claim, on: controls, natural_experiment, mechanism.
- `fnd_9a86b153880e9c30_10` [inferred] H4 is supported only in its age-and-poverty component and is disconfirmed in its widowhood component: most historians place old, poor, widowed or single women at highest risk, 60%+ of Scottish accused were over forty when life expectancy was low, 29% came from poorer backgrounds with little access to land, work or permanent housing, and old women could be persecuted merely for being unattractive — but the one marital-status sample available shows 245 married against 67 widowed and 7 unmarried, so widows were about a fifth of the Scottish accused with known status, and the persistence of male-majority regions such as Iceland shows no demographic mechanism is sufficient on its own. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_05`, `ev_dc904403b24e_07`, `ev_dc904403b24e_11`, `ev_bf53a223765b_08`, `ev_dc904403b24e_05`, `ev_dc904403b24e_06`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05`.
- `fnd_c4bd941fbd80bd02_11` [inferred] H3 survives as a real caveat on precision but not as an explanation of the shift: 1,572 Scottish cases lack any recorded marital status, Bamberg's total executions are unknown because only some were documented and its yearly series is explicitly incomplete, Europe-wide execution estimates of 30,000-60,000 openly include cases where no records exist, most accused were never tried and most tried were never executed outside panics, and Germany alone contributed more than twenty thousand executions — more than all other parts of Europe combined — so pooled totals are dominated by one region. Against that, the female majority is recorded independently in Scotland (84%), England, and across a 71-92% band in many jurisdictions, which is too broad to be manufactured by one region's sample. Cites `ev_dc904403b24e_06`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06`, `ev_bf53a223765b_01`, `ev_c554d530c590_16`, `ev_c554d530c590_14`, `ev_c554d530c590_02`, `ev_dc904403b24e_02`, `ev_bf53a223765b_02`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02`.
- `fnd_3e7e3fe1a6b1ce32_12` [inferred] Large panics behave differently from endemic prosecution and should not be pooled with it when testing any of these hypotheses: outside panics most of those tried were not executed, whereas in the Bamberg commission arrests ran indiscriminately across sex, age and class, Würzburg swept in clerical elites and many children while Bamberg took secular adult elites, and whole families including adult sons were burned — panic episodes dissolve precisely the age, sex and marginality profile that characterises ordinary accusation. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_16`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05`.

### Hypothesized

A hypothesized finding is a candidate reading this run wrote down. The run
**did not establish it**. It may still name passages — the contract requires
evidence of the two statuses above and forbids it to the one below, and asks
nothing of this one — so a citation here shows what suggested the reading, not
what settled it. The group is kept apart for that reason: listed beside an
observed finding, a candidate reads as a conclusion the run reached.

- `fnd_bc0602c1d01955ee_15` [hypothesized] A scope-conditioned reading reconciles the conflict: demonological misogyny supplied a legitimating vocabulary that could amplify and lethalise female-skewed accusation where secular Roman-law courts with torture and crimen exceptum procedure already received community denunciations, but it did not create the skew and could not override a local culture that coded magical competence as male — so the predicted correlation between text penetration and female share should appear only within the subset of jurisdictions sharing that procedural profile, and should vanish or invert outside it.

## 7. Evidence

Excerpts are printed verbatim, inside a fence: this document writes the
stored bytes and does not edit them. Two differences belong to the format
rather than to the passage, and both show up only when a passage is read
back out of this page. A fenced block terminates each of its own lines, so
an excerpt that did not end in a newline gains one. And a markdown parser
normalises as it reads: a carriage return comes back as a newline, and a
null byte comes back as U+FFFD, because the format requires both. A digest
recomputed over text copied out of this page can therefore differ from the
snapshot digest printed beside it for those reasons alone — that digest is
the one taken over the stored bytes, and it remains the thing to check a
passage against.

### Passages weighed against every live explanation

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_01`

- Answers subquestion `SQ2`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Why were women accused of witchcraft? section`

```
In Europe as a whole, more than 70% of those accused of witchcraft were women.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ2`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Why were women accused of witchcraft? section`

```
In Scotland 84% of those accused of witchcraft were women.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `quote from King James VI, Daemonologie`

```
as that sexe is frailer then man is, so is it easier to be intrapped in these grosse snares of the Devill, as was over well proved to be true, by the Serpents deceiving of Eva at the beginning.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_04`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Why were women accused of witchcraft? section`

```
Often, when men were accused of witchcraft, they were charged in connection to a female witch. It could be that they were related by marriage or were the brothers or children of women accused of witchcraft.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_05`

- Answers subquestion `SQ7`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Were witches unmarried women? section`

```
In Scotland, there are 319 cases where the marital status of someone accused of witchcraft is known:

245 were married

67 were widowed

7 were unmarried
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_06`

- Answers subquestion `SQ7`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Were witches unmarried women? section`

```
These numbers suggest that most witches were married but there are 1572 cases in which marital status is not recorded.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_07`

- Answers subquestion `SQ7`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Were witches always older women? section`

```
In Scotland, over 60% of people accused of witchcraft were aged over forty at a time when life expectancy was much lower than today.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_08`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Were witches always older women? section`

```
Most people were accused by members of their community. Those who had lived longer may have been more likely to have come into conflict with neighbours at some time.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_09`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Antisocial behaviour section`

```
Often those accused of witchcraft displayed behaviour that was seen as argumentative or antisocial.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_10`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Agnes Finnie section`

```
In 1643, Agnes Finnie, a shopkeeper and money lender in Edinburgh, was accused of having witched several people who became ill after she argued with them. Agnes was found guilty of witchcraft and executed in March 1645.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_11`

- Answers subquestion `SQ7`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Social background section`

```
6% were from rich backgrounds, including landowners and the nobility

64% had middle incomes. This included tenant farmers, and craftspeople like weavers or bakers

29% were from poorer backgrounds. This included people with little access to land or work, or who did not have a permanent home.
```

#### `ev_dc904403b24e_12`

- Answers subquestion `SQ1`.
- Read from `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize
- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Located at: `Introduction: witchcraft accusations`

```
In Scotland, between 1450 and 1750, nearly 4,000 people were accused of being witches. It is estimated that around 2,500 of these were executed.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Background section`

```
Ankarloo and Clark claim that Kramer's purpose in writing the book was to explain his own views on witchcraft, systematically refute arguments claiming that witchcraft did not exist, discredit those who expressed skepticism about its reality, claim that those who practised witchcraft were more often women than men, and to convince magistrates to use Kramer's recommended procedures for finding and convicting witches.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ4`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Background section`

```
Before 1400 it was rare for anyone to be prosecuted for witchcraft, but the increasingly common prosecution of heresy and failure to fully defeat these heretics paved the way for later criminal prosecution of witchcraft.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_04`

- Answers subquestion `SQ4`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Background section`

```
their prosecution became more brutal following the publication of the Malleus Maleficarum, as witchcraft became widely accepted as a real and dangerous phenomenon. The most severe prosecutions took place between the years 1560 and 1630, largely ending in Europe around 1780.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_05`

- Answers subquestion `SQ4`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Background section`

```
The book became the handbook for secular courts throughout Renaissance Europe, but was not used by the Inquisition, which "denied any authority to the Malleus" in the words of historian Wolfgang Behringer.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_06`

- Answers subquestion `SQ4`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Background section, quoting Jenny Gibbons`

```
Actually the Inquisition immediately rejected the legal procedures Kramer recommended and censured the inquisitor himself just a few years after the Malleus was published. Secular courts, not inquisitorial ones, resorted to the Malleus.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_07`

- Answers subquestion `SQ4`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Notes/Citations, quoting Levack`

```
"The effect that the book had on witch-hunting is difficult to determine. It did not open the door 'to almost indiscriminate prosecutions' or even bring about an immediate increase in the number of trials. In fact its publication in Italy was followed by a noticeable reduction in witchcraft cases"
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_08`

- Answers subquestion `SQ4`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Notes/Citations, quoting Jolly, Peters & Raudvere`

```
Nor was the Malleus immediately regarded as a definitive work. Its appearance triggered no prosecutions in areas where there had been none earlier, and in some cases its claims encountered substantial scepticism (for Italy, Paton 1992: 264–306). In 1538 the Spanish Inquisition cautioned its members not to believe everything the Malleus said, even when it presented apparently firm evidence.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_09`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Lead section`

```
The Malleus classifies sorcery as heresy, a severe crime at the time, and recommends that secular courts prosecute it accordingly.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_10`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Theological foundations and major themes section`

```
Kramer and Sprenger were the first to raise harmful sorcery to the criminal status of heresy.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_11`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Theological foundations and major themes section`

```
They maintain that the lesser penalty of banishment prescribed by Canon Episcopi for those convicted of harmful sorcery does not apply to the new breed of witches, whose unprecedented evil justifies capital punishment.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_12`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Victims section`

```
After the publication of the Malleus, it seems as though about three quarters of those individuals prosecuted as witches were women.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_13`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Victims section`

```
The text argues that women are more susceptible to demonic temptations through the manifold weaknesses of their sex. It was believed that they were weaker in faith and more carnal than men.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_14`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Victims section`

```
Witches were usually female. The reasons for this is the suggestion that women are "prone to believing and because the demon basically seeks to corrupt the faith, he assails them in particular." They also have a "temperament towards flux" and "loose tongues". They "are defective in all the powers of both soul and body" and are stated to be more lustful than men.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_15`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Victims section`

```
The major reason is that at the foundation of sorcery is denial of faith and "woman, therefore, is evil as a result of nature because she doubts more quickly in the faith". Men could be witches, but were considered rarer, and the reasons were also different.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_16`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Victims section`

```
Indeed, the very title of the Malleus Maleficarum is feminine, alluding to the idea that it was women who were the villains. Otherwise, it would be the Malleus Maleficorum (the masculine form of the Latin noun maleficus or malefica, 'witch').
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_17`

- Answers subquestion `SQ11`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Victims section`

```
Although authors give many examples of male witchery in the second part of the handbook, those witchcraft trials that are independently confirmed and that were led by Kramer himself are related to persecution of women almost exclusively. They took place in Ravensburg near Constance (1484) and Innsbruck (since 1485).
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_18`

- Answers subquestion `SQ11`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Citations, note on Innsbruck trial`

```
there were only 2 men among 50 accused
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_19`

- Answers subquestion `SQ9`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Popularity and influence section`

```
The sex-specific theory developed in the Malleus Maleficarum laid the foundations for the widespread consensus in early modern Germany on the tie between the evil nature of witches and women. Later works on witchcraft did not fully agree with the Malleus but none of them challenged the view that women were more inclined to become witches than men.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_20`

- Answers subquestion `SQ9`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Popularity and influence section`

```
Some authors argue that the book's publication was not as influential as earlier authors believed. According to MacCulloch, the Malleus Maleficarum was one of several key factors contributing to the witch craze, along with popular superstition, and tensions created by the Reformation.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_21`

- Answers subquestion `SQ4`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Popularity and influence section, quoting Encyclopædia Britannica`

```
The Malleus went through 28 editions between 1486 and 1600 and was accepted by Roman Catholics and Protestants alike as an authoritative source of information concerning Satanism and as a guide to Christian defence [against acts of Satan].
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_22`

- Answers subquestion `SQ4`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Factors stimulating widespread use section`

```
The Malleus Maleficarum was able to spread throughout Europe rapidly in the late 15th and at the beginning of the 16th century due to the innovation of the printing press in the middle of the 15th century by Johannes Gutenberg.
```

#### `ev_8a5c677af125_23`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Located at: `Background section`

```
Within continental and Roman Law witchcraft was the crimen exceptum, a crime so foul that all normal legal procedures were superseded.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_01`

- Answers subquestion `SQ1`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 2`

```
men were well-represented in Europe's earliest known witch hunts, forming 28 percent of the 250-plus witches tried in the Alpine valleys of Dauphiné between 1424 and 1448.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ2`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 4`

```
During the period of most intense witch-hunts between 1570 and 1660, women usually comprised between 71 and 92 percent of those tried and executed, including about 80 percent in present-day Germany, where more than half of all deaths occurred.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 3`

```
witches now became coded as female—a phenomenon vividly exemplified in the title of Europe's single best-known treatise about witchcraft, the Malleus maleficarum (The witch hammer), first printed in 1486 and reprinted (always in Latin) approximately two dozen times by the mid-seventeenth century.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_04`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 3`

```
This seminal work was a transitional document in gendering discourse on witchcraft; although the Malleus insisted vigorously that witches were almost invariably women, the (probably forged) papal bull that introduced it specified that men and women alike were guilty of witchcraft.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_05`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 4`

```
Most historians agree that old, poor, widowed, and/or single women were most likely to be accused of witchcraft, although younger women charged with sexual crimes (fornication, adultery, abortion, infanticide) were also accused, particularly if they had female relatives accused of witchcraft.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_06`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 5`

```
Witches purportedly practiced various socially harmful forms of magic, directed primarily against young children but also raising storms that damaged crops. Witches supposedly congregated at so-called "Sabbaths" where they worshipped the Devil, feasted on bland foods, engaged in diabolical sexuality, and occasionally ate children. The Witches' Sabbath was an invention of early modern demonologists, which some historians claim reflected a prurient fascination with female sexuality.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_07`

- Answers subquestion `SQ7`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 5`

```
Although women were much more likely than men to use diabolical magic in order to harm other women's young children, men were equally inclined to resort to harmful magic (as well as non-magical techniques) in order to harm their neighbor's property. Killing livestock—the second most frequent accusation in European witch trials after killing babies—was practiced by both women and men.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_08`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 7`

```
Greenland's Kolgrim came from a colony settled from Iceland—perhaps the only part of Europe where women comprised barely 10 percent of accused witches. In a few other places—for example, seventeenth-century Muscovy and Normandy in northwestern France—men comprised a clear majority of accused witches; in Finland and Estonia, along Muscovy's western borders, and in northern France around Normandy, men represented approximately half of accused witches.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_09`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 7`

```
Most people arrested for witchcraft in two Austrian provinces, Styria and Carinthia, were also male.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_10`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 8`

```
Although the kinds of men accused of witchcraft seem at first very different in Muscovy (where most were vagrants, recent immigrants, fugitive serfs, or even non-Christian Finns or Turks) and Normandy (where witches were primarily shepherds, with sizable numbers of priests and blacksmiths), they shared one important characteristic: in both places, many suspected male witches were also magical healers.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_11`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 8`

```
Men comprised half or even more of Europe's numerous "white" witches who specialized in countering the effects of harmful witchcraft (so-called "cunning folk," curadores, Hexenbanner, Benandanti, etc.) were often male. They were arrested for witchcraft according to the widely believed notion that "whoever knows how to heal also knows how to harm."
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_12`

- Answers subquestion `SQ12`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 10`

```
Most witches were tried in Roman-law courts of continental Europe by legal systems that featured public accusers, used professional judges instead of juries to decide criminal cases, and permitted torture. In northern Europe (with the partial exception of Scotland), witchcraft, like other kinds of criminal trials, required private accusers and prohibited torture.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_13`

- Answers subquestion `SQ13`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 11`

```
estimates of the number of people executed for witchcraft have been vastly reduced from a still-repeated number of nine million, an early nineteenth-century estimate originally based on erroneous extrapolation from misread data.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_14`

- Answers subquestion `SQ13`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 11`

```
Wolfgang Behringer, the leading expert in the field, estimates that more than twenty thousand executions occurred in what is present-day Germany, more than in all other parts of Europe combined.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_15`

- Answers subquestion `SQ13`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 11`

```
On the basis of such admittedly imperfect statistics, a reasonable estimate might be approximately forty thousand people executed for witchcraft within both Protestant and Catholic regions of Latin Christendom.
```

#### `ev_c554d530c590_16`

- Answers subquestion `SQ16`.
- Read from `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com
- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Located at: `paragraph 10`

```
Historians have shown that, outside of panics, most people tried for witchcraft were not executed; in fact, most European women or men who reputedly practiced witchcraft were probably never even brought to trial.
```

#### `ev_cd8d10389080_01`

- Answers subquestion `SQ1`.
- Read from `src_c0144672df4e1e6edc3c5579` — Valais witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valais_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `cd8d10389080a076440bfa78ff3830341d64622fd249ea2036feec53b2a32a13`
- Located at: `History section, final paragraph`

```
Contrary to the later phase of the European witch-trials, when the majority of those accused were women, the victims in the Valais witch trials are estimated to have been two-thirds male and one-third female.
```

#### `ev_cd8d10389080_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ1`.
- Read from `src_c0144672df4e1e6edc3c5579` — Valais witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valais_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `cd8d10389080a076440bfa78ff3830341d64622fd249ea2036feec53b2a32a13`
- Located at: `History section, paragraph beginning 'The number of victims is unknown'`

```
Fründ speaks of a conspiracy of "700" witches of which "more than 200" had been burned two years into the trials (c. 1430).
```

#### `ev_cd8d10389080_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_c0144672df4e1e6edc3c5579` — Valais witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valais_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `cd8d10389080a076440bfa78ff3830341d64622fd249ea2036feec53b2a32a13`
- Located at: `History section, paragraph beginning 'According to Fründ's account'`

```
According to Fründ's account, the victims were accused of murder, heresy, and sorcery, being in pact with the devil.
```

#### `ev_cd8d10389080_04`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_c0144672df4e1e6edc3c5579` — Valais witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valais_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `cd8d10389080a076440bfa78ff3830341d64622fd249ea2036feec53b2a32a13`
- Located at: `History section, paragraph beginning 'By the summer of 1428'`

```
According to this document, the "public talk or slander of three or four neighbours" was enough for arrest and imprisonment, even if the accused was a member of the nobility.
```

