Il processo di Triora visto dall'America di Casimir Kukielka, Laureato in Storia all'Università di Pittsburgh, USA.

The Witch Trial of Triora, a Short History

By Casimir Kukielka
(please feel free to forward all questions and comments to casimirkukielka@hotmail.com)

Triora is a small village in the mountains of Liguria, a province on the northwest coast of Italy. At dawn, when the fog hides the neighboring hills, Triora seems like a city out of a fairy tail, far away and floating above the world. For a few moments you forget about the horrors that once took place here. But as you walk the winding streets, and climb through some of the old abandoned buildings- homes, bakeries, churches- the pervasive melancholy returns. Iron bars, which turned ordinary homes into prisons, can still be seen on some of the windows. It’s strange to see the town from behind the same bars as the condemned women did; you imagine neighborhood boys daring each other to go up to the window to taunt the witches. You wonder if family members ever visited the accused or if perhaps the families actually believed the charges leveled against their wives, sisters and mothers. You even wonder if the women were guilty of some kind of crime that may have seemed like witchcraft to the superstitious people. While most questions remain unanswered, recent studies have turned up some startling facts.

Causes of The Trial
In the 1580’s the Italian peninsula experienced a terrible famine. For a long time this was seen as the primary cause for the hysteria. Some historians have also speculated that ergot, a type of grain mold that can induce mental disturbances, was consumed by residents. Though the black, horn like fungus was known to farmers, they had no way of knowing that it could cause insanity, and would have eaten infected grain after a poor harvest. The same fungus is believed to have been a contributing factor in the Salem witch trials. Those these hypothesizes may have some validity, what were the deeper causes that transformed group madness into a witch trial?
A study of the records hints at several things. First, the truth of the famine has been discovered. In Triora, though not necessarily in other parts of the Italian peninsula, the famine was due in large part to an economic maneuver. A letter written by a noble from the period states, “here (in Triora) there was such an abundance of victuals that we knew not where to put them.” If that were so, how could two poor harvests have brought Triora to the brink of starvation? It seems that the wealthy landowners also controlled the grain stores. They restricted the distribution of grain in order to keep the prices high- beyond the buying power of the average peasant. It’s not hard to imagine that those involved in the scheme would have done anything to to draw attention away from their activities, like for example, scapegoating witches.
But where do you find a witch? An answer has been found for this question as well. The witch trial of Triora took place in the middle of the Catholic (Counter) Reformation. In response to the unprecedented challenges of the Protestant Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church tried hard to reinvigorate itself. It did this by cleaning up the clergy, and by purging society of enduring pagan ritual and belief. One such holdover from ancient times that was found in Triora in 1587 was the cult of Diana. The cult was linked to fertility and the harvest; women played active, and frequently dominant, roles in the ceremonies. A goat was often used to symbolize the position of priestess. Due to its connection to the harvest, the lunar cycle was paramount; this meant nocturnal celebration. The parallels between the cult of Diana and popular notions of witchcraft are evident. During the period of cleansing, anything not directly in- line with official Church diktats would have been seen as a product of Satan, and vigorously attacked. Practitioners of the cult would have been obvious targets for zealous reformers and easy scapegoats for people in need of one.

The Trial
At the time of the trial, Triora was under the suzerainty of La Superba Republic of Genoa. It was to Genoa that the people turned in August 1587 to request the intervention of the Inquisition. The Inquisition obliged and, in September, the trial began. The trial was a complex affair, which rumbled on for about two years. There were several long impasses, which were punctuated by short but brutal periods of investigation.
The methods of investigation underlined the worst aspects of medieval/ early modern justice. Accusation was often tantamount to a death sentence. Reading through the surviving records, which include transcripts of torture sessions, is an eye opening experience. Frequently, defendants denied all accusations, even under the worst excesses of torture. It was to no avail though. The Inquisition accepted nothing less than a guilty plea. If one were not forthcoming, the person would return to prison and then be tortured again the next day. Several women, realizing the utter hopelessness of the situation, took their own lives. Seen through the perspective of the Inquisition, these suicides were further evidence of a demonic presence, and a reason to push forward with the trial.
The first impasse came about 4 months after the trial began, in January 1588. It began when wealthy nobles sent a letter to Genoa protesting the methods of the Inquisition. Their chief complaints were that defendants were not allowed to defend themselves with evidence, and that the conditions of the jails were appalling. For a moment this seems to cast doubt on the hypothesis that the nobles used the witch trial as a shield for their price fixing activities. It must be noted however, that they did not act until aristocratic women had been embroiled. Second, they complained mainly about the methods of the Inquisition; they did not challenge the supposition that there were witches in Triora. The nobles claimed that if people were rounded up solely on the basis of accusation, everybody in Triora would eventually be implicated. Finally, the nobles withdrew their opposition to the trial after one of the representatives of the Inquisition made a verbal agreement not to prosecute anymore highborn women.
The trial began again several months later with more of the same horrors; the numbers of accused soared to well over 200 people. Just as things seemed like they would spin completely out of control, a dispute arose between the government of Genoa and the Holy Inquisition, which ultimately saved the lives of many people. The Inquisition claimed that the civil authorities had overstepped their jurisdiction by prosecuting religious crimes such as engaging in blasphemous ceremonies or worshiping the devil. Only the Church was allowed to handle these matters. From September 1588 until about August of 1589, the powers that be argued and the trial remained at a standstill. There was a downside to this though. The incarcerated women began dying from the terrible conditions of dungeon. This created pressure to bring the trials to an end. Finally, two years after the investigation began, the women were released and the trial ended inconclusively.
While nobody was put to death for crimes relating to witchcraft, at least 9 women died during the trial, either by suicide, from torture, or from the terrible conditions of the jails. Another 13 disappeared. Many others’ bodies were broken on the rack, had their reputations damaged or were ruined financially.

The residents of Triora commemorate the trial every year only Halloween. Though even in Italy the events of 1587- 1589 have largely been forgotten, there has been a recent growth of interest, both nationally and internationally. Several outstanding books have been written on the subject, namely 1587 Anno Domini, A History of Witchcraft in Western Liguria by Ippolito Edmondo Ferrario. People are also discovering that Triora is a good place, not just to learn about history, but to escape from the world for a little while. Hopefully all this renewed interest will help us uncover some of the secrets that Triora is still hiding.