The Witch Panics

Witches are engaged in something called witchcraft and that is understood to be essentially entering into some kind of ritual and formal relationship with Satan. And it's assumed that there are these organized networks of these people. It culminates in the notorious European witch trials in places like Spain and Britain, which end up in the early 17th century in Britain. They're heavily focused on women. Women who are seen as being some kind of economic burden on the community who are persecuted for witchcraft. There was a theory proposed from the late 19th century onwards that the witches who were being persecuted were actually members of some ancient pre-Christian religion. That was what was being suppressed.