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40 Real People Executed for Witchcraft

Tim Flight October 15, 2019 27 min

7. Mima Renard’s success as a prostitute saw her burned for witchcraft in Brazil

A witch performs the Osculum Infame (kissing the devil’s bottom) in an Italian woodcut of 1608. Wikimedia Commons

Witches often found themselves accused of having monstrous sexual appetites. Witches were thought to use black magic to seduce men to satisfy these urges. Hence the modern verb, ‘to bewitch’ someone. Mima Renard, a beautiful Frenchwoman living in Brazil, fell foul of these beliefs. After an admirer murdered Renard’s husband, she had to turn to prostitution to make ends meet. Furious, cuckolded wives decided she must have bewitched their husbands. When two married clients fought a fatal duel over her, Renard was arrested for witchcraft. The authorities agreed this amