The Witch-cult in Western Europe: A Study in AnthropologyMurray, Margaret Alice
Religion
The Witch-cult in Western Europe: A Study in Anthropology
Murray, Margaret Alice
Ethnology; Witchcraft -- Great Britain
In women the supernumerary nipple is
observed to increase at the time of the periods; in some cases during
lactation so much milk is secreted as to make it a matter of indifference
whether the child is suckled at the normal nipples or at the supernumerary
one. In cases of polymastia the nipple is not always formed; the milk, when
secreted, issuing from a small opening. Though the nipple is congenital,
the supernumerary breast may develop, or at any rate become noticeable,
later; the theory being that the ducts carrying the secretion from the
supernumerary to the normal breast become blocked in some way, and that the
milk is thus exuded through the pore in the supernumerary breast. The
change in the case quoted by Cameron, as well as in the case of the witch
Rose Cullender, seems to have been caused by a strain.
Making allowance for the unscientific language of the recorders of the
witch trials, it will be seen that the descriptions of the 'witch-pap' or
'little Teat' exactly coincide with these anatomical facts. I give the
evidence below, the trials being in chronological order. It will be
observed that the cases are from England and New England only; if the
phenomena of polymastia and polythelia occurred in France and Scotland,
there are no records of the fact in the witch-trials of those countries.
Alice Gooderidge and her mother, Elizabeth Wright, of Stapenhill near
Burton-on-Trent, were tried in 1597:
'The old woman they stript, and found behind her right sholder a thing
much like the vdder of an ewe that giueth sucke with two teates, like
vnto two great wartes, the one behinde vnder her armehole, the other
a hand off towardes the top of her shoulder. Being demanded how long
she had those teates, she aunswered she was borne so. Then did they
search Alice Gooderige, and found vpon her belly, a hole of the
bignesse of two pence, fresh and bloudy, as though some great wart had
beene cut off the place.'[304]
The witch of Edmonton, tried in 1621:
'The Bench commanded three women to search the body of Elizabeth
Sawyer. They all three said, that they a little aboue the Fundiment of
Elizabeth Sawyer found a thing like a Teate the bignesse of the little
finger, and the length of half a finger, which was branched at the top
like a teate, and seemed as though one had suckt it, and that the
bottome thereof was blew, and the top of it was redde.'[305]
The greatest number of cases recorded in one place is in Essex during the
trials before Sir Matthew Hale in 1645:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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