#### `ev_cd8d10389080_05`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_c0144672df4e1e6edc3c5579` — Valais witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valais_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `cd8d10389080a076440bfa78ff3830341d64622fd249ea2036feec53b2a32a13`
- Located at: `History section, paragraph beginning 'By the summer of 1428'`

```
The use of torture was reserved for victims "slandered by five, six, or seven or more persons, up to the number of ten, who were qualified to do so and not under suspicion themselves", but also those "accused by three persons who had been tried and sentenced to death for the practice of sorcery".
```

#### `ev_cd8d10389080_06`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_c0144672df4e1e6edc3c5579` — Valais witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valais_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `cd8d10389080a076440bfa78ff3830341d64622fd249ea2036feec53b2a32a13`
- Located at: `Reception and influence section, final paragraph`

```
These documents were perused by the first generation of authors on witchcraft, such as Johannes Nider, the author of Formicarius (written 1436–1438).
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_01`

- Answers subquestion `SQ13`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 2 section`

```
About 30,000–60,000 people were executed in the whole of the main era of witchcraft persecutions, from the 1427–36 witch-hunts in Savoy (in the western Alps) to the execution of Anna Goldi in the Swiss canton of Glarus in 1782. These figures include estimates for cases where no records exist.
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ2`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 7 section`

```
In England the majority of those accused were women. In other countries, including some of the Scandinavian countries, men were in a slight majority.
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ2`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 7 section`

```
Across Europe, in the years of witch persecution around 6,000 men – 10 to 15 per cent of the total – were executed for witchcraft.
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_04`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 7 section`

```
In England, most of the accusers and those making written complaints against witches were women.
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_05`

- Answers subquestion `SQ14`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 8 section`

```
The idea that those accused of witchcraft were midwives or herbalists, and especially that they were midwives possessed of feminine expertise that threatened male authority, is a myth. Midwives were rarely accused. Instead, they were more likely to work side by side with the accusers to help them to identify witch marks.
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_06`

- Answers subquestion `SQ17`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 8 section`

```
Nobody was goddess-worshipping during the period of the witch-hunts, or if they were, they have left no trace in the historical records. Despite the beliefs of lawyers, historians and politicians (such as Karl Ernst Jarcke, Franz-Josef Mone, Jules Michelet, Margaret Murray and Heinrich Himmler among others), there was no ‘real’ pagan witchcraft. There was some residual paganism in a very few trials.
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_07`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 4 image caption`

```
The Spanish Inquisition persecuted those perceived as heretics by the Catholic Church, but witchcraft was largely regarded as a superstition, and wasn’t pursued as a heresy by officials except in rare cases
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_08`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 4 section`

```
Many others knew that old women could be persecuted by their neighbours for no reason other than that they weren’t very attractive.
```

#### `ev_bf53a223765b_09`

- Answers subquestion `SQ12`.
- Read from `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage
- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Located at: `Myth 4 section`

```
The total number of people tried for witchcraft in England throughout the period of persecution was no more than 2,000.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01`

- Answers subquestion `SQ2`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `Caliban and the Witch, p. 282, quoted in section A`

```
In the first period, men accounted for up to 40 per cent of the accused, and a smaller number continued to be judged, mainly vagrants, beggars, itinerant workers, gypsies and lower-ranking priests. (…) But the outstanding fact is that over 80% of those tried and executed in Europe in the XVIth and XVIIth century for crimes of witchcraft were women.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ2`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `quoted from Alison Rowlands, section A`

```
Globally, 70 to 80 percent of those tried for witchcraft in early modern Europe and England were women.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `Alison Rowlands, "Witchcraft and Gender in Early Modern Europe", in Brian P. Levack (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe and Colonial America, 2003, section A`

```
There was, however, considerable regional variation in the sex of persecuted individuals. (…) Men were in the majority in Iceland, Normandy, Estonia and Russia; men and women were prosecuted in roughly the same proportions in Finland, Burgundy and the French regions which depended on the Parliament of Paris.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_04`

- Answers subquestion `SQ14`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `section D, 'To conclude part 1'`

```
As early as 1973, Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English asserted that the goal had been to eliminate the rivals of male doctors, thereby ensuring male dominance over the medical profession.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_05`

- Answers subquestion `SQ14`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `quoted from Alison Rowlands, section D`

```
The myths without a factual basis forged by nineteenth- and twentieth-century writers, which feminists have acritically adopted to serve their own agendas. (…) Historians have refuted the idea that midwives and healers were the specific targets of an elite-orchestrated witch hunt. Midwives were sometimes prosecuted for witchcraft, but they were much more likely to participate in infanticide proceedings than to be accused of using witchcraft to kill the children they had borne.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_06`

- Answers subquestion `SQ13`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `section A, discussion of victim numbers`

```
the highest estimate from a professional historian (Anne Barstow) estimates the number of victims at 100,000, the other specialists (Hutton, Levack, Rowlands, Vissière) setting it unanimously between 40,000 and 60,000.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_07`

- Answers subquestion `SQ13`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `section A, discussion of victim numbers`

```
the suffragette Joslyn Gage was already advancing in her book Woman, Church, and State the truly delusional figure of 9 million killed.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `quoting Brian P. Levack, section E`

```
His books constituted a frontal attack on the conceptions expressed in Malleus Malleficarum. To support his theses, Weyer used his medical knowledge by claiming, on the one hand, that the so-called maleficia of the witches could be explained by medical and natural causes, and on the other hand, that the witches’ confessions relating to their diabolical activities were largely the consequence of a uterine disorder, called melancholy.
```

#### `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09`

- Answers subquestion `SQ3`.
- Read from `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org
- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Located at: `section E, footnote 12 reference`

```
Jean Wier wrote two books denouncing the witch hunt: De praestigiis daemonum in 1563 and De Lamiis in 1582.
```

#### `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01`

- Answers subquestion `SQ6`.
- Read from `src_319d97a6b4a85ff2f7cd7220` — Bamberg witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `62d74fa6ae912d42e393ca73e61788dd0c31c25b4e3c62c067ccaa662200a823`
- Located at: `Legal process section`

```
The accused were tortured to confess maleficia (harmful magic); flying; participating in a Witches' Sabbath (in Bamberg often called "witches' dance"); sexual intercourse with Satan or with a lower ranked male or female demon; and having desecrated a sacred object.
```

#### `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_319d97a6b4a85ff2f7cd7220` — Bamberg witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `62d74fa6ae912d42e393ca73e61788dd0c31c25b4e3c62c067ccaa662200a823`
- Located at: `Legal process section`

```
the Witch Commission did not discriminate as to which names to accept but arrested men and women of all ages and classes indiscriminately.
```

#### `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ2`.
- Read from `src_319d97a6b4a85ff2f7cd7220` — Bamberg witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `62d74fa6ae912d42e393ca73e61788dd0c31c25b4e3c62c067ccaa662200a823`
- Located at: `Cases and accused section`

```
Of the confirmed numbers, 15 men and women were charged with witchcraft in the year 1626; 85 are noted for the year 1627, 137 for 1628, and 167 for 1629, which was the peak year of the witch trials, followed by 54 in 1630, and a lesser number in 1631, but these are only the confirmed cases and are not complete.
```

#### `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_319d97a6b4a85ff2f7cd7220` — Bamberg witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `62d74fa6ae912d42e393ca73e61788dd0c31c25b4e3c62c067ccaa662200a823`
- Located at: `Cases and accused section`

```
Würzburg and Bamberg differed in that, in Würzburg, many members of the clerical elite were arrested, and a large number of children were among the accused, while Bamberg focused on secular adult elites.
```

#### `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05`

- Answers subquestion `SQ5`.
- Read from `src_319d97a6b4a85ff2f7cd7220` — Bamberg witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `62d74fa6ae912d42e393ca73e61788dd0c31c25b4e3c62c067ccaa662200a823`
- Located at: `Cases and accused section`

```
The most famous cases during the Bamberg witch trials were those of the official Georg Haan and his wife Katharina, daughter Maria Ursula Haan, and son Adam Haan, who were all executed at the stake, and that of the official Johannes Junius, whose testimony of the torture he underwent become famous, was another, as was his wife.
```

#### `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06`

- Answers subquestion `SQ12`.
- Read from `src_319d97a6b4a85ff2f7cd7220` — Bamberg witch trials
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg_witch_trials`
- Snapshot digest: `62d74fa6ae912d42e393ca73e61788dd0c31c25b4e3c62c067ccaa662200a823`
- Located at: `Cases and accused section`

```
The total number of executions is unknown as only some were documented.
```

#### `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77` — Witch trials in Iceland
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_trials_in_Iceland`
- Snapshot digest: `8b845f0e5990a6318d0304fe06bf7071920abb1847c6728531d961f2c85f6b84`
- Located at: `History > Danish influenced witch hunt, para 1`

```
The international Christian demonology and the Christian interpretation of magic as witchcraft connected to Satan, and the Christian definition of a magician as a witch who was able to master sorcery after a Pact with the Devil, was introduced to Iceland by the clergy (who were often Danes or educated in Denmark) in the 17th century.
```

#### `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77` — Witch trials in Iceland
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_trials_in_Iceland`
- Snapshot digest: `8b845f0e5990a6318d0304fe06bf7071920abb1847c6728531d961f2c85f6b84`
- Located at: `History > Danish influenced witch hunt, para 2`

```
This law banned the ownership of magical books among other practices of magic, leading to an unusually larger number of men being executed in the witch trials.
```

#### `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ10`.
- Read from `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77` — Witch trials in Iceland
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_trials_in_Iceland`
- Snapshot digest: `8b845f0e5990a6318d0304fe06bf7071920abb1847c6728531d961f2c85f6b84`
- Located at: `History > Male dominance, para 1`

```
The Icelandic witch trials were uncommon in Europe because almost all were directed toward men: of the 22 executed for sorcery in Iceland, 20 were men and only two women, one of whom (Galdra-Manga) unconfirmed, and only Thuridur Olafsdottir confirmed to have been executed.
```

#### `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04`

- Answers subquestion `SQ10`.
- Read from `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77` — Witch trials in Iceland
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_trials_in_Iceland`
- Snapshot digest: `8b845f0e5990a6318d0304fe06bf7071920abb1847c6728531d961f2c85f6b84`
- Located at: `Introduction, para 1`

```
Iceland was uncommon for Europe in that magic as such was viewed favorably on the island, and the majority of those executed were men, which it had in common with only the witch trials in Finland.
```

#### `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77` — Witch trials in Iceland
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_trials_in_Iceland`
- Snapshot digest: `8b845f0e5990a6318d0304fe06bf7071920abb1847c6728531d961f2c85f6b84`
- Located at: `History > Male dominance, para 2`

```
The reason for this was that the magic openly performed in Icelandic society had come to be associated with men. Prior to Christianity, women had performed magic, but during the Catholic Middle Ages, this changed as almost only men were accepted in the convents and Latin schools on Iceland and their literacy gave them better opportunities to attain fjölkynngi ('learning').
```

#### `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06`

- Answers subquestion `SQ10`.
- Read from `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77` — Witch trials in Iceland
- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_trials_in_Iceland`
- Snapshot digest: `8b845f0e5990a6318d0304fe06bf7071920abb1847c6728531d961f2c85f6b84`
- Located at: `History > Danish influenced witch hunt, para 2`

```
Belief in the Devil and the Christian definition of witchcraft spread after the publication of the first witchcraft books by Gudmundur Einarsson in 1627, and Pall Björnsson's Character Bestiae in 1630, and in 1630 Denmark introduced the Danish Witchcraft Act of 1617 on Iceland.
```

#### `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01`

- Answers subquestion `SQ10`.
- Read from `src_91db37b7ca0b8a3774f4b03c` — Trends&Statistics
- URL: `https://pages.uoregon.edu/dluebke/Witches442/Trends&Statistics.html`
- Snapshot digest: `6b44a26db45fd1591b9c99cb66b2398e60cbe090101fa25889774c116f423d3f`
- Located at: `Sex of Accused Witches table, Parlement of Burgundy row`

```
Parlement of Burgundy
1580-1642
83
76
48%
```

#### `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02`

- Answers subquestion `SQ10`.
- Read from `src_91db37b7ca0b8a3774f4b03c` — Trends&Statistics
- URL: `https://pages.uoregon.edu/dluebke/Witches442/Trends&Statistics.html`
- Snapshot digest: `6b44a26db45fd1591b9c99cb66b2398e60cbe090101fa25889774c116f423d3f`
- Located at: `Sex of Accused Witches table, Finland row`

```
Finland
1520-1699
316
325
51%
```

#### `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_03`

- Answers subquestion `SQ8`.
- Read from `src_91db37b7ca0b8a3774f4b03c` — Trends&Statistics
- URL: `https://pages.uoregon.edu/dluebke/Witches442/Trends&Statistics.html`
- Snapshot digest: `6b44a26db45fd1591b9c99cb66b2398e60cbe090101fa25889774c116f423d3f`
- Located at: `Male Witches in Normandy table, 1564-1578 row`

```
1564-1578
15
10
40%
```

### Passages nothing has scored

These passed the verbatim gate, and nothing has compared them to the live
explanations. No finding in this document rests on one.

*This run holds no unscored passages.*

## 8. Competing Explanations

The roster in its own order, with the five bearing counts each explanation
collected. The counts are unweighted by evidence tier on purpose: no weight
vector has been argued anywhere in this system, and an invented one would let
a genre label quietly outvote the passages themselves. No condition below
carries a probability either — a narrated number moves the argument onto the
number and away from the condition nobody can support.

| Explanation | ++ | + | 0 | - | -- |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | 20 | 47 | 17 | 5 |
| `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | 19 | 68 | 2 | 0 |
| `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | 7 | 77 | 5 | 0 |
| `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | 5 | 77 | 7 | 0 |

### `H1_demonological_misogyny` — The diffusion of demonological treatises (notably Malleus Maleficarum, 1487, and subsequent demonology literature) that theorized women as inherently susceptible to diabolical pact was the primary driver of the shift to ~80% female defendants during 1560-1650, by shaping elite/clerical prosecutorial theory and judicial training across jurisdictions.

- Falsified by: Regions and periods with documented high circulation, citation, or judicial use of demonological texts (e.g., parts of the Holy Roman Empire, France) but female defendant shares remaining at or below 50%, OR regions with negligible demonological-text penetration (e.g., Iceland, Estonia, Finland, Russia) nonetheless showing the same timing and magnitude of female-share increase as high-penetration regions, would disconfirm the causal link.
- Disconfirming evidence would be observable at: Comparative jurisdiction-level trial record datasets cross-referenced with library/court inventory records of demonological text ownership and citation, as compiled in regional witch-trial historiography (e.g., Behringer, Levack, Rowlands regional studies)
- Required conditions — **all of these must hold**, and the weakest is where
  the argument actually breaks:
  1. Demonological texts were actually read/cited by the specific prosecuting courts in question, not merely published somewhere in Europe
  2. The timing of text circulation precedes (not follows or coincides accidentally with) the documented rise in female defendant share in the same jurisdiction
  3. Male-majority regions show measurably lower demonological-text penetration than female-majority regions
  4. The shift from heresy to maleficium framing, which carries independent gender associations, does not fully account for the correlation attributed to demonology
- Passages declaring a bearing on it: 89.

### `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` — The gender shift is primarily explained by bottom-up local accusation dynamics - neighbour disputes, household conflict, accusations disproportionately targeting older/widowed women with weak kin protection, and female accusers targeting other women - which became dominant as prosecution shifted from heresy/Sabbat framing to maleficium framing after the early period.

- Falsified by: Trial samples showing that local social-conflict variables (widowhood rate, age, accuser identity, household disputes) do NOT differ systematically between early male-majority trials and peak female-majority trials, i.e., the same proportion of accusations stemming from neighbour/household conflict in both periods despite the gender-share shift, would disconfirm this as the operative mechanism.
- Disconfirming evidence would be observable at: Microhistorical trial-record databases with accuser/defendant relationship coding (e.g., Scottish Survey of Witchcraft, German regional Hexenprozess archives, Rowlands' Rothenburg study)
- Required conditions — **all of these must hold**, and the weakest is where
  the argument actually breaks:
  1. Surviving trial records contain sufficient detail on accuser identity, relationship to defendant, and stated grievance to code for 'local conflict' type across both periods
  2. Widowhood and age data are recoverable at the individual defendant level in a large enough sample to detect period-over-period change
  3. The heresy-to-maleficium prosecutorial shift is independently documented and temporally aligned with the gender-share shift rather than being a redescription of the same evidence
  4. Male-majority regions do not show equally strong local-conflict/widowhood patterns despite retaining male-majority defendants, which would weaken the theory's power to explain exceptions
- Passages declaring a bearing on it: 89.

### `H3_recording_artifact` — The apparent shift from male to female defendants is substantially an artifact of changes in which courts kept records, what charges were logged, and uneven record survival, rather than a true change in underlying accusation behavior - i.e., the phenomenon is weaker or differently distributed than the 80% figure suggests.

