WIER, Jean. De præstigiis dæmonum, et incantationibus ac veneficiis libri sex, aucti et recogniti.
Basileae, Officina Oporiniana, 1568
8vo. 190x115 mm. Contemporary limp vellum with squares. Pp. 697, [57]. Italic, Greek, Roman type. Woodcut initials, some ornate. Printer’s device on title-page. Ancient handwritten Ex-Libris on the title-page. Significant lackings on vellum binding, including a portion of the front cover. Slight waterstains on the upper part of some leaves, tear on pp. 97-98.
Important work on witchcraft and demonology, forerunner of modern psychiatry.
Norman: “The first major European work to take an empirical, scientific approach to the study of mental illness, and one of the most celebrated exposés of the witchcraft delusion”.
Wier investigates and refutes many erroneous beliefs about demons and magic prevalent at the time. The book is divided into six parts, the first of which concerns demons, the second spells, the third witchcraft, the fourth divination, the fifth dreams and the sixth miracles. In this book, Wier advocates reason and opposes superstition.
Grolier: “He relates 60 cases of witchcraft or mental phenomena, describing the accused as usually poor, gullible women, and he advocates a rational approach, establishing and confirming facts, observing physical, behavioral and emotional traits, in order to formulate "a concrete and sensible plan of treatment [along] what we would now describe as psychological principles”.
New revised and enlarged edition, published five years after the first edition by the same publisher in Basel.
VD16, W2666. Cfr. Norman, n. 2209-11; Garrison-Morton 4916; Grolier Medicine, 20.