The history of witchcraft and demonologySummers, Montague
History
The history of witchcraft and demonology
Summers, Montague
Demonology; Demonology -- History; Witchcraft; Witchcraft -- History
The Devil was represented as black, with goat’s horns, ass’s ears, cloven
hoofs, and an immense phallus. He is, in fact, the Satyr of the old
Dionysiac processions, a nature-spirit, the essence of joyous freedom
and unrestrained delight, shameless if you will, for the old Greek
knew not shame. He is the figure who danced light-heartedly across the
Aristophanaic stage, stark nude in broad midday,[1] animally physical,
exuberant, ecstatic, crying aloud the primitive refrain, Φαλῆς, ἑταῖρε
Βακχίου, ξύγκωμε, νυκτεροπλάνητε, μοιχε, παιδεραστά, (Phales, boon mate
of Bacchus, joyous comrade in the dance, wanton wanderer o’ nights,
fornicating Phales), in a word he was Paganism incarnate, and Paganism
was the Christian’s deadliest foe; so they took him, the Bacchic
reveller, they smutted him from horn to hoof, and he remained the
Christian’s deadliest foe, the Devil.[2]
It was long before the phallic demon was banished the stage, for strange
as it may seem, positive evidence exists that he was known there as late
as Shakespeare’s day. In 1620 was published in London by Edward Wright
_A Courtly Masque: The Deuice called, The World tost at Tennis_. “As it
hath beene diuers times Presented to the Contentment of many Noble and
Worthy Spectators: By the Prince his Seruants.” It was “Inuented and set
downe by Tho: Middleton, Gent, and William Rowley, Gent.” The title-page
presents a rough engraving of the various characters in this masque,
doubtless from a sketch made at the actual performance. Outside the main
group stands a hideous black figure “The Diuele,” who made his appearance
towards the end to take part in the last dance, furnished with horns,
hoofs, talons, tail, and a monstrous phallus. It may be remarked that
these horns are prominent on the goat-like head (a clear satyr) of the
Devil in _Doctor Faustus_ as depicted on the title-page of the Marlovian
quarto. A phallus, to which reference is made in the text, was also worn
by the character dressed up as the monkey (_Bavian_) in the May-dance
scene in Shakespeare & Fletcher’s _The Two Noble Kinsman_, Act III, 5,
1613. It is worth remembering that troops of phallic demons formed a
standing characteristic of the old German carnival comedy. Moreover,
several of the grotesque types of the Commedia dell’ arte in the second
decade of the seventeenth century were traditionally equipped in like
manner.[3] That the Devil was so represented in the English theatre
is important. It gives us the popular idea of the Prince of Evil, and
incidentally throws a side-light upon much of the grotesque and obscene
evidence in the contemporary witch-trials.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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