- Falsified by: Demonstration that within single continuously-operating courts/jurisdictions with stable record-keeping practices across both the early and peak periods, the same male-to-female shift is independently observed with consistent documentation standards, ruling out record-practice change as the explanation; or finding that the 80% aggregate figure derives from a small number of unrepresentative large-sample regions (e.g., Germany) that dominate pooled totals while most other regions show no clear shift.
- Disconfirming evidence would be observable at: Historiographical meta-analyses of trial record survival and completeness (e.g., Levack's tabulations, regional archive condition reports) and comparison of within-court longitudinal samples
- Required conditions — **all of these must hold**, and the weakest is where
  the argument actually breaks:
  1. Early-period records (Valais, Russia) and peak-period records differ in court type (ecclesiastical vs secular), charge categorization, or archival survival rate in ways that could mechanically alter recorded gender ratios
  2. The ~80% aggregate figure is actually a pooled/weighted estimate sensitive to a few large regional datasets rather than a robust cross-regional median
  3. No independent cross-check (e.g., chronicle accounts, execution lists kept outside formal court records) corroborates the shift
- Passages declaring a bearing on it: 89.

### `H4_demographic_vulnerability` — Structural demographic and economic changes in women's legal/social status (rising numbers of unmarried/widowed women, their economic marginalization and dependency, population pressures in the 16th-17th century) independently increased women's vulnerability to accusation, operating alongside but distinct from both demonological theory and immediate local disputes.

- Falsified by: Regions with comparable or greater rises in widowhood/female economic marginalization during 1560-1650 but no corresponding rise in female defendant share (e.g., if Iceland or Finland show similar demographic trends to Germany but remain male-majority) would disconfirm demographic vulnerability as a sufficient or even necessary driver.
- Disconfirming evidence would be observable at: Historical demography datasets (parish registers, tax/property records) cross-tabulated with regional witch-trial defendant rosters
- Required conditions — **all of these must hold**, and the weakest is where
  the argument actually breaks:
  1. Reliable regional demographic data on widowhood rates, marriage patterns, and women's economic/legal status across the comparison regions and periods
  2. A measurable correlation (not just plausible narrative) between demographic vulnerability indices and defendant gender share at the regional level
  3. The demographic variable adds explanatory power beyond what local accusation dynamics (H2) already captures, rather than being the same mechanism redescribed
- Passages declaring a bearing on it: 89.

### Explanations a count cannot settle

An explanation whose disconfirming evidence has nowhere it could be seen can
never lose, and therefore can never win: every empty search is absorbed as
further concealment. Its counts are printed above because the evidence really
was weighed against it and hiding the column would conceal that — but a count
**cannot settle** an explanation nothing could disconfirm, and the shape of
the claim is the finding here, not the number.

*This run holds no self-sealing explanations.*

## 9. Contradictory Evidence

### Adversarial searches

#### `e370d86925848b9fb8bedbff` against `H1_demonological_misogyny`

- Searched: Normandy witch trials demonology judicial treatises male majority
- Looked for: Evidence that Norman magistrates and judges were well-versed in and utilized standard demonological literature (e.g., Bodin, Malleus) while consistently prosecuting male shepherds and priests, disconfirming the direct causal link between demonological texts and high female defendant shares.
- Result: returned nothing; that is a result, not a blank. The search ran and came back empty.

#### `46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26` against `H1_demonological_misogyny`

- Searched: Iceland Estonia Finland witch trials demonological ideas reception gender ratio
- Looked for: Studies examining the diffusion or translation of Continental demonological theory into Iceland, Finland, and Estonia to test whether absence of demonology explains male prevalence or if demonological concepts were adopted without shifting the defendant gender balance.
- Result: returned `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77`.

#### `257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9` against `H1_demonological_misogyny`

- Searched: German mass witch panics Bamberg Wurzburg male defendant percentage torture chains
- Looked for: Quantitative data showing that during peak central European panics driven by elite demonological prosecution, the proportion of male and high-status defendants rose significantly toward parity, countering the claim that demonology sustained an ~80% female ratio.
- Result: returned `src_91db37b7ca0b8a3774f4b03c`.

#### `f11183f48e710556b770f545` against `H2_local_accusation_dynamics`

- Searched: Valais Dauphine 15th century witch trials neighbor disputes maleficium male accused
- Looked for: Court records from early 15th-century Alpine trials showing that neighbor disputes, interpersonal grievances, and harmful magic (maleficium) were already the primary basis of accusations against male-majority defendants, disproving the claim that interpersonal maleficium dynamics were unique to the female-majority phase.
- Result: returned nothing; that is a result, not a blank. The search ran and came back empty.

#### `b8c35337b7541a1371d83d47` against `H2_local_accusation_dynamics`

- Searched: early modern witch trials accuser gender female accusers England Germany statistics
- Looked for: Data assessing whether accusers in peak female-majority trials were predominantly men rather than women, or whether female-on-female accusation rates were historically constant across both male-majority and female-majority trials.
- Result: returned nothing; that is a result, not a blank. The search ran and came back empty.

#### `d3e06b3cfbb39adfd9c1cb2b` against `H3_recording_artifact`

- Searched: continuous court records early modern witch trials Parlement of Paris assizes longitudinal gender ratio
- Looked for: Longitudinal studies from single jurisdictions with unbroken records across 1450-1650 (such as the Parlement of Paris or English Assize circuits) showing whether defendant gender shares remained constant or genuinely shifted over time under identical recording procedures.
- Result: returned nothing; that is a result, not a blank. The search ran and came back empty.

#### `20d44091ede7170ffae8949b` against `H3_recording_artifact`

- Searched: early modern witchcraft trial archive survival bias secular vs ecclesiastical courts gender
- Looked for: Methodological critique demonstrating that surviving early 15th-century records over-represent male political/heresy prosecutions while unrecorded local secular courts already tried predominantly female practitioners of maleficium.
- Result: returned nothing; that is a result, not a blank. The search ran and came back empty.

#### `3e170a7ffa01c48cc95b3b81` against `H4_demographic_vulnerability`

- Searched: witchcraft trials marital status married women proportion Scotland Germany England
- Looked for: Quantitative demographic studies showing that married women embedded in households constituted the majority of accused witches rather than unprotected widows or unmarried spinsters, challenging the demographic vulnerability mechanism.
- Result: returned nothing; that is a result, not a blank. The search ran and came back empty.

#### `015aefc489a64e1607734ef5` against `H4_demographic_vulnerability`

- Searched: economic marginalization poverty accused witches socioeconomic status tenant farmers elites
- Looked for: Evidence that accused witches across major European trial centers were predominantly of middling or prosperous economic status rather than impoverished, socially marginal women vulnerable to demographic dislocation.
- Result: returned nothing; that is a result, not a blank. The search ran and came back empty.

### Passages bearing against an explanation

| Passage | Explanation | Bearing | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| `ev_dc904403b24e_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | A continent-wide aggregate over 70% female suggests the pattern is broad rather than an artifact of a few unrepresentative large-sample regions, weakly undercutting the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | - | Married women vastly outnumber widows among accused, undercutting the widowhood/weak-kin-protection mechanism as primary explanation. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Only ~21% of accused were widowed, suggesting widowhood/economic marginalization was not the dominant demographic driver in Scotland. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Finding most witches married, not widowed, cuts against the widowhood-driven vulnerability narrative central to this hypothesis. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows the Malleus was rejected by the Inquisition itself, undermining claims of uniform elite/clerical judicial adoption driving the gender shift. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_07` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Shows the Malleus did not increase trials and even preceded a decline in Italy, undermining the claim that demonological texts drove prosecutorial practice. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_08` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Directly shows the Malleus failed to trigger new prosecutions and faced official scepticism, undercutting claims it drove prosecutorial practice. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_20` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | MacCulloch's view downgrades Malleus Maleficarum to one of several contributing factors, undercutting a 'primary driver' claim. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Pre-Malleus Dauphiné trials (1424-1448) already show a majority-female defendant pool, undercutting the claim that demonological texts drove the shift to female predominance. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | High female share appears before the 16th-17th century demographic/economic pressures the hypothesis cites as drivers, weakening its explanatory necessity. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | The 71-92% range across many regions beyond Germany undercuts the claim that the 80% figure is an artifact of a few unrepresentative large samples dominating the total, though Germany's outsized death toll is noted. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_08` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows male-majority regions existed despite being within European demonological print culture, weakening claim that treatise diffusion alone drove female-share rise. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_09` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Styria and Carinthia were within the demonology-saturated Holy Roman Empire yet remained male-majority, undercutting a simple text-diffusion causal story. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_10` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows male-majority regions defined by occupational/marginal-status categories (healers, vagrants) rather than demonological gender theory, undercutting misogynist-text diffusion as the operative mechanism there. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_10` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Male witches' vulnerability here stems from occupational/marginal-status roles (healer, vagrant, outsider), not from the female demographic marginalization mechanism posited by H4. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_14` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | Confirms Germany's outsized, well-documented execution total dominates pooled European figures, supporting the concern that aggregate gender-share estimates are skewed by one region's large sample. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows heresy/diabolical pact framing already present in 1428 Valais trials with male-majority defendants, predating Malleus and undermining a simple link between pact narrative and female targeting. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Scandinavian male-majority regions undercut a uniform demonological-misogyny effect across Protestant Europe. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Female-driven accusation suggests grassroots social dynamics rather than elite demonological theory as the operative mechanism. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Debunks the notion that women's threatening expertise (midwifery) drove misogynistic targeting, undercutting one popular narrative tied to demonological framing. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | A broad 70-80% figure spanning Europe and England suggests the pattern is not confined to a few unrepresentative large-sample regions, weakening the artifact/dominance explanation. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Wier's skeptical treatises show the demonological literature of the period was contested, not a uniform elite consensus driving prosecutions. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Indiscriminate arrest by age/class/sex in this episode contradicts a theory-driven focus on women as especially diabolically susceptible. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | - | Indiscriminate targeting across sex and age undercuts the claim that local dynamics systematically selected older/widowed women. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Arrests spanning all ages and classes indiscriminately suggest no special demographic targeting of economically marginal women in this episode. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | The passage itself flags that 'these are only the confirmed cases and are not complete,' illustrating record incompleteness that could inflate or distort apparent trends. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Execution of male officials alongside female kin shows demonological misogyny alone did not confine targeting to women. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Demonological Pact theology reached Iceland via clergy yet Iceland stayed male-majority, undercutting the claim that text diffusion drives female-share increase. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Iceland's male-majority prosecutions stem from a legal ban on magical books (a male-associated practice) rather than demonological misogyny theory, undermining H1 as universal driver. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Iceland's near-total male-majority persists despite European demonological literature circulating to some degree, undercutting misogyny theory as universal driver. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Iceland's male-majority trials despite general European demonological currents undercuts misogyny-driven theory as universal driver. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | A persistent male-majority region suggests demographic vulnerability of women was not a sufficient driver everywhere. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows Iceland's male-majority stemmed from local cultural association of magic with literate men, not from demonological misogyny theory which was arguably equally available yet did not shift gender share. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Attributes Iceland's male association with magic to educational/institutional access rather than demographic vulnerability of women, offering an alternative explanation that sidelines demographic factors. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Iceland shows substantial demonological text circulation (1627/1630 treatises, 1617 Danish Witchcraft Act adopted) yet remained a male-majority prosecution region, directly disconfirming the text-penetration-to-female-share link. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Burgundy's Parlement, in a high-demonological-literature region of France, shows only 48% female defendants, far below the 80% peak figure, undercutting the misogyny-driven account. |

### Pre-registered probes

*This run does not record any pre-registered probe.*

A probe states, before a search runs, what should be findable and where.
Only a search like that turns an empty result into evidence of absence;
without one, nothing distinguishes a thing that is not there from a place
nobody looked. No probe was pre-registered in this run, so no absence
reported anywhere in this document counts as evidence of absence.

## 10. Analysis

This section is a matrix and a causal ledger, **not a narrative**. Nothing in
this run's state performs prose analysis, and this renderer does not invent
one; what follows is what was recorded, read across rows and down columns.

### Bearing matrix

| Passage | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | `H3_recording_artifact` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| `ev_dc904403b24e_01` | 0 | 0 | - | 0 |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_02` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_03` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_04` | 0 | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_05` | 0 | - | 0 | - |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_06` | 0 | 0 | + | - |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_07` | 0 | + | 0 | + |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_08` | 0 | + | 0 | + |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_09` | 0 | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_10` | 0 | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_11` | 0 | 0 | 0 | + |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_12` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_02` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_03` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_04` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_05` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_06` | - | 0 | + | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_07` | -- | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_08` | -- | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_09` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_10` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_11` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_12` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_13` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_14` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_15` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_16` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_17` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_18` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_19` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_20` | - | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_21` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_22` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_23` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_01` | - | + | 0 | - |
| `ev_c554d530c590_02` | 0 | 0 | - | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_03` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_04` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_05` | 0 | + | 0 | + |
| `ev_c554d530c590_06` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_07` | 0 | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_08` | - | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_09` | - | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_10` | - | + | 0 | - |
| `ev_c554d530c590_11` | 0 | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_12` | 0 | + | + | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_13` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_14` | 0 | 0 | - | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_15` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_c554d530c590_16` | 0 | 0 | + | 0 |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_01` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_02` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_03` | - | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_04` | 0 | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_05` | 0 | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_06` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_01` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_02` | - | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_03` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_04` | - | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_05` | - | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_06` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_07` | 0 | 0 | + | 0 |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_08` | 0 | + | 0 | + |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_09` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02` | 0 | 0 | - | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_04` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_05` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_06` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_07` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09` | - | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` | - | - | 0 | - |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03` | 0 | 0 | - | 0 |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05` | - | + | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06` | 0 | 0 | + | 0 |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01` | -- | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02` | - | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03` | - | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04` | - | 0 | 0 | - |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05` | - | + | 0 | - |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06` | -- | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01` | -- | 0 | + | 0 |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02` | + | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_03` | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |

### Why each cell reads as it does

| Passage | Explanation | Bearing | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| `ev_dc904403b24e_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Confirms the aggregate female-majority figure but says nothing about whether demonological texts caused it. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_01` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Gives an overall gender ratio but no information on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | A continent-wide aggregate over 70% female suggests the pattern is broad rather than an artifact of a few unrepresentative large-sample regions, weakly undercutting the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Provides only the aggregate percentage without demographic or regional variation data needed to test vulnerability claims. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Confirms Scotland's peak-period female share near 80% but says nothing about demonological text circulation or causal mechanism there. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Gives only an aggregate gender percentage with no data on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity to test local dynamics. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | A single aggregate figure cannot show whether record-keeping practices changed within Scottish courts across periods, so it neither confirms nor refutes an artifact explanation. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No information on widowhood rates or economic marginalization in Scotland is given, so demographic vulnerability cannot be assessed from this figure alone. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Exemplifies demonological text explicitly asserting women's innate frailty as mechanism for diabolical susceptibility, supporting the misogyny-theory content claim. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Irrelevant to court record-keeping practices or survival. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic status of women, only theological characterization. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Passage describes kinship-linked accusation chains, not uptake of demonological theory among elites or judges. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_04` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Shows male defendants typically entered via family ties to an already-accused woman, consistent with local kin/household-driven accusation networks centering on women. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_04` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Says nothing about record-keeping practices or court continuity across periods. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic vulnerability of women, only the relational pattern of male co-accusations. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Marital status breakdown says nothing about demonological text influence or theory diffusion. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | - | Married women vastly outnumber widows among accused, undercutting the widowhood/weak-kin-protection mechanism as primary explanation. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_05` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Marital status data does not speak to record-keeping continuity or artifact concerns. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Only ~21% of accused were widowed, suggesting widowhood/economic marginalization was not the dominant demographic driver in Scotland. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Marital status data does not speak to demonological text influence. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_06` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | The large unrecorded fraction undermines confident claims about household/widowhood patterns without further breakdown. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_06` | `H3_recording_artifact` | + | A huge gap in recorded marital status highlights record incompleteness that could distort demographic conclusions drawn from trial samples. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Finding most witches married, not widowed, cuts against the widowhood-driven vulnerability narrative central to this hypothesis. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_07` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Age distribution of Scottish accused says nothing about demonological text influence or clerical theory. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_07` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Older age at accusation aligns with the predicted local-dynamics pattern of targeting older/widowed women with weak kin protection. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_07` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | An age-at-accusation statistic does not speak to record-keeping continuity or sample representativeness issues. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_07` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | + | High share of accused over forty supports the idea that older, likely widowed or economically marginal women were disproportionately vulnerable. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_08` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Passage describes community-level accusation origins, not elite demonological theory, so it does not bear on this hypothesis. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_08` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Confirms accusations arose from community/neighbour conflict and links age to accumulated disputes, supporting the local-dynamics mechanism. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_08` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Says nothing about record-keeping practices or court continuity, so it does not discriminate on this hypothesis. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_08` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | + | Age-related conflict accumulation is consistent with older/widowed women being more exposed to accusation, lending mild support to demographic vulnerability. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_09` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Behavioral trait of accused says nothing about demonological text diffusion or elite theory. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_09` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Argumentative/antisocial reputation is a classic neighbour-dispute marker consistent with local conflict-driven accusation. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_09` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or survival differences across courts/periods. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_09` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Behavioral reputation is unrelated to widowhood or economic marginalization trends. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_10` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | No mention of demonological theory or clerical influence in this single case. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_10` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Illustrates a household/neighbour dispute preceding illness and accusation, consistent with local conflict-driven dynamics. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_10` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | A single case gives no information about record-keeping practices or sample representativeness. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_10` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Agnes's marital/economic status as a shopkeeper and moneylender is not clearly marginal, so this case does not clearly support or refute demographic vulnerability. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_11` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Economic class breakdown of accused says nothing about demonological theory or textual diffusion. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_11` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Class distribution alone doesn't indicate whether accusations stemmed from neighbour/household disputes. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_11` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No information here about record-keeping practices or court continuity. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_11` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | + | Shows poorer/marginalized individuals (29%) were disproportionately accused, consistent with economic marginalization as a vulnerability factor, though gender is not specified. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_12` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Gives only aggregate Scottish accusation/execution totals with no gender breakdown or period comparison bearing on demonological influence. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_12` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | No data on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity is given, so it cannot support or undermine local dynamics. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_12` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Provides total counts but no indication of record-keeping continuity or gender-share changes needed to assess artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_dc904403b24e_12` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic or gender-specific information is present to bear on structural vulnerability claims. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Confirms Malleus explicitly argued witches were disproportionately women and urged magistrates to adopt procedures, supporting elite-text-driven theory. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Describes textual content and intent, not local social conflict mechanisms, so it doesn't discriminate this hypothesis. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Says nothing about court record-keeping practices or survival, so no bearing on artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic conditions affecting women's vulnerability, only textual content. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Notes pre-1400 rarity of prosecutions but says nothing about demonological text circulation or its link to prosecutorial practice. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Does not address neighbour/household dynamics or the heresy-to-maleficium framing shift's gender effects. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Gives no information on record-keeping practices or court continuity that would bear on an artifact explanation. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Contains no demographic or economic data on women's status or vulnerability. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Links Malleus Maleficarum publication to intensified prosecutions in the 1560-1630 peak window, consistent with demonological diffusion driving harsher prosecutorial practice, though gender is not mentioned. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_04` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_04` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No information on record-keeping practices or court continuity is given. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic or economic data on women's status is addressed. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows a plausible mechanism by which the Malleus's misogynistic framework reached secular courts, but its rejection by the Inquisition complicates a uniform causal link across all prosecuting bodies. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Says nothing about neighbour disputes, accusers, or household conflict dynamics. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_05` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or data survival issues. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows the Malleus was rejected by the Inquisition itself, undermining claims of uniform elite/clerical judicial adoption driving the gender shift. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_06` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Does not address neighbour disputes or household conflict dynamics. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_06` | `H3_recording_artifact` | + | Differential uptake by secular vs inquisitorial courts suggests jurisdictional variation in record/charge practices could confound apparent demonology-driven shifts. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Says nothing about demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_07` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Shows the Malleus did not increase trials and even preceded a decline in Italy, undermining the claim that demonological texts drove prosecutorial practice. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_07` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | By showing demonology's weak causal role, it implicitly strengthens the case for bottom-up local dynamics as the operative mechanism instead. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_07` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | This passage concerns the treatise's prosecutorial impact, not record-keeping practices, so it does not bear on the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_07` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | The passage addresses textual influence on trial rates, not demographic/economic vulnerability of women, so it is non-discriminating here. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_08` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Directly shows the Malleus failed to trigger new prosecutions and faced official scepticism, undercutting claims it drove prosecutorial practice. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_08` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Does not address neighbour/household dynamics or local accusation mechanisms. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_08` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No information on record-keeping practices or court documentation continuity. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_08` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_09` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows the Malleus itself pushed heresy framing into secular courts, a plausible mechanism for elite demonological theory reshaping prosecution, though it does not mention gender directly. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_09` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_09` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or court documentation continuity. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_09` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of demographic or economic status of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_10` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows the Malleus authors actively reshaped legal-theological framing, supporting a causal role for demonological treatises in prosecution logic. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_10` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Describes elite doctrinal innovation, not local neighbour/household conflict dynamics, so it doesn't bear on this hypothesis. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_10` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Concerns substantive legal-theological change, not court record-keeping practices or sample representativeness. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_10` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Addresses doctrinal classification of maleficium as heresy, not demographic or economic conditions of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_11` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows demonological argument justifying harsher punishment, consistent with elite theological reasoning escalating witch persecution, but says nothing about gender targeting specifically. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_11` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage concerns elite legal doctrine on punishment severity, not local accusation or household dynamics. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_11` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or court documentation changes. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_11` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of demographic or economic status of accused women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_12` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Correlates Malleus publication timing with subsequent rise in female share, consistent with demonological influence but shows only association. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_12` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_12` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or court continuity, so does not bear on artifact explanation. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_12` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of demographic or economic status of accused women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_13` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Confirms the content of demonological misogyny the hypothesis claims drove prosecution theory, though it doesn't show dissemination timing or regional correlation with gender-share shift. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_13` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | This passage describes elite textual doctrine, not neighbour-level accusation dynamics, so it does not bear on local conflict mechanisms. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_13` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Content of a theological text says nothing about court record-keeping practices or survival of documentation. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_13` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | The passage addresses theological beliefs about women's spiritual weakness, not demographic or economic structural changes affecting vulnerability. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_14` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Directly documents Malleus-style misogynist theorizing of women's susceptibility, supporting the content claim underlying H1, though it shows no dissemination timeline or correlation data. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_14` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage is purely demonological text content and says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_14` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices, court continuity, or data representativeness. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_14` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic status of women, only theological characterization. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_15` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Confirms Malleus-era demonological text explicitly theorizes women's inherent susceptibility to diabolism, the core mechanism H1 claims. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_15` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage is purely textual-theological content, says nothing about neighbour disputes or household conflict dynamics. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_15` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or court documentation changes. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_15` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of demographic or economic status of women, only doctrinal reasoning. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_16` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows the Malleus's own grammatical framing encoded women as the paradigmatic witch, consistent with demonology shaping elite prosecutorial theory. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_16` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | A textual/grammatical observation about the treatise's title says nothing about neighbour disputes or household conflict dynamics. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_16` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address court record-keeping practices or sample composition, so it neither supports nor undermines an artifact explanation. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_16` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Concerns textual framing, not demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_17` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows Kramer's own real trials, not just theoretical writing, already targeted women almost exclusively, linking demonological authorship to actual female-focused prosecution. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_17` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity in these trials. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_17` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or survival across jurisdictions. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_17` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No information on widowhood, economic marginalization, or demographic status of the accused. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_18` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | The raw count gives a gender ratio but says nothing about whether demonological text circulation caused it. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_18` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | A bare tally of 2 men among 50 accused offers no detail on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity to test local dynamics. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_18` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No information on record-keeping practices or court continuity is given, so it cannot address artifact concerns. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_18` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | The figure alone does not speak to widowhood rates or economic marginalization trends needed to test demographic vulnerability. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_19` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows Malleus established a textual/ideological consensus on women's propensity to witchcraft that persisted in later demonology, supporting a mechanism for misogynist theory shaping prosecution. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_19` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage concerns elite demonological consensus, not neighbour disputes or household-level accusation patterns. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_19` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Says nothing about court record-keeping practices or survival, so does not bear on an artifact explanation. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_19` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic status of women, only theological consensus. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_20` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | MacCulloch's view downgrades Malleus Maleficarum to one of several contributing factors, undercutting a 'primary driver' claim. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_20` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage discusses demonological text influence, not local accusation dynamics specifically. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_20` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No mention of record-keeping practices or data artifacts. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_20` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Reformation tensions and superstition are mentioned but not tied to demographic/economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_21` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows the Malleus achieved broad cross-confessional circulation and authority, consistent with a mechanism for diffusing misogynistic demonology, though it doesn't link this to actual sentencing or gender outcomes. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_21` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_21` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address court record-keeping practices or survival of records. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_21` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic status of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_22` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Shows mechanism for rapid diffusion of misogynistic demonology text, supporting plausibility but not proving actual prosecutorial uptake. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_22` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or local accusers. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_22` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or court documentation standards. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_22` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_23` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Crimen exceptum status describes procedural exception, not demonological gendering of suspects. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_23` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Does not address neighbour/household conflict dynamics or accuser identity. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_23` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Legal classification as crimen exceptum says nothing about record-keeping practices or survival. |
| `ev_8a5c677af125_23` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No connection to demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Pre-Malleus Dauphiné trials (1424-1448) already show a majority-female defendant pool, undercutting the claim that demonological texts drove the shift to female predominance. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_01` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Early trials already skewing female (72%) suggests local accusation dynamics could produce female-majority outcomes independent of later heresy-to-maleficium shift. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | A single regional count of defendant gender does not address whether record-keeping practices changed over time or regions. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | High female share appears before the 16th-17th century demographic/economic pressures the hypothesis cites as drivers, weakening its explanatory necessity. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Gives aggregate gender ratios but says nothing about demonological text circulation or judicial use, so it cannot discriminate this mechanism. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Provides no information on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity, so it does not bear on this mechanism. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | The 71-92% range across many regions beyond Germany undercuts the claim that the 80% figure is an artifact of a few unrepresentative large samples dominating the total, though Germany's outsized death toll is noted. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No data on widowhood, marriage status, or economic marginalization is given, so this passage is silent on demographic drivers. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Confirms publication and extensive Latin reprinting of the Malleus through the peak period, establishing temporal overlap with the female-majority shift. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address court record-keeping practices or survival bias. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not discuss widowhood, economic marginalization, or demographic change. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Confirms Malleus explicitly framed witches as predominantly female, supporting the misogynist-text mechanism, though the contemporaneous bull's gender-neutral language shows the discourse was still transitional. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_04` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_04` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address court record-keeping practices or sample representativeness. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Describes demographic profile of accused but says nothing about demonological text diffusion or judicial theory. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Confirms that age, poverty, widowhood, and kinship ties to other accused women shaped who was targeted, consistent with local social-conflict dynamics. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_05` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or court continuity, so does not bear on the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | + | Supports the idea that marginalized demographic categories (poor, widowed, single women) were structurally more vulnerable to accusation. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Links Sabbath invention and demonologists' prurient fascination with female sexuality to the diabolism narrative that fed misogynistic theorizing. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_06` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Describes elite demonological imagery rather than neighbour-level accusation dynamics. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_06` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or survival of court documents. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_07` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Describes gendered patterns in type of harm alleged but says nothing about demonological treatises or judicial theory. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_07` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Shows gendered division of maleficium targets (women accused of harming children, men more associated with property/livestock harm) consistent with local social-role-based accusation dynamics. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_07` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or court continuity, only the content of accusations. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_07` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of widowhood, economic marginalization, or demographic structure, only gendered accusation content. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_08` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows male-majority regions existed despite being within European demonological print culture, weakening claim that treatise diffusion alone drove female-share rise. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_08` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage only documents regional gender ratios, not the accusation mechanisms behind them, so it doesn't directly test local dynamics. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_08` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Gives comparative percentages but no information on record-keeping practices or survival that would support or refute an artifact explanation. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_08` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic data (widowhood, marginalization) given for these regions, so it neither confirms nor disconfirms the demographic-vulnerability mechanism. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_09` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Styria and Carinthia were within the demonology-saturated Holy Roman Empire yet remained male-majority, undercutting a simple text-diffusion causal story. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_09` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | The passage names the region's gender skew but gives no detail on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity to test local dynamics. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_09` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No information is given about record-keeping practices or court continuity in Styria/Carinthia to assess an artifact explanation. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_09` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic data on widowhood or female economic status in these provinces is provided to evaluate this hypothesis. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_10` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows male-majority regions defined by occupational/marginal-status categories (healers, vagrants) rather than demonological gender theory, undercutting misogynist-text diffusion as the operative mechanism there. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_10` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Points to local social roles (healer, outsider status, occupation) as the basis for accusation, consistent with bottom-up local dynamics rather than top-down doctrine. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_10` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or documentation consistency, so it neither supports nor undermines the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_10` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Male witches' vulnerability here stems from occupational/marginal-status roles (healer, vagrant, outsider), not from the female demographic marginalization mechanism posited by H4. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_11` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Does not address demonological text diffusion or judicial theory, only the practical role and arrest basis of male cunning-folk. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_11` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Suggests local reputational logic (healer-equals-harmer belief) rather than demonology drove male defendants' arrests, fitting bottom-up accusation dynamics. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_11` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not speak to record-keeping practices or court continuity, only to the social role of male practitioners. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_11` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Irrelevant to demographic/economic vulnerability of women; concerns male healers' occupational exposure to accusation. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_12` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Describes procedural/legal system differences, not the diffusion or influence of demonological texts, so it does not bear on misogynist doctrine as cause. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_12` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Public vs private accuser systems structurally shape whether local neighbour/household disputes could even initiate prosecution, supporting a local-dynamics mechanism varying by region. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_12` | `H3_recording_artifact` | + | Shows systematic cross-regional differences in legal procedure (torture, accuser type) that could produce differing conviction/gender patterns independent of true accusation-rate change, supporting a confound distinct from pure record-keeping but analogous in effect. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_12` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Legal procedural contrasts say nothing about demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_13` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Debunking the nine million figure does not bear on whether demonology drove gender composition of accusations. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_13` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | The scale of total executions is irrelevant to whether local disputes drove the gender shift. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_13` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | This addresses total death-toll inflation, not record-keeping shifts behind the male-to-female composition change. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_13` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | The magnitude of the nine million myth has no bearing on demographic vulnerability explanations for gender share. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_14` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | A total execution count for Germany does not speak to gender composition or demonological causation. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_14` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Aggregate execution numbers say nothing about neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_14` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | Confirms Germany's outsized, well-documented execution total dominates pooled European figures, supporting the concern that aggregate gender-share estimates are skewed by one region's large sample. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_14` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | A raw execution-count estimate does not address demographic vulnerability or widowhood trends. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_15` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | The revised execution total does not speak to demonological texts' causal role in gender composition. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_15` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | A revised total execution count does not bear on whether local disputes drove gender share. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_15` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | This is about overall magnitude, not about whether gender-share shift is a recording artifact. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_15` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | The revised total number of executions says nothing about demographic vulnerability of women specifically. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_16` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Addresses trial/execution rates generally, not the mechanism of demonological theory shaping gender targeting. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_16` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Does not speak to whether local disputes or widowhood status differed between early and peak periods. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_16` | `H3_recording_artifact` | + | Reminds that most accused were never tried and most tried never executed, implying surviving records capture only a fraction of actual accusations, supporting a record-artifact caveat. |
| `ev_c554d530c590_16` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic/economic vulnerability trends among women. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Confirms the pre-shift baseline but does not show whether demonological text circulation correlates with the later change in Valais or elsewhere. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_01` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Gives gender ratio but no information on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity to test local dynamics. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | An 'estimated' two-thirds/one-third split does not address whether differing record-keeping practices between periods explain the later shift. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic or economic data on widowhood or marginalization is given, so it cannot test this hypothesis. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Gives only a victim count from Fründ's account, with no gender breakdown or mention of demonological theory's role. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | No information on accusers, household conflict, or widowhood status is provided, only a tally of burnings. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | The passage is a chronicle estimate, not evidence about record-keeping continuity or court practice across periods. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic or economic detail about the accused is given to bear on vulnerability claims. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows heresy/diabolical pact framing already present in 1428 Valais trials with male-majority defendants, predating Malleus and undermining a simple link between pact narrative and female targeting. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage gives no information about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices or court continuity, so it is silent on this hypothesis. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic or economic data on widowhood or marginalization is given here. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | This passage describes the evidentiary threshold for arrest via neighbour gossip, not demonological theory's role in gender targeting. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_04` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Confirms that informal neighbour slander, a core local accusation dynamic, was sufficient to trigger prosecution regardless of social rank. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_04` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Describes an evidentiary/procedural rule rather than record-keeping practices or sample composition, so it does not bear on the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Says nothing about widowhood, economic marginalization, or demographic shifts underlying vulnerability. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Describes procedural torture thresholds, not demonological theory about women's nature. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Shows accusation chains built on denunciations by multiple named accusers, consistent with local social-network dynamics driving prosecution. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_05` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Describes evidentiary/legal procedure, not record-keeping practice differences across courts or periods. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of gender, age, widowhood, or demographic/economic status of the accused. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Shows early demonological sourcing predates peak persecution but does not establish causal reach into trial practice or gender-share correlation. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_06` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage concerns elite textual transmission, not neighbour/household accusation dynamics. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_06` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Irrelevant to court record-keeping practices or survival bias. |
| `ev_cd8d10389080_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic conditions affecting women. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Total execution estimate does not address demonological text penetration or gender composition mechanisms. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_01` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Aggregate death toll figure says nothing about local conflict dynamics or accuser identity. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | This passage addresses overall scale of executions, not record-keeping practices affecting gender ratios. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Total victim count does not speak to demographic/economic vulnerability trends among women. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Scandinavian male-majority regions undercut a uniform demonological-misogyny effect across Protestant Europe. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage gives only aggregate gender ratios, not the underlying local conflict dynamics that would support or refute this hypothesis. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Notes regional variation but does not address record-keeping practices or sample representativeness. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic data on widowhood or economic marginalization is given to support or refute this hypothesis. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Confirms the aggregate ~85-90% female share but says nothing about demonological texts as the mechanism driving it. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Establishes the magnitude of the gender gap but offers no data on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | A pan-European pooled figure neither confirms nor rules out that record-keeping changes or a few large samples drive the apparent female-majority. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Gives the overall male/female execution split but contains no demographic or economic variables linking it to widowhood or marginalization. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Female-driven accusation suggests grassroots social dynamics rather than elite demonological theory as the operative mechanism. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_04` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Documents that female accusers were central in English witch complaints, supporting the local-dynamics mechanism linking women to women's prosecution. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_04` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Says nothing about record-keeping practices or court continuity, so does not bear on the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not address demographic or economic marginalization trends, only accuser identity. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Debunks the notion that women's threatening expertise (midwifery) drove misogynistic targeting, undercutting one popular narrative tied to demonological framing. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Shows midwives acted alongside accusers in community identification of witches, consistent with bottom-up, accuser-driven local dynamics rather than elite doctrine. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_05` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping or court documentation practices. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Does not speak to demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Refuting Murray's pagan-cult thesis does not bear on whether demonological treatises drove the gender shift. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_06` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Debunking pagan-cult survival says nothing about neighbour/household accusation dynamics or their timing. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_06` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | This passage addresses the reality of pagan worship, not record-keeping practices or sample composition. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No bearing on demographic or economic vulnerability explanations; it only dismisses an alternative cultic explanation. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_07` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Spanish Inquisition's lack of witchcraft prosecution doesn't address demonological text influence on female defendant shares elsewhere. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_07` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity in Spain or elsewhere. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_07` | `H3_recording_artifact` | + | Shows institutional/jurisdictional choice (Inquisition treating witchcraft as superstition, not heresy) shaped which cases were ever prosecuted, supporting record-practice confounds. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_07` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No mention of demographic or economic vulnerability of women in Spain. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_08` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Passage describes neighbour-level animus, not demonological theory or elite doctrine. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_08` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Supports neighbour-driven targeting of unattractive/marginal old women as a local social dynamic, though vague and anecdotal. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_08` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Says nothing about record-keeping practices or court documentation changes. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_08` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | + | Hints at vulnerability of old women tied to social marginalization, loosely consistent with demographic vulnerability thesis. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_09` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | A bare national total of accused persons says nothing about demonological text influence or gender composition. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_09` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | The figure does not speak to neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity underlying English prosecutions. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_09` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | A total case count alone cannot show whether record-keeping changes or survival bias affected the observed gender shift. |
| `ev_bf53a223765b_09` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | The passage gives no demographic breakdown by sex or marital status, so it cannot bear on vulnerability claims. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Confirms the 80% female figure but says nothing about whether demonological texts caused it. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Establishes the gender shift magnitude but does not address local conflict mechanisms behind it. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | General aggregate figure across Europe without addressing record-keeping continuity or regional dominance in totals. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Notes the shift's scale but offers no evidence on demographic/economic vulnerability as cause. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Confirms the aggregate female-share figure but says nothing about demonological text penetration as the cause. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Establishes the phenomenon to be explained but offers no data on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | A broad 70-80% figure spanning Europe and England suggests the pattern is not confined to a few unrepresentative large-sample regions, weakening the artifact/dominance explanation. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Confirms the magnitude of female predominance but does not link it to demographic/economic vulnerability factors. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Confirms the existence of male-majority regions but says nothing about demonological-text penetration there. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Lists regional exceptions without describing accuser identity, household conflict, or widowhood patterns. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Describes regional variation as apparently real but does not address record-keeping or court continuity. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Notes male-majority and mixed regions but provides no demographic or economic data to test vulnerability claims. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | This cites a 1970s feminist medical-rivalry thesis about midwife-targeting, not demonological text diffusion or misogynist theology driving gender shares. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_04` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Ehrenreich/English's professional-rivalry claim is a distinct economic-competition thesis, not evidence about neighbour disputes or household conflict dynamics. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_04` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | The passage addresses motive attribution for midwife persecution, not record-keeping practices or survival bias affecting gender-share data. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | This is a claim about deliberate professional elimination, not about structural demographic/economic vulnerability trends among women generally. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Debunking the midwife-hunt myth does not speak to whether demonological texts drove the broader gender shift. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Refuting midwife-targeting as a specific motif neither confirms nor denies the role of neighbour/household conflict dynamics. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_05` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | This concerns a mythologized occupational target, not record-keeping practices affecting gender ratios. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | The passage addresses a specific debunked claim about midwives, not demographic/economic vulnerability patterns generally. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Total victim count estimates do not bear on whether demonological texts drove the gendering of accusations. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_06` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Revised aggregate death toll figures say nothing about neighbour/household dynamics behind individual accusations. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_06` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | This refutes the inflated nine-million popular claim but does not address whether the male-to-female shift itself is a recording artifact. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Correcting the overall victim count does not speak to demographic drivers of female vulnerability to accusation. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_07` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Identifies origin of the nine-million myth but says nothing about demonological text diffusion or gender shares. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_07` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Does not address local accusation dynamics or neighbour/household conflict patterns. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_07` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Debunking an exaggerated death toll does not speak to record-keeping practices behind the 80% gender-share figure. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_07` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No bearing on demographic/economic vulnerability of women as drivers of accusation. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Shows intellectual contestation of Malleus's demonology via a competing medical-gender theory but doesn't measure whether demonological texts actually drove prosecutorial gender shift. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Concerns elite medical/theological debate about witches' nature, not local neighbour or household accusation dynamics. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address court record-keeping practices or sample composition, only intellectual discourse. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Weyer's uterine-melancholy theory is a medical explanation of female susceptibility, not evidence about demographic/economic vulnerability trends. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Wier's skeptical treatises show the demonological literature of the period was contested, not a uniform elite consensus driving prosecutions. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | This passage concerns elite skeptical publishing, not neighbour-level accusation dynamics. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Publication dates of skeptical treatises say nothing about court record-keeping practices. |
| `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Wier's anti-witch-hunt writings do not speak to demographic or economic vulnerability of women. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Describes Sabbat/demonic-pact content typical of demonological framing but gives no gender data to link it to the female-share shift. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Lists maleficia alongside diabolism but says nothing about accuser identity, household conflict, or widowhood. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Describes charge content under torture, not record-keeping continuity or sample composition, so it doesn't bear on artifact claims. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic or marital-status information is given about the accused. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Indiscriminate arrest by age/class/sex in this episode contradicts a theory-driven focus on women as especially diabolically susceptible. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | - | Indiscriminate targeting across sex and age undercuts the claim that local dynamics systematically selected older/widowed women. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | This describes arrest practice, not record-keeping or survival differences, so it does not bear on the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Arrests spanning all ages and classes indiscriminately suggest no special demographic targeting of economically marginal women in this episode. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Gives yearly case counts without any gender breakdown or mention of demonological influence, so it cannot support or undercut this hypothesis. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | No information on accusers, household conflict, or age/widowhood is provided, only aggregate case totals. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | - | The passage itself flags that 'these are only the confirmed cases and are not complete,' illustrating record incompleteness that could inflate or distort apparent trends. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic or economic data on defendants' marital/widowhood status is given, only yearly totals of charges. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Describes elite/social composition of defendants in two prince-bishoprics but says nothing about demonological text influence or gender share. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Notes clerical/secular elite and child defendants but does not address neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity relevant to gender dynamics. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Highlights differing targets of prosecution across courts but offers no evidence on record-keeping practices or data representativeness. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Elite and child defendants in these specific hunts do not speak to demographic vulnerability of widowed/marginalized women. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Execution of male officials alongside female kin shows demonological misogyny alone did not confine targeting to women. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Family-based prosecution of an official, his wife, daughter and son suggests household/kin-network accusation cascades rather than pure gender targeting. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Passage gives no information on record-keeping practices or court continuity. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No data on widowhood, economic marginalization, or demographic trends is presented. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Mere uncertainty about total execution counts says nothing about whether demonological ideology drove gender composition. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Undocumented execution totals do not speak to whether neighbour/household conflict dynamics explain the gender shift. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06` | `H3_recording_artifact` | + | Acknowledged incompleteness of documentation directly supports the possibility that apparent gender ratios are skewed by uneven record survival. |
| `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Unknown total execution counts do not bear on demographic/economic vulnerability as a driver of female accusation share. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Demonological Pact theology reached Iceland via clergy yet Iceland stayed male-majority, undercutting the claim that text diffusion drives female-share increase. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage says nothing about neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity in Iceland. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No information here about record-keeping practices or court continuity in Iceland. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Passage is about theological diffusion, not demographic or economic status of women. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Iceland's male-majority prosecutions stem from a legal ban on magical books (a male-associated practice) rather than demonological misogyny theory, undermining H1 as universal driver. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | This passage describes a statutory legal target (book ownership) rather than neighbour/household conflict dynamics, so it doesn't speak to local accusation mechanisms. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | The explanation concerns substantive legal targeting, not changes in record-keeping practice, so it is silent on the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | The male-majority pattern here is explained by legal targeting of book ownership, not demographic/economic vulnerability of women, so it doesn't bear on H4. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Iceland's near-total male-majority persists despite European demonological literature circulating to some degree, undercutting misogyny theory as universal driver. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage gives execution counts only, no detail on neighbour disputes, household conflict, or accuser identity to assess this mechanism. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Execution tallies don't address record-keeping practices or survival bias, so they don't speak to an artifact explanation. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic data on widowhood or female economic marginalization in Iceland is given to test this hypothesis. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Iceland's male-majority trials despite general European demonological currents undercuts misogyny-driven theory as universal driver. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage notes gender composition and cultural view of magic but gives no detail on local accuser/household dynamics. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Does not address record-keeping practices, so neither supports nor refutes the artifact explanation. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | A persistent male-majority region suggests demographic vulnerability of women was not a sufficient driver everywhere. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | - | Shows Iceland's male-majority stemmed from local cultural association of magic with literate men, not from demonological misogyny theory which was arguably equally available yet did not shift gender share. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | + | Supports local accusation dynamics thesis by tying Iceland's gendered pattern to specific local institutional/cultural factors (male literacy and monopoly on learned magic) rather than imported demonology. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Passage addresses underlying cultural causes of gendered magic association, not court record-keeping practices, so it does not bear on the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | - | Attributes Iceland's male association with magic to educational/institutional access rather than demographic vulnerability of women, offering an alternative explanation that sidelines demographic factors. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Iceland shows substantial demonological text circulation (1627/1630 treatises, 1617 Danish Witchcraft Act adopted) yet remained a male-majority prosecution region, directly disconfirming the text-penetration-to-female-share link. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | Passage concerns textual/legal diffusion of demonology, not neighbour disputes or household conflict dynamics, so it does not bear on this hypothesis. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No information here about court record-keeping practices or sample representativeness. |
| `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | Passage is about publication and legal adoption of demonology texts, not demographic or economic status of women. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | -- | Burgundy's Parlement, in a high-demonological-literature region of France, shows only 48% female defendants, far below the 80% peak figure, undercutting the misogyny-driven account. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | The passage gives only aggregate gender share with no data on accuser identity, widowhood, or household conflict to test this mechanism. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01` | `H3_recording_artifact` | + | A near-even gender split in this large, continuously documented jurisdiction suggests the 80% aggregate may be skewed by other unrepresentative regions rather than reflecting a uniform shift. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic or economic data on widowhood or marginalization is given for Burgundy to assess this hypothesis. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | + | Finland's near-even 51% split (far below the 80% peak-period female share) matches its low demonological-text penetration, consistent with the misogyny thesis's predicted regional variation. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | The passage gives only aggregate counts and percentage, with no detail on neighbour disputes, widowhood, or accuser identity to assess local dynamics. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | No information on court record-keeping practices or survival is given, so this does not bear on the artifact hypothesis. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic data on widowhood or economic marginalization in Finland is provided here. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_03` | `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | Bare numeric fragment with no mention of demonological texts or their circulation, so it cannot support or refute misogyny-driven diffusion. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_03` | `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | No information on accuser identity, household conflict, or widowhood status accompanies these counts. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_03` | `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | Without context on which court or record type these figures come from, record-keeping continuity cannot be assessed. |
| `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_03` | `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | No demographic data on widowhood or economic marginalization is given to link to the figures. |

