"Luther and the witches" – exhibition about witch-hunts in Thuringia

The witch-hunts at the end of the Middle Ages are in the focus of a special exhibition that has been opened in Schmalkalden in the south of Thuringia. Under the motto "Luther and the witches", the attitude of the Reformer towards witchcraft is documented.

The witch-hunts at the end of the Middle Ages are in the focus of a special exhibition that has been opened in Schmalkalden in the south of Thuringia. Under the motto "Luther and the witches", the attitude of the Reformer towards witchcraft is documented. A speaker of the museum said that the second part of the exhibition is dedicated to the south of Thuringia as a centre of the witch-hunts of that time.

The Reformers believed in witches, too

With his supportive comments about witch-hunts, Martin Luther has been "a child of his time". Other educated contemporaries like Philipp Melanchthon or Paracelsus also believed in witches. But Luther has neither been guilty of witch-hunts, "nor did he assist them". The exhibition tries to find an answer to the question how this delusion was able to develop in the 16th century, ultimately costing the lives of thousands of people.

The persecutions in the region are documented with the help of concrete examples. Around 70 cases are documented in Kaltennordheim, ca. 80 in Suhl, 100 in Schleusingen and as many as 250 in Meiningen. In the area of Schmalkalden, however, the issue played "hardly any role". The exhibition is shown until the beginning of 2013 and is the main contribution of the alliance of museums in the south of Thuringia for the Luther Decade before the Reformation anniversary in 2017.