Trafficking with Demons
Magic, Ritual, and Gender from Late Antiquity to 1000
Will be published approx. on 15. January 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
480 pages
978-1-5017-8520-7 (ISBN)
Description
Trafficking with Demons explores how magic was perceived, practiced, and prohibited in western Europe during the first millennium CE. Through the overlapping frameworks of religion, ritual, and gender, Martha Rampton connects early Christian reckonings with pagan magic to later doctrines and dogmas. Challenging established views on the role of women in ritual magic during this period, Rampton provides a new narrative of the ways in which magic was embedded within the foundational assumptions of western European society, informing how people understood the cosmos, divinity, and their own Christian faith.
As Rampton shows, throughout the first Christian millennium, magic was thought to play a natural role within the functioning of the universe and existed within a rational cosmos hierarchically arranged according to a "great chain of being." Trafficking with the "demons of the lower air" was the essense of magic. Interactions with those demons occurred both in highly formalistic, ritual settings and on a routine and casual basis. Rampton tracks the competition between pagan magic and Christian belief from the first century CE, when it was fiercest, through the early Middle Ages, as atavistic forms of magic mutated and found sanctuary in the daily habits of the converted peoples and new paganisms entered Europe with their own forms of magic. By the year 1000, she concludes, many forms of magic had been tamed and were, by the reckoning of the elite, essentially ineffective, as were the women who practiced it and the rituals that attended it.
As Rampton shows, throughout the first Christian millennium, magic was thought to play a natural role within the functioning of the universe and existed within a rational cosmos hierarchically arranged according to a "great chain of being." Trafficking with the "demons of the lower air" was the essense of magic. Interactions with those demons occurred both in highly formalistic, ritual settings and on a routine and casual basis. Rampton tracks the competition between pagan magic and Christian belief from the first century CE, when it was fiercest, through the early Middle Ages, as atavistic forms of magic mutated and found sanctuary in the daily habits of the converted peoples and new paganisms entered Europe with their own forms of magic. By the year 1000, she concludes, many forms of magic had been tamed and were, by the reckoning of the elite, essentially ineffective, as were the women who practiced it and the rituals that attended it.
Reviews / Votes
This is a monumental work. I found the book fascinating, enjoyable to read and full of interesting detail. It raises important questions about these relationships in subsequent European historym and it will be essential reading for gender studies courses and scholars of medieval religion and witchcraft.(Journal of the Australian Early Medieval Association) In Trafficking with Demons, Rampton has set out to challenge established scholarly views on the role of women in ritual magic during the first millennium... In refocusing our attention on the relationship between ritual and authority, and between authority and gender, Rampton's study offers an important new contribution to our understanding of elite Church views of magic during the first millennium.
(Journal of Religious History) A comprehensive study of the changes and continuities that magic-and its gendered and ritual associations-underwent from early Christianity through to the Carolingian period... This is an extremely valuable study, and will in particular appeal to scholars and students entering into and seeking a foothold within the study of early Christian and early medieval magic.
(Preternature: Critical and Historical Studies on the Preternatural) Rampton's book is an ambitious project, attempting to cover a millennium of historical, social, and political contexts. While the book covers a broad span of time and geographical area, it helps the reader understand how views on magic changed drastically depending on where and when magic was discussed. It fills a gap in scholarship and does so in a way that engages the reader and highlights the depth of the research presented.
(Cerae: An Australasian Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies) This book will serve as a stimulus to careful rethinking about a period in the history of magic that deserves more attention than it has sometimes been given.
(Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies)
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Ithaca
United States
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Dimensions
Height: 152 mm
Width: 230 mm
Thickness: 31 mm
Weight
698 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-5017-8520-7 (9781501785207)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
01/2022
Cornell University Press
€27.49
Available for download
Person
Martha Rampton is Professor Emerita of History at Pacific University. She is the editor of European Magic and Witchcraft.
Content
Introduction
Part 1: Studying Magic
1. Magic and Its Sources in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages
2. Demons of the Lower Air
Part 2: Breaking In: Christianity in Classical Rome
3. Ritual, Demons, and Sacred Space
4. A Thousand Vacuous Observances
5. Maleficium and Traffic with the Dead
6. Screech Owl, Vampire, Moon, and Women's Magic
Part 3: Traffic with Demons: Post-Roman Europe
7. Sub Dio
8. Victimless Magic and Execrable Remedies
9. The Awesome Power of the Women's Craft
Part 4: Skepticism: The Carolingian Era
10. Demonization of the Natural World
11. Superstition and Divination Questioned
12. Women's Magic Challenged
13. Magic, Women, and the Carolingian Court
14. Magic and Materia Medica
15. Conclusion
Part 1: Studying Magic
1. Magic and Its Sources in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages
2. Demons of the Lower Air
Part 2: Breaking In: Christianity in Classical Rome
3. Ritual, Demons, and Sacred Space
4. A Thousand Vacuous Observances
5. Maleficium and Traffic with the Dead
6. Screech Owl, Vampire, Moon, and Women's Magic
Part 3: Traffic with Demons: Post-Roman Europe
7. Sub Dio
8. Victimless Magic and Execrable Remedies
9. The Awesome Power of the Women's Craft
Part 4: Skepticism: The Carolingian Era
10. Demonization of the Natural World
11. Superstition and Divination Questioned
12. Women's Magic Challenged
13. Magic, Women, and the Carolingian Court
14. Magic and Materia Medica
15. Conclusion