### Causal ledger

What each passage's evidence establishes about causation, from a closed
vocabulary. An empty entry is the ordinary answer: most passages report an
association, and saying so is a result rather than an omission.

- `ev_dc904403b24e_01` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_02` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_03` — mechanism
- `ev_dc904403b24e_04` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_05` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_06` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_07` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_08` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_09` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_10` — temporality
- `ev_dc904403b24e_11` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_dc904403b24e_12` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_02` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_03` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_04` — temporality
- `ev_8a5c677af125_05` — mechanism
- `ev_8a5c677af125_06` — controls
- `ev_8a5c677af125_07` — temporality
- `ev_8a5c677af125_08` — temporality
- `ev_8a5c677af125_09` — mechanism
- `ev_8a5c677af125_10` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_11` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_12` — temporality
- `ev_8a5c677af125_13` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_14` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_15` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_16` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_17` — mechanism
- `ev_8a5c677af125_18` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_19` — mechanism
- `ev_8a5c677af125_20` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_21` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_22` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_8a5c677af125_23` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_c554d530c590_01` — temporality
- `ev_c554d530c590_02` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_c554d530c590_03` — temporality
- `ev_c554d530c590_04` — mechanism
- `ev_c554d530c590_05` — mechanism
- `ev_c554d530c590_06` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_c554d530c590_07` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_c554d530c590_08` — controls
- `ev_c554d530c590_09` — natural_experiment
- `ev_c554d530c590_10` — natural_experiment
- `ev_c554d530c590_11` — mechanism
- `ev_c554d530c590_12` — controls
- `ev_c554d530c590_13` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_c554d530c590_14` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_c554d530c590_15` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_c554d530c590_16` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_cd8d10389080_01` — temporality
- `ev_cd8d10389080_02` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_cd8d10389080_03` — temporality
- `ev_cd8d10389080_04` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_cd8d10389080_05` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_cd8d10389080_06` — temporality
- `ev_bf53a223765b_01` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_bf53a223765b_02` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_bf53a223765b_03` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_bf53a223765b_04` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_bf53a223765b_05` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_bf53a223765b_06` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_bf53a223765b_07` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_bf53a223765b_08` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_bf53a223765b_09` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_04` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_05` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_06` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_07` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05` — mechanism
- `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01` — temporality
- `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02` — mechanism
- `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03` — natural_experiment
- `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04` — natural_experiment
- `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05` — mechanism
- `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06` — temporality
- `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01` — controls, natural_experiment
- `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02` — no causal criterion named; association only
- `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_03` — no causal criterion named; association only

And what each finding claims of it:

- `fnd_9533748e4ea645c3_00` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_5a646aa6269ed697_01` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_e7538ab344e43e8c_02` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_cffd104faf5e1794_03` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_58ceed68e23d74a3_04` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_bd345674064aaf85_05` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_c400e7c659b51cab_06` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_2ad70d0f4c23646e_07` — temporality, mechanism
- `fnd_8c04c0215a11f8a2_08` — mechanism, natural_experiment
- `fnd_066b5506a41a5b1c_09` — controls, natural_experiment, mechanism
- `fnd_9a86b153880e9c30_10` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_c4bd941fbd80bd02_11` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_3e7e3fe1a6b1ce32_12` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_65138c03c2f5f048_13` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_1d1b53026f75c521_14` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_bc0602c1d01955ee_15` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_7bff77fa6a0ad87d_00` — not a causal claim
- `fnd_21642f4c6e3d761e_01` — not a causal claim

## 11. Conclusions

There is **no run-level verdict** in this run's state — no field holds one —
and this renderer does not invent one. What follows is what the run recorded,
each claim carrying the kind of claim it is.

*This run does not record which stage minted each finding.*

`ResearchState.findings` is a single tuple with no stage marker, so a reloaded
run cannot separate the synthesis from the later gaps sweep. The split between
this section and §14 therefore rests on each finding's own status, which is a
property of the claim, not on which stage produced it.

### What the run recorded

- `fnd_9533748e4ea645c3_00` [observed] Across the pooled European record, women formed a large majority of witchcraft defendants in the 16th-17th century peak, with figures reported at \>70% Europe-wide, 70-80% for Europe and England, ~80% for those tried and executed in the XVIth-XVIIth centuries, 84% in Scotland, and 71-92% across the most intense hunting years (1570-1660), with men only ~10-15% of executions; the phenomenon to be explained is therefore real at aggregate level, but it is an average over a wide band, not a uniform rate. Cites `ev_dc904403b24e_01`, `ev_dc904403b24e_02`, `ev_c554d530c590_02`, `ev_bf53a223765b_03`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02`.
- `fnd_5a646aa6269ed697_01` [observed] That aggregate conceals systematic regional variation large enough to break any single-cause account: Iceland ran ~10% female (20 of 22 executed were men), Muscovy, Normandy, Estonia and Russia were male-majority, Styria and Carinthia inside the Holy Roman Empire were male-majority, Finland ran 51% female (316/325), the Parlement of Burgundy 48% over 1580-1642, and some Scandinavian jurisdictions showed a slight male majority — i.e. several large jurisdictions sat at or below 50% female during exactly the decades when Germany sat near 80%. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_08`, `ev_c554d530c590_09`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_03`, `ev_bf53a223765b_02`, `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01`, `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_02`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04`, `ev_c554d530c590_02`.
- `fnd_e7538ab344e43e8c_02` [observed] H1's content premise is fully established: the Malleus and the demonological tradition it founded explicitly theorized women as the paradigmatic witch — frailer sex entrapped by the Devil, 'defective in all the powers of both soul and body', quicker to doubt in faith, the title itself feminine — the work argued witches were more often women and urged magistrates to adopt its procedures, Kramer's own confirmed trials at Ravensburg and Innsbruck targeted women almost exclusively, it ran 28 editions between 1486 and 1600 on Gutenberg-era presses, was accepted by Catholics and Protestants alike, and later German demonology never challenged the premise that women were more inclined to witchcraft. Cites `ev_dc904403b24e_03`, `ev_8a5c677af125_02`, `ev_8a5c677af125_13`, `ev_8a5c677af125_14`, `ev_8a5c677af125_15`, `ev_8a5c677af125_16`, `ev_8a5c677af125_17`, `ev_8a5c677af125_19`, `ev_8a5c677af125_21`, `ev_8a5c677af125_22`, `ev_c554d530c590_03`, `ev_c554d530c590_04`, `ev_c554d530c590_06`.
- `fnd_cffd104faf5e1794_03` [inferred] H1's causal claim — that demonological diffusion was the primary driver of the ~80% female share — meets its own stated falsifier and must be rejected as the primary mechanism: Iceland had Christian pact-demonology introduced by Danish-trained clergy, two domestic witchcraft books (1627, 1630) and the Danish Witchcraft Act of 1617 imposed in 1630, yet executed 20 men to 2 women; the Parlement of Burgundy, in France, ran 48% female across 1580-1642; Styria and Carinthia inside the demonology-saturated Empire stayed male-majority; and Normandy, a French region, was male-majority. High textual penetration coexists with male-majority outcomes in multiple independent jurisdictions. Cites `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_01`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_06`, `ev_falsify_6b44a26db45f_257679a47a6627bd32b1c3a9_01`, `ev_c554d530c590_09`, `ev_c554d530c590_08`.
- `fnd_58ceed68e23d74a3_04` [inferred] The timing and reception record compounds the problem for H1: the Malleus triggered no prosecutions where none had existed, its Italian publication was followed by a noticeable fall in witchcraft cases, the Inquisition denied it any authority and censured Kramer within years, the Spanish Inquisition in 1538 warned members against believing it, Wier published two book-length attacks in 1563 and 1582 offering a rival medical aetiology, and MacCulloch treats it as only one factor among popular superstition and Reformation tensions — so the literature was contested and unevenly authoritative rather than a uniform elite programme. The one correlational datum in its favour, that roughly three quarters of those prosecuted after publication were women, is bare temporal association across a period in which many other things changed. Cites `ev_8a5c677af125_07`, `ev_8a5c677af125_08`, `ev_8a5c677af125_06`, `ev_8a5c677af125_05`, `ev_8a5c677af125_20`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_08`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_09`, `ev_8a5c677af125_12`, `ev_8a5c677af125_04`.
- `fnd_bd345674064aaf85_05` [inferred] The 'early male-majority baseline' that both H1 and H2 presuppose is itself unstable and the two sources disagree: Valais is estimated at two-thirds male, while Dauphiné 1424-48, pre-Malleus, was already 72% female among 250-plus tried, and a third account puts men at 'up to 40 per cent' in the first period. What separates them is evidentiary type — the Dauphiné figure is a count over a defined tried population, whereas the Valais split is an estimate resting on a chronicler (Fründ) who reported a conspiracy of '700' witches and 'more than 200' burned. Weight should follow the counted sample, which means the female skew partly predates the demonological corpus. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_01`, `ev_cd8d10389080_01`, `ev_cd8d10389080_02`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_01`.
- `fnd_c400e7c659b51cab_06` [inferred] The heresy/pact framing does not by itself select for female defendants, which cuts against the framing-shift clause inside H2 as much as against H1: the Valais victims were charged with murder, heresy, sorcery and pact with the devil in a male-majority trial series of the 1420s-30s, and at Bamberg in the 1620s the full diabolic repertoire (Sabbath, intercourse with Satan, desecration) was extracted under torture from men and women of all ages and classes indiscriminately, including the official Georg Haan with his wife, daughter and son, and Johannes Junius with his wife. Cites `ev_cd8d10389080_03`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_01`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04`.
- `fnd_2ad70d0f4c23646e_07` [observed] The evidence favours H2 as the operative selection mechanism for who was named: most accused were denounced by members of their own community, the public talk or slander of three or four neighbours sufficed for arrest even of nobles and denunciation by five to ten qualified persons opened the way to torture, the accused were typically people with argumentative or antisocial reputations and over forty (60%+ in Scotland) with correspondingly longer histories of neighbourly conflict, a concrete case (Agnes Finnie, Edinburgh, accused 1643 after quarrels preceded her neighbours' illness, executed 1645) exhibits the dispute-then-misfortune-then-accusation sequence, in England most accusers and written complainants were themselves women, midwives worked alongside accusers rather than being targeted, and men characteristically entered the dock through kinship to an already-accused woman. Cites `ev_dc904403b24e_08`, `ev_dc904403b24e_09`, `ev_dc904403b24e_07`, `ev_dc904403b24e_10`, `ev_dc904403b24e_04`, `ev_cd8d10389080_04`, `ev_cd8d10389080_05`, `ev_bf53a223765b_04`, `ev_bf53a223765b_05`, `ev_bf53a223765b_08`, `ev_c554d530c590_05`. Causal claim, on: temporality, mechanism.
- `fnd_8c04c0215a11f8a2_08` [inferred] The male-majority regions are explained by local occupational and cultural coding of magic rather than by absent demonology, which is the strongest positive case for a local-dynamics account: in Iceland magic was viewed favourably and had become associated with men because convents and Latin schools admitted almost only men, and the statute banning ownership of magical books produced an unusually large number of male executions; in Muscovy (vagrants, immigrants, fugitive serfs, non-Christian outsiders) and Normandy (shepherds, priests, blacksmiths) the common thread among male suspects was that they were magical healers; and across Europe male cunning folk, Hexenbanner and benandanti were arrested on the belief that whoever knows how to heal knows how to harm. The same bottom-up logic that names quarrelsome old women in Scotland names literate or healing men where magic is coded male. Cites `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_02`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_03`, `ev_c554d530c590_10`, `ev_c554d530c590_11`. Causal claim, on: mechanism, natural_experiment.
- `fnd_066b5506a41a5b1c_09` [inferred] Procedural and institutional structure, not text circulation, is the variable that best sorts the jurisdictions that disagree: Roman-law continental courts used public accusers, professional judges and torture while northern systems (Scotland partly excepted) required private accusers and barred torture; witchcraft was crimen exceptum in continental and Roman law, suspending normal safeguards; the Malleus was adopted by secular courts and repudiated by inquisitorial ones; and the Spanish Inquisition treated witchcraft as superstition rather than heresy and so rarely pursued it. These differences govern which denunciations could enter a court and how far cascades could run, and they track the regional gender spread more closely than demonological availability does. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_12`, `ev_8a5c677af125_23`, `ev_8a5c677af125_05`, `ev_8a5c677af125_06`, `ev_bf53a223765b_07`, `ev_8a5c677af125_09`, `ev_8a5c677af125_10`, `ev_8a5c677af125_11`. Causal claim, on: controls, natural_experiment, mechanism.
- `fnd_9a86b153880e9c30_10` [inferred] H4 is supported only in its age-and-poverty component and is disconfirmed in its widowhood component: most historians place old, poor, widowed or single women at highest risk, 60%+ of Scottish accused were over forty when life expectancy was low, 29% came from poorer backgrounds with little access to land, work or permanent housing, and old women could be persecuted merely for being unattractive — but the one marital-status sample available shows 245 married against 67 widowed and 7 unmarried, so widows were about a fifth of the Scottish accused with known status, and the persistence of male-majority regions such as Iceland shows no demographic mechanism is sufficient on its own. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_05`, `ev_dc904403b24e_07`, `ev_dc904403b24e_11`, `ev_bf53a223765b_08`, `ev_dc904403b24e_05`, `ev_dc904403b24e_06`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_04`, `ev_falsify_8b845f0e5990_46451bd4b78b1c18b5f2df26_05`.
- `fnd_c4bd941fbd80bd02_11` [inferred] H3 survives as a real caveat on precision but not as an explanation of the shift: 1,572 Scottish cases lack any recorded marital status, Bamberg's total executions are unknown because only some were documented and its yearly series is explicitly incomplete, Europe-wide execution estimates of 30,000-60,000 openly include cases where no records exist, most accused were never tried and most tried were never executed outside panics, and Germany alone contributed more than twenty thousand executions — more than all other parts of Europe combined — so pooled totals are dominated by one region. Against that, the female majority is recorded independently in Scotland (84%), England, and across a 71-92% band in many jurisdictions, which is too broad to be manufactured by one region's sample. Cites `ev_dc904403b24e_06`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_03`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_06`, `ev_bf53a223765b_01`, `ev_c554d530c590_16`, `ev_c554d530c590_14`, `ev_c554d530c590_02`, `ev_dc904403b24e_02`, `ev_bf53a223765b_02`, `ev_f76b5fdcf034_02`.
- `fnd_3e7e3fe1a6b1ce32_12` [inferred] Large panics behave differently from endemic prosecution and should not be pooled with it when testing any of these hypotheses: outside panics most of those tried were not executed, whereas in the Bamberg commission arrests ran indiscriminately across sex, age and class, Würzburg swept in clerical elites and many children while Bamberg took secular adult elites, and whole families including adult sons were burned — panic episodes dissolve precisely the age, sex and marginality profile that characterises ordinary accusation. Cites `ev_c554d530c590_16`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_02`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_04`, `ev_62d74fa6ae91_05`.
- `fnd_bc0602c1d01955ee_15` [hypothesized] A scope-conditioned reading reconciles the conflict: demonological misogyny supplied a legitimating vocabulary that could amplify and lethalise female-skewed accusation where secular Roman-law courts with torture and crimen exceptum procedure already received community denunciations, but it did not create the skew and could not override a local culture that coded magical competence as male — so the predicted correlation between text penetration and female share should appear only within the subset of jurisdictions sharing that procedural profile, and should vanish or invert outside it.

### How the explanations stood at the end

In the roster's own order, deliberately not sorted by any summed score.

| Explanation | ++ | + | 0 | - | -- |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| `H1_demonological_misogyny` | 0 | 20 | 47 | 17 | 5 |
| `H2_local_accusation_dynamics` | 0 | 19 | 68 | 2 | 0 |
| `H3_recording_artifact` | 0 | 7 | 77 | 5 | 0 |
| `H4_demographic_vulnerability` | 0 | 5 | 77 | 7 | 0 |

## 12. Confidence Assessment

Every level below is **computed** from this run's own ledger: how many
passages back the finding, how many distinct *origins* those passages trace
to, and whether the counter-search came back holding anything.
**No stage was asked for this label**, and no model typed one. Origins rather
than hosts, because four hundred sites paraphrasing one blog post are one
source; and a source whose provenance could not be established never raises a
level, since unknown provenance is unknown independence.

A finding that cites nothing reads `unknown`. That is the honest result and
not a missing measurement: **nothing in this run backs it** yet.

| Finding | Level | What that is counted from |
|---|---|---|
| `fnd_9533748e4ea645c3_00` | unknown | 6 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 4 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_5a646aa6269ed697_01` | unknown | 9 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 5 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_e7538ab344e43e8c_02` | unknown | 13 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 3 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_cffd104faf5e1794_03` | unknown | 6 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 3 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_58ceed68e23d74a3_04` | unknown | 9 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 2 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_bd345674064aaf85_05` | unknown | 4 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 3 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_c400e7c659b51cab_06` | unknown | 5 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 2 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_2ad70d0f4c23646e_07` | unknown | 11 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 4 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_8c04c0215a11f8a2_08` | unknown | 6 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 2 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_066b5506a41a5b1c_09` | unknown | 8 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 3 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_9a86b153880e9c30_10` | unknown | 8 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 4 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_c4bd941fbd80bd02_11` | unknown | 10 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 5 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_3e7e3fe1a6b1ce32_12` | unknown | 4 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found; 2 source(s) could not be traced to an origin. |
| `fnd_65138c03c2f5f048_13` | unknown | 0 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found. |
| `fnd_1d1b53026f75c521_14` | unknown | 0 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found. |
| `fnd_bc0602c1d01955ee_15` | unknown | 0 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found. |
| `fnd_7bff77fa6a0ad87d_00` | unknown | 0 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found. |
| `fnd_21642f4c6e3d761e_01` | unknown | 0 passage(s) tracing to 0 distinct origin(s); counter-evidence was found. |

## 13. Limitations

### Audit measurements

Counted from the ledger rather than answered by a model, and printed even
when the result is zero. Provenance tracing and primary-data classification
are separate measurements: reaching an upstream origin does not make a source
primary data, and a primary-data source can still have unresolved provenance.

- Origin tracing: 0/11 snapshot(s) reached an upstream origin (0.00%).
- Primary-data share: 0/11 assessed source(s) were assigned stage 9's `primary_data` tier (0.00%).

#### Distinct source families behind each asserted finding

Repeated passages and several URLs from one family still count once. Unknown
findings are open questions rather than conclusions, so they are not rows here.

| Finding | Distinct source families |
|---|---|
| `fnd_9533748e4ea645c3_00` | 4 |
| `fnd_5a646aa6269ed697_01` | 5 |
| `fnd_e7538ab344e43e8c_02` | 3 |
| `fnd_cffd104faf5e1794_03` | 3 |
| `fnd_58ceed68e23d74a3_04` | 2 |
| `fnd_bd345674064aaf85_05` | 3 |
| `fnd_c400e7c659b51cab_06` | 1 |
| `fnd_2ad70d0f4c23646e_07` | 4 |
| `fnd_8c04c0215a11f8a2_08` | 2 |
| `fnd_066b5506a41a5b1c_09` | 3 |
| `fnd_9a86b153880e9c30_10` | 4 |
| `fnd_c4bd941fbd80bd02_11` | 5 |
| `fnd_3e7e3fe1a6b1ce32_12` | 2 |
| `fnd_bc0602c1d01955ee_15` | 0 |

- Falsification yield: 2/9 adversarial search(es) yielded a snapshot-bound, verified counter-passage (22.22%).

- Excerpt round-trip: 89/90 readable passage(s) survived the verbatim gate (98.89%); 1 were refused and 0 could not be checked.

### Attacks made on this run's own conclusions

- `stp_9e9eb4c9e27e3386_00` [survivorship_bias] against `fnd_9533748e4ea645c3_00`: The aggregated Europe-wide execution and trial totals over-represent formal judicial archives and jurisdictions with high recording rates such as Germany, England, and Scotland, while under-representing informal, summary, or peripheral village proceedings. It fails if: Archival survival is found to systematically skew toward female-dominated formal trials while undocumented summary lynchings or rural magistrate records in central and eastern Europe disproportionately prosecuted men.
- `stp_e070265d45c336c0_01` [measurement_error] against `fnd_5a646aa6269ed697_01`: Comparing jurisdictions using disparate legal stages—such as formal trial counts in Finland versus execution statistics in Iceland—treats differing levels of attrition as equivalent measures of gender prosecution rates. It fails if: Standardizing metrics to a single stage, such as formal accusation or indictment, eliminates the male majority in regions like Finland, Normandy, or Burgundy by showing male drop-off occurred predominantly before sentencing.
- `stp_0e2581983c5f2ad0_02` [source_dependence] against `fnd_e7538ab344e43e8c_02`: Asserting that post-Malleus German demonology uniformly maintained that women were more inclined to witchcraft relies on prominent canonical treatises while ignoring skeptical legal dissents, parish manuals, and regional judicial instructions. It fails if: Systematic sampling of German university legal consilia and regional judicial manuals reveals substantial elite pushback asserting demonic sorcery was equally practiced by men.
- `stp_27d3eda7e01e1e20_03` [confounding] against `fnd_cffd104faf5e1794_03`: Dismissing demonological diffusion based on Iceland, Normandy, and Burgundy overlooks that intellectual reception is deeply filtered by institutional transmission mechanisms such as judicial universities, secular censorship, and printing density. It fails if: Measures of operational demonological literacy among courtroom judges—rather than mere formal availability of statutory texts—show that the specific misogynistic doctrines were actively rejected or unread by magistrates in those male-majority jurisdictions.
- `stp_c1b9065c54b7285d_04` [alternative_explanation] against `fnd_58ceed68e23d74a3_04`: Inferring that the Italian decline in witchcraft cases post-publication reflects lack of elite authority overlooks the counter-explanation that the Roman Inquisition purposefully centralized jurisdiction to suppress decentralized secular panic. It fails if: Italian archival records indicate that inquisitorial centralization diverted cases into secret penitential channels rather than secular courts, reducing recorded trials without diminishing theological reliance on demonological texts.
- `stp_d88a4c8a8f99c2c6_05` [selection_bias] against `fnd_bd345674064aaf85_05`: Prioritizing the Dauphine count over the Valais estimate assumes Dauphine trial records are geographically and demographically representative of pre-Malleus Alpine witchcraft prosecution. It fails if: Additional surviving early Alpine ecclesiastical trial rolls show that Dauphine was an anomalous urban-adjacent outlier and that rural fifteenth-century trials across the Savoyard and Swiss regions were consistently male-majority.
- `stp_05b61645516cebb0_06` [causal_overreach] against `fnd_c400e7c659b51cab_06`: Concluding that diabolic pact framing does not select for women based on extreme mass panics like Bamberg conflates the terminal snowball phase of torture cascades with initial framing. It fails if: Disaggregating Bamberg and Valais cases by chronological phase demonstrates that the diabolic pact doctrine specifically selected female targets during initial accusations before torture cascades broadened indiscriminately across elites and males.
- `stp_41455f0d2e79530e_07` [generalizability] against `fnd_2ad70d0f4c23646e_07`: Extrapolating the Scottish and English patterns of female accusers, dispute-misfortune sequences, and kin-based male arrests across Europe generalizes findings from common-law and Scottish kirk-session contexts without equivalent continental evidence. It fails if: Continental secular court depositions show that initial denunciations in German and French territories were predominantly driven by male household heads, municipal officials, or feudal lords rather than female neighbors.
- `stp_19f694c3b35e36f6_08` [alternative_explanation] against `fnd_8c04c0215a11f8a2_08`: Attributing male-majority regions solely to occupational or cultural coding of magic ignores broader structural legal mechanisms, such as state focus on political subversion and heresy among vagrants in Muscovy or specific pastoral labor contracts in Normandy. It fails if: Muscovite and Norman court depositions demonstrate that magical healing was culturally associated with both sexes, but state prosecutors specifically targeted mobile, unattached men for political control and fiscal vagrancy.
- `stp_1d8871a65f8313f3_09` [confounding] against `fnd_066b5506a41a5b1c_09`: Claiming procedural structures sort the gender distribution better than demonology fails to account for jurisdictions sharing Roman-law, torture-permitting, crimen exceptum frameworks that produced starkly divergent gender outcomes, such as Germany versus Normandy or Burgundy. It fails if: A matched comparison of procedural rules across French and German provincial parlements reveals identical crimen exceptum and torture guidelines operating alongside drastically different gender ratios.
- `stp_db40f2fad7118b25_10` [selection_bias] against `fnd_9a86b153880e9c30_10`: Rejecting the widowhood component of H4 based on a single Scottish sample of 319 individuals with recorded marital status risks severe selection bias due to non-random recording omissions among marginalized women. It fails if: Reconstruction of missing Scottish demographic profiles using parish death and communion registers demonstrates that the 1,572 unrecorded accused had a widowhood rate exceeding 60 percent.
- `stp_49b740dfbc52bd75_11` [source_dependence] against `fnd_c4bd941fbd80bd02_11`: Discounting H3 by citing broad 71-92% female majorities in England and Scotland treats those regional records as methodologically independent from the record-keeping practices that define German historiography. It fails if: Historiographical audits demonstrate that English assize and Scottish central court surviving rolls systematically privileged property-holding disputes and formal depositions that over-recorded adult female householders while dropping summary male offenses.
- `stp_858d45f36e687f3f_12` [causal_overreach] against `fnd_3e7e3fe1a6b1ce32_12`: Segregating large panics from endemic prosecutions assumes distinct causal mechanisms rather than a continuous progression where identical socio-legal pressures scale upward under administrative stress. It fails if: Quantitative tracking of panic timelines shows that panic cascades operated under identical demographic selection mechanisms until reaching the final three months of judicial breakdown, leaving overall panic demographics over 75 percent female.
- `stp_8a5c050e070aa6cb_13` [causal_overreach] against `fnd_bc0602c1d01955ee_15`: Hypothesizing that demonological misogyny merely amplified bottom-up community denunciations without generating female skew assumes community dispute dynamics were inherently gendered prior to theological influence. It fails if: Pre-demonological dispute records in early medieval secular courts show that communal accusations of harmful maleficio targeted men and women at equal rates before clergy popularized demonological concepts at the parish level.

### Saturation

Measured, never judged. This pipeline retrieves exactly twice, so the only
comparison available is round 1 alone against both rounds combined. Source
exhaustion and information exhaustion are different things, and this measures
the first.

- Round 1 found 6 source family(ies).
- Round 2 found 3, of which 2 were new.
- New-family share of round 2: 0.67.
- Explanations whose counts moved when round 2 was added: `H1_demonological_misogyny`, `H2_local_accusation_dynamics`, `H3_recording_artifact`, `H4_demographic_vulnerability`.
- Saturated by idea.md's rule: no.

### What the sources do not state

- `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` does not state: No named author/historian byline for this specific article is given beyond being a BBC Bitesize resource; methodology of the underlying Survey of Scottish Witchcraft is not detailed; sourcing for some case details (e.g. Janet Horne) is described as 'some accounts' without citation.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article draws broad conclusions (e.g. about why women or older people were accused) based on incomplete or unrecorded data, and explicitly acknowledges 'we really can't answer this question for sure,' showing its own evidence is thinner than some generalisations suggest.
- `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` does not state: Does not state who wrote or edited this specific article version, their credentials, or any editorial review process beyond Wikipedia's general community editing; does not state funding or conflicts of interest.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article itself flags internal disputes among cited historians (e.g., over Sprenger's co-authorship and the Cologne approbation's authenticity) without resolving them, so its own synthesized narrative sometimes asserts more certainty in prose than the underlying contested sources support.
- `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` does not state: No funding source, no original data collection method, no peer-review process for this specific encyclopedia entry, and no description of how cited estimates were derived beyond naming the scholars.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article presents a confident synthetic narrative and specific numeric estimates (e.g., ~40,000 executions) while acknowledging 'admittedly imperfect statistics' and destroyed records, showing some conclusions rest on extrapolation the text itself flags as uncertain.
- `src_c0144672df4e1e6edc3c5579` does not state: The article does not identify its own author(s), does not state any editorial review process, and does not disclose funding or conflicts of interest for the Wikipedia entry itself.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article presents specific figures ('700' conspirators, '200+' burned) drawn from a single 15th-century chronicler's account as if broadly reliable, while itself noting the actual number of victims is unknown—its narrative framing is more confident than the underlying primary source warrants.
- `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` does not state: The article does not cite primary sources, archives, or scholarship underlying its statistics; does not explain how figures were derived or their uncertainty; does not disclose funding or conflicts.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The piece asserts precise-sounding figures (e.g. exact percentages and counts) as settled fact without presenting the evidentiary basis, so the confidence of the claims exceeds what is shown to the reader.
- `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` does not state: The authors' own academic credentials or institutional affiliations are not given beyond being bloggers (La Faucille et le Labo, La Hutte des Classes) and one author's prior book is referenced; no peer review process for this critique is mentioned; translation/publication process via Intransigence is described but not vetted editorially.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The piece concludes broadly that Federici's thesis is unsupported and reflects a political 'sign of the times,' extending beyond the specific factual and methodological errors documented, into a wider ideological argument about Marxism and feminism that is less tightly evidenced than the factual critiques.
- `src_319d97a6b4a85ff2f7cd7220` does not state: Author identity, editorial review process beyond Wikipedia's general policies, funding, and conflicts of interest are not stated. Precise methodology of cited historians for deriving execution numbers is not detailed here.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article presents numeric estimates (e.g., 'est. 900-950' trials, '300-900+' executions, '~1,000 killed') as if settled while also stating documentation is incomplete and numbers are not fully confirmed, revealing a gap between the confidence of summary figures and the acknowledged uncertainty of underlying records.
- `src_7c613ffdcf06b79fd0d7041c` does not state: The source does not state funding, conflicts of interest, peer-review process details beyond journal context, or explicit methodology/selection criteria for sources beyond the reference list.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The abstract makes broad claims about why Murray's theory endured ('emotional nerve') and about modern believers, which are interpretive conclusions not directly tied to a stated evidentiary method beyond literature review.
- `src_90c7d821df3ac8e7cc03cfca` does not state: Exact number of cases examined, specific archival sources/collections consulted, peer-review status of the thesis defense committee, and any conflicts of interest.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The abstract presents a broad interpretive argument about political power and jurisdictional conflict based on a qualitative 'ethnographic' reading of an unspecified set of trial records, without detailing the evidentiary base supporting the scope of the claim.
- `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77` does not state: No named author/editor responsible for content, no peer review process, no explanation of how trial/execution counts were tallied, no discussion of source reliability or disputed cases (e.g., 'unconfirmed' executions noted without resolution).
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article asserts specific, precise figures (120 trials, 22 executions, gender breakdown) while itself flagging reliance on a single source and leaving one execution 'unconfirmed,' suggesting more certainty than its sourcing supports.
- `src_91db37b7ca0b8a3774f4b03c` does not state: No explanation of how underlying primary sources compiled their counts, no discussion of record completeness or bias, no funding or author affiliation, and no analysis of why rates vary so widely between regions.
  - Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The compilation presents cross-regional comparative tables implying broad comparability, but the underlying regions differ vastly in legal system, record-keeping, and time span, which the source does not address.

### Provenance not established

- 11 source(s) could not be traced to an origin.

*This run does not record how each source's provenance was resolved.*

Only the resulting origin id reaches canonical state, so this document
**cannot tell an original source from an untraced one**: both arrive holding
no origin, and unknown provenance is unknown independence.

### Explanations no observation could settle

*This run holds no self-sealing explanations.*

### What the question assumed

- Surviving trial records, though incomplete and unevenly distributed across regions and time, are treated as the best available proxy for actual accusation patterns
- The distinction between heresy-driven and maleficium-driven prosecution is treated as a meaningful and recoverable variable in the historiography, not merely a retrospective analytic construct
- Claims that cannot be checked against surviving quantitative or documentary evidence (e.g., due to lost records or inherently unverifiable scope, such as the full 'nine million' estimate's original sourcing) will be explicitly marked as unverifiable rather than adjudicated true or false
- Female accusers and household-level conflict are assumed to be a legitimate and recordable category distinct from top-down demonological influence, based on existing social-history scholarship on witch trials

### What this document cannot say

*This run does not record any pre-registered probe.*

*This run does not record whether any reviewer approved any gate.*

*This run does not record its own cost or wall-clock time.*

The gate record and the budget counters live in the console and are not
carried by canonical state, so nothing in this document is a claim that a
person reviewed any step of this run.

One more, about this page rather than about the run. No URL written by a
model is a link here: a source's address is printed as text beside the
digest of the bytes that were actually stored, because a clickable target
is a claim that the address resolves to what the run read, and nothing
checked that. An email address typed into a recorded fact is the single
exception a markdown reader may still turn into a link on its own, and it
is not one this renderer can suppress without altering the text it was
given.

## 14. Open Questions

*This run does not record which stage minted each finding.*

As in §11: the split between a conclusion and a gap rests on each finding's
own status, because state carries no marker for which stage minted it.

### Findings this run could not settle

- `fnd_65138c03c2f5f048_13` H2's own falsifier has not been tested by anything in this evidence: no trial sample here compares local social-conflict variables — widowhood rate, age at accusation, accuser identity, proportion of cases originating in neighbour or household dispute — between early male-majority series and peak female-majority series within the same setting. Would be settled by: A case-level dataset from one region coding accuser identity, defendant age, marital status and dispute origin for both an early (pre-1500) and a peak (1560-1650) cohort, so the proportion of conflict-originated accusations can be compared across the two periods.
- `fnd_1d1b53026f75c521_14` H3's decisive test is likewise absent: no continuously operating court with documented stable record-keeping is shown here with a gender series spanning both the early and the peak period, so record-practice change cannot be ruled out as a contributor even though it cannot plausibly carry the whole shift. Would be settled by: A single jurisdiction's unbroken court series with an attested constant registration protocol, reporting defendant sex year by year from the fifteenth century through 1650, plus an account of what share of its original registers survive.
- `fnd_7bff77fa6a0ad87d_00` Whether the scope-conditioned reconciliation holds — that demonological-misogyny content correlates with higher female share only within the subset of jurisdictions sharing Roman-law, public-accuser, torture-permitting, crimen-exceptum procedure, and that the correlation weakens or inverts outside that subset — is not tested by anything in the evidence assembled; no dataset here cross-tabulates text penetration, procedural type, and gender share together for the same set of jurisdictions. Would be settled by: A comparative table or study classifying multiple jurisdictions simultaneously by (a) degree of demonological-text circulation/judicial use, (b) procedural type (Roman-law/torture/public-accuser vs. private-accuser/no-torture), and (c) resulting female defendant share, so the predicted interaction effect could be checked rather than assumed.
- `fnd_21642f4c6e3d761e_01` Whether the English finding that most witchcraft accusers and written complainants were women generalizes to other high-female-share jurisdictions (Germany, Scotland) or is instead a local English peculiarity is unresolved; no accuser-gender data exists here for any continental jurisdiction. Would be settled by: Accuser/complainant gender breakdowns for trial samples in Germany, Scotland, or other high-female-share continental jurisdictions, comparable to the English data, to test whether female-on-female accusation is a general mechanism or an English-specific pattern.

### Explanations nothing has weighed

A live explanation no passage declared a bearing on. This is not the same as
an explanation every passage found non-discriminating, which is a finding.

*This run holds no explanations nothing has weighed.*

### Parts of the question no passage answers

- `SQ15` — What is the evidentiary basis for Federici's capitalism/primitive-accumulation thesis linking witch hunts to economic transformation, and what is the current scholarly verdict on its accuracy?
- `SQ18` — What remains unknown or unresolved in the historiography regarding the causes of the gender-share shift and the exceptions to it, given the limitations of surviving trial records?

### Ambiguities the question recorded

- Whether 'drove' the shift should be read as primary causation, necessary condition, or merely correlated/contributing factor — this changes what counts as confirming or disconfirming evidence
- Whether regional trial-record samples (often small, non-random, and unevenly surviving) can support population-level gender-share estimates at all, or only localized claims
- Whether 'popular claims' (nine million, midwife hunt, etc.) should be verdicted against the best current scholarly consensus or against the original claimants' own evidentiary standards
- Whether shifts in recording practice (e.g., which courts kept records, what charges were logged) confound apparent shifts in actual accusation gender ratios

## 15. Sources

*This run does not record which query found each source.*

Retrieval keeps no link from a search to the sources it returned, and this
renderer will not invent one; §4's searches and the list below cannot be
joined by anything in this document.

### Snapshotted sources

Bytes were fetched, hashed and stored for each of these. Only these can
support a claim.

#### `src_89f389155fa83d09413dfaf8` — What sort of people were accused of being witches? - BBC Bitesize

- URL: `https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z9y7m39`
- Retrieval round: 1.
- Source family: `web:bbc.co.uk`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `dc904403b24e97bec0d3161f749e408ec25c3e96bcb41831fd829dfc48681eb7`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:55:05.493256+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: not recorded
- Published: 2022-03-23
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `quality_journalism`.
- What was studied: Characteristics of people accused of witchcraft in Scotland 1450-1750 (gender, marital status, social class, age, health/disability), drawing on historical records and the University of Edinburgh's Survey of Scottish Witchcraft database.
- Data collection: Compiles statistics from the Survey of Scottish Witchcraft database and historical trial records/accounts, plus named case studies (Marione Corsan, Agnes Finnie, Alesoun Pierson, Janet Horne) and a contemporary quote from Robert Bowes and King James VI's Daemonologie.
- Sample: Up to ~4,000 accused in Scotland 1450-1750; subsets noted where data recorded, e.g. 319 cases with known marital status (of 1572 total recorded), 141 folk healers accused.
- Controls: None stated; this is a narrative educational summary, not a controlled study.
- Statistical approach: Simple percentages reported (e.g. 84% women, 60% over forty, 6/64/29% by social class) with explicit caveats that many cases lack recorded data on marital status or social background.
- Funding: Not stated.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated; produced by BBC Bitesize as an educational resource, not an independent research publication.
- Does not state: No named author/historian byline for this specific article is given beyond being a BBC Bitesize resource; methodology of the underlying Survey of Scottish Witchcraft is not detailed; sourcing for some case details (e.g. Janet Horne) is described as 'some accounts' without citation.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article draws broad conclusions (e.g. about why women or older people were accused) based on incomplete or unrecorded data, and explicitly acknowledges 'we really can't answer this question for sure,' showing its own evidence is thinner than some generalisations suggest.

#### `src_43adfecb88362ddf097ef514` — Malleus Maleficarum

- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum`
- Retrieval round: 1.
- Source family: `web:en.wikipedia.org`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `8a5c677af125591a35521fd49b3907b59096181b86985a2abe6373eff07de9ae`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:55:05.728292+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: not recorded
- Published: not recorded
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `quality_journalism`.
- What was studied: The source is a Wikipedia article describing the Malleus Maleficarum (1486), its authorship, contents, approbation history, and reception by historians.
- Data collection: Compiled from secondary and tertiary historical scholarship (Mackay, Behringer, Broedel, Brauner, Summers, Britannica, etc.) and citations to primary documents like the papal bull and approbation text, not original archival research by the article's writers.
- Sample: Not applicable; this is a synthesis of scholarly sources about a single historical text, not a study with a sample.
- Controls: None; it is an encyclopedia article aggregating and summarizing competing historian interpretations, with some noted disputes (e.g., Hansen vs. Mackay on Sprenger's authorship).
- Statistical approach: None stated; no statistical methodology is used or described.
- Funding: Not stated.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated; article is anonymously crowd-edited per Wikipedia's model, with no declared authorial interests.
- Does not state: Does not state who wrote or edited this specific article version, their credentials, or any editorial review process beyond Wikipedia's general community editing; does not state funding or conflicts of interest.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article itself flags internal disputes among cited historians (e.g., over Sprenger's co-authorship and the Cologne approbation's authenticity) without resolving them, so its own synthesized narrative sometimes asserts more certainty in prose than the underlying contested sources support.

#### `src_c1ca9d27c53849c649b89276` — Witch Trials, Europe | Encyclopedia.com

- URL: `https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/witch-trials-europe`
- Retrieval round: 1.
- Source family: `web:encyclopedia.com`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `c554d530c5909946efea82635ce52ce028b8f4d1c808c0850344f31eda1c2b01`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:55:05.812097+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: not recorded
- Published: not recorded
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `expert_analysis`.
- What was studied: Gender patterns, religious/legal contexts, and estimated death tolls in European witch trials from the 15th-17th centuries, synthesizing historical scholarship.
- Data collection: Not a primary data collection; the article synthesizes findings from named historians' research (e.g., Behringer's execution estimates, Monter's Normandy study, Kivelson's Russia study) and judicial/trial records referenced secondhand.
- Sample: Varies by cited study (e.g., 250+ Dauphiné witches 1424-1448, German execution estimates ~20,000); no single sample defined for the article itself, which aggregates multiple regional datasets.
- Controls: None stated; this is a narrative historical synthesis, not a controlled study.
- Statistical approach: Reports percentages and estimates from cited historians (e.g., 71-92% female defendants 1570-1660, ~40,000 total executions) without describing underlying statistical methodology.
- Funding: Not stated.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated. Author William Monter is a named historian with cited publications on this subject, included in the bibliography.
- Does not state: No funding source, no original data collection method, no peer-review process for this specific encyclopedia entry, and no description of how cited estimates were derived beyond naming the scholars.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article presents a confident synthetic narrative and specific numeric estimates (e.g., ~40,000 executions) while acknowledging 'admittedly imperfect statistics' and destroyed records, showing some conclusions rest on extrapolation the text itself flags as uncertain.

#### `src_c0144672df4e1e6edc3c5579` — Valais witch trials

- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valais_witch_trials`
- Retrieval round: 1.
- Source family: `web:en.wikipedia.org`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `cd8d10389080a076440bfa78ff3830341d64622fd249ea2036feec53b2a32a13`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:55:05.851644+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: not recorded
- Published: not recorded
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `industry_commentary`.
- What was studied: The 1428–1434/6 witch-hunt and trials in the Valais region, their origins, spread, procedures, accusations, and later historiographical reception.
- Data collection: Compiled from historical chronicles (notably Johannes Fründ's c.1430 account), court proclamations, and secondary scholarly works (Modestin, Ostorero et al., Maxwell-Stuart, Behringer) cited in footnotes.
- Sample: No sample in a research sense; covers documented trials across Lower and Upper Valais over roughly six to eight years, with victim numbers described as 'hundreds' and Fründ's figure of '700' accused, '200' burned.
- Controls: Not applicable; this is a historical narrative synthesis, not an experiment or controlled study.
- Statistical approach: None; victim counts are quoted from a primary chronicler's claims (e.g., Fründ's figures) without independent statistical verification, and the article notes the true number is unknown.
- Funding: Not stated.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated; no authorship or institutional affiliation disclosed beyond being a collaboratively edited Wikipedia article citing named historians.
- Does not state: The article does not identify its own author(s), does not state any editorial review process, and does not disclose funding or conflicts of interest for the Wikipedia entry itself.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article presents specific figures ('700' conspirators, '200+' burned) drawn from a single 15th-century chronicler's account as if broadly reliable, while itself noting the actual number of victims is unknown—its narrative framing is more confident than the underlying primary source warrants.

#### `src_f862a9820bd0f0a9b703ff0c` — Witchcraft: Eight Myths and Misconceptions | English Heritage

- URL: `https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/eight-witchcraft-myths`
- Retrieval round: 1.
- Source family: `web:english-heritage.org.uk`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `bf53a223765b3ebaa44c0816ad3cca0ddcf5ad3f94453d662ad37bfcb397b22e`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:55:06.133926+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: not recorded
- Published: not recorded
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `expert_analysis`.
- What was studied: Common myths and misconceptions about European and English witchcraft persecutions (burning vs hanging, death tolls, conviction rates, religious responsibility, King James's role, gender of accused, and the 'goddess-worshipping herbalist' theory).
- Data collection: Not a primary study; the article presents historical claims and figures (e.g. execution counts, trial numbers, percentages) drawn from the author's scholarly knowledge, with no citations, sources, or references given for any specific figure.
- Sample: Not applicable/not stated. Figures cited cover the broad witch-persecution era (c.1427-1782) across England, Scotland, and continental Europe, but no underlying dataset or record set is identified.
- Controls: None stated; this is a narrative explainer, not an empirical study with controls.
- Statistical approach: None described; numeric claims (e.g. '30,000-60,000 executed', '25 per cent acquitted', '2,000 tried in England') are stated as facts without methodology, error margins, or sourcing explained.
- Funding: Not stated.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated. Author is identified as Professor Diane Purkiss of Keble College, Oxford, writing for English Heritage, a heritage charity; no financial or other conflicts are disclosed.
- Does not state: The article does not cite primary sources, archives, or scholarship underlying its statistics; does not explain how figures were derived or their uncertainty; does not disclose funding or conflicts.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The piece asserts precise-sounding figures (e.g. exact percentages and counts) as settled fact without presenting the evidentiary basis, so the confidence of the claims exceeds what is shown to the reader.

#### `src_a94fd37282a50c7341d64842` — Caliban and the Witch: A Critical Analysis - Yann Kindo and Christophe Darmangeat | libcom.org

- URL: `https://libcom.org/article/caliban-and-witch-critical-analysis-yann-kindo-and-christophe-darmangeat`
- Retrieval round: 1.
- Source family: `web:libcom.org`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `f76b5fdcf034ef4c748550725112c6751a688caea5de69bc50d01c461538de3d`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:55:07.133732+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: not recorded
- Published: not recorded
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `expert_analysis`.
- What was studied: A critique of Silvia Federici's book Caliban and the Witch, examining its historical claims, use of sources, iconography, statistical claims about witch-hunt victims, and theoretical arguments about primitive accumulation and gender.
- Data collection: The authors re-examined Federici's cited sources, cross-checked her claims against specialist historians (Levack, Rowlands, Barstow, Muchembled), traced the provenance of images she reproduced, and compared her figures to professional historical estimates.
- Sample: Single book-length critique; no sample in the statistical sense. Evidence consists of close reading of Caliban and the Witch alongside comparison to a range of named historical works and specialist sources.
- Controls: No experimental controls; this is textual/historical argumentation. The authors state their comparisons are drawn from named historians' published figures and documented original sources (e.g., tracing an illustration back to its original 1405 manuscript).
- Statistical approach: No formal statistical method; the piece cites numerical estimates (e.g., victim counts of 40,000-100,000 vs Federici's 'hundreds of thousands') drawn from other historians' work rather than performing its own quantitative analysis.
- Funding: Not stated. No funding source or sponsoring institution is mentioned.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated explicitly, though the authors identify as having a Marxist/materialist political perspective themselves (discussed openly in their conclusion), which forms part of their critical stance toward Federici's politics.
- Does not state: The authors' own academic credentials or institutional affiliations are not given beyond being bloggers (La Faucille et le Labo, La Hutte des Classes) and one author's prior book is referenced; no peer review process for this critique is mentioned; translation/publication process via Intransigence is described but not vetted editorially.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The piece concludes broadly that Federici's thesis is unsupported and reflects a political 'sign of the times,' extending beyond the specific factual and methodological errors documented, into a wider ideological argument about Marxism and feminism that is less tightly evidenced than the factual critiques.

#### `src_319d97a6b4a85ff2f7cd7220` — Bamberg witch trials

- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg_witch_trials`
- Retrieval round: 1.
- Source family: `web:en.wikipedia.org`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `62d74fa6ae912d42e393ca73e61788dd0c31c25b4e3c62c067ccaa662200a823`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:55:07.180591+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: not recorded
- Published: not recorded
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `quality_journalism`.
- What was studied: The historical Bamberg witch trials of 1626–1632, their background, legal process, notable cases, and end, as reconstructed from historical records and secondary scholarship.
- Data collection: Compiled from secondary historical sources (academic books, journal articles, an encyclopedia, and a dissertation) and cites primary materials like Johannes Junius's letter and court/diary records, but the article itself performed no original archival research.
- Sample: Not a sample-based study; covers an estimated 900–950 trials and 300–1,000+ executions across 1623–1632, with some yearly counts given as 'confirmed' but incomplete.
- Controls: Not applicable; this is a historical narrative, not an experimental or statistical study, so no controls are stated.
- Statistical approach: No statistical methodology stated; yearly execution/charge counts are presented as historian-reported tallies with explicit caveats that totals are incomplete and uncertain.
- Funding: No funding source is stated for the Wikipedia article or for the underlying historical works cited.
- Conflicts of interest: No conflicts of interest are declared; article is anonymously authored/edited per Wikipedia's collaborative model with no named conflicts disclosed.
- Does not state: Author identity, editorial review process beyond Wikipedia's general policies, funding, and conflicts of interest are not stated. Precise methodology of cited historians for deriving execution numbers is not detailed here.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article presents numeric estimates (e.g., 'est. 900-950' trials, '300-900+' executions, '~1,000 killed') as if settled while also stating documentation is incomplete and numbers are not fully confirmed, revealing a gap between the confidence of summary figures and the acknowledged uncertainty of underlying records.

#### `src_7c613ffdcf06b79fd0d7041c` — From Fact to Fallacy: The Evolution of Margaret Alice Murray’s Witch-Cult | Pomegranate

- URL: `https://journal.equinoxpub.com/POM/article/view/2936`
- Retrieval round: 1.
- Source family: `web:journal.equinoxpub.com`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `ebc19109e0a5fce4eba7e57ae729f7192b8972c35c4e7fde88981aa52010a021`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:55:07.837581+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: Catherine Noble
- Published: 2007-03-08
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `peer_reviewed`.
- What was studied: The historiographical evolution of Margaret Murray's witch-cult theory, its acceptance and endurance despite factual inaccuracies, and its later influence on modern Pagan/Wiccan belief.
- Data collection: Not a data-collection study; the article is a historiographical/literary analysis drawing on Murray's publications, contemporary reviews, and secondary scholarship listed in the references.
- Sample: No sample in the empirical sense; the 'corpus' consists of Murray's books (1921, 1933, 1954), period reviews, and later scholarly commentary (e.g., Hutton, Simpson, Frew, Cohn).
- Controls: Not stated; as a historiographical essay it does not describe controls or comparison groups.
- Statistical approach: None stated; the article is qualitative textual and historiographical analysis, not statistical.
- Funding: Not stated.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated. Author identified as a graduate student/teaching assistant at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee with research focus on Renaissance occult philosophy.
- Does not state: The source does not state funding, conflicts of interest, peer-review process details beyond journal context, or explicit methodology/selection criteria for sources beyond the reference list.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The abstract makes broad claims about why Murray's theory endured ('emotional nerve') and about modern believers, which are interpretive conclusions not directly tied to a stated evidentiary method beyond literature review.

#### `src_90c7d821df3ac8e7cc03cfca` — Repositório Institucional da UnB: Justiça, magia e poder : a bruxaria entre a legislação e a prática judiciária na Normandia dos séculos XVII-XVIII

- URL: `https://repositorio.unb.br/handle/10482/40993?locale=es`
- Retrieval round: 2.
- Source family: `web:repositorio.unb.br`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `847bbb0db6e347555198ee8fc19d3f33a4208494c3dc90d1b77e73bdf92e080d`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:57:55.075020+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: Campos, Érico Saad
- Published: 2021-05-24
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `peer_reviewed`.
- What was studied: Why the Parlement of Normandy continued trying witchcraft cases between 1682 and 1715, after decriminalization by Louis XIV, framed as a jurisdictional power struggle.
- Data collection: An 'ethnographic reading' of witchcraft trial records (processos) judged by the Norman parlement between 1682 and 1715, plus the court's historical jurisprudence.
- Sample: Witchcraft court cases from the Parlement of Normandy's archive spanning 1682-1715; exact number of cases not stated.
- Controls: Not stated; this is a historical/archival thesis, not an experimental or comparative study with controls.
- Statistical approach: None stated; the work is qualitative and interpretive, analyzing legal records and jurisprudence rather than statistics.
- Funding: Funded by Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq), a Brazilian federal research funding agency.
- Conflicts of interest: None declared in the record.
- Does not state: Exact number of cases examined, specific archival sources/collections consulted, peer-review status of the thesis defense committee, and any conflicts of interest.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The abstract presents a broad interpretive argument about political power and jurisdictional conflict based on a qualitative 'ethnographic' reading of an unspecified set of trial records, without detailing the evidentiary base supporting the scope of the claim.

#### `src_89020d00c4a649250d592f77` — Witch trials in Iceland

- URL: `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_trials_in_Iceland`
- Retrieval round: 2.
- Source family: `web:en.wikipedia.org`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `8b845f0e5990a6318d0304fe06bf7071920abb1847c6728531d961f2c85f6b84`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:57:57.771953+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: not recorded
- Published: not recorded
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `industry_commentary`.
- What was studied: Historical witch trials in Iceland (c.1554–1692), their origins under Danish rule, legal basis, demographics of accused/executed, and their end.
- Data collection: Compiled historical narrative citing secondary historical scholarship (an edited volume on European witch trials, a monograph on witchcraft history, and a journal article) rather than primary trial records or archives.
- Sample: Describes 120 witch trials (1604–1720) and 22 confirmed executions (1625–1685); does not specify how these figures were derived or verified.
- Controls: None stated; this is a narrative historical summary, not a controlled study.
- Statistical approach: No statistical methodology described; figures (120 trials, 22 executions, 20 men/2 women) are presented as established facts without methodology.
- Funding: Not stated.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated. Article is a crowd-edited Wikipedia page, flagged as relying on a single source, with no named author or institutional affiliation declared.
- Does not state: No named author/editor responsible for content, no peer review process, no explanation of how trial/execution counts were tallied, no discussion of source reliability or disputed cases (e.g., 'unconfirmed' executions noted without resolution).
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The article asserts specific, precise figures (120 trials, 22 executions, gender breakdown) while itself flagging reliance on a single source and leaving one execution 'unconfirmed,' suggesting more certainty than its sourcing supports.

#### `src_91db37b7ca0b8a3774f4b03c` — Trends&Statistics

- URL: `https://pages.uoregon.edu/dluebke/Witches442/Trends&Statistics.html`
- Retrieval round: 2.
- Source family: `web:pages.uoregon.edu`.
- Origin: not established.
- Snapshot digest: `6b44a26db45fd1591b9c99cb66b2398e60cbe090101fa25889774c116f423d3f`
- Fetched at: 2026-10-10T01:58:01.230274+00:00
- Venue: not recorded.
- Authors: David Luebke
- Published: not recorded
- Retracted: no.
- Assessed tier: `technical_report`.
- What was studied: Statistical trends in European witch trial prosecutions: execution rates by region and the sex ratio of accused witches, compiled from regional court records across several centuries.
- Data collection: Figures are compiled secondhand from published scholarly monographs and a journal article, which themselves derived numbers from archival trial and court records; this compilation does not describe its own collection method beyond citing those sources.
- Sample: Multiple regions (e.g., Fribourg, Geneva, Luxembourg, Scotland, Finland, Normandy) with varying year ranges and case counts, from dozens to over 900 persons tried per region; selection criteria for which regions/studies to include is not stated.
- Controls: No controls described; this is a tabular compilation of counts and percentages across heterogeneous regions, time periods, and legal systems without accounting for differing judicial practices or record survival.
- Statistical approach: Simple descriptive statistics: raw counts of persons tried and executed, with percentages calculated for execution rate and percent female.
- Funding: Not stated.
- Conflicts of interest: Not stated.
- Does not state: No explanation of how underlying primary sources compiled their counts, no discussion of record completeness or bias, no funding or author affiliation, and no analysis of why rates vary so widely between regions.
- Evidence-to-conclusion gap: The compilation presents cross-regional comparative tables implying broad comparability, but the underlying regions differ vastly in legal system, record-keeping, and time span, which the source does not address.

### Indexed sources

Known by metadata alone — no bytes were fetched, so an indexed record
**cannot support a claim**. These inform the citation graph and nothing else,
and no finding in this document rests on one.

- `src_2a0fe8c0577c1efbb49efcc3` — Why Witches Are Women (`https://doi.org/10.1556/aethn.48.2003.3-4.5`), citations: 3
- `src_bfffc99496f53ce226ccbba3` — \"...and he shall rule over thee" The malleus maleficarum and the politics of misogyny, medecine, and midwifery (1484-present): A feminist historical inquiry (`https://summit.sfu.ca/_flysystem/fedora/sfu_migrate/5274/etd1626.pdf`), citations: 1
- `src_7422fde911d036a6be2408c8` — Male Witches and Gendered Categories in Seventeenth-Century Russia (`https://doi.org/10.1017/s0010417503000276`), citations: 49
- `src_714e5d383ed892933beb133b` — As the Crone Flies: The Imagery of Women as Flying Witches in Early Modern Europe (`http://hdl.handle.net/11244/34591`), citations: 0
- `src_2c2593453f8da11d75b35401` — The Midwife-Witch on Trial: Historical Fact or Myth? (`https://doi.org/10.22374/cjmrp.v9i1.125`), citations: 2
- `src_fd234c60f7acab0231f8955e` — A Witch of Quality: George Eliot’s Maggie Tulliver (`http://dx.doi.org/10.46569/3r0752723`), citations: 0
- `src_104307f1b893d5ecf2cabd62` — La acumulación imaginaria: de Marx a Federici en torno a las metáforas de un capítulo del Capital (`https://dialnet.unirioja.es/descarga/articulo/7426575.pdf`), citations: 0
- `src_f9cb042b9d05010ccdfb3427` — Children, Adolescents, and English Witchcraft (`https://doi.org/10.12794/metadc4952`), citations: 0
- `src_ece6e54dbee825ce8e6be61b` — Margaret Murray (1863–1963): Pioneer Egyptologist, Feminist and First Female Archaeology Lecturer (`https://doi.org/10.5334/ai.1608`), citations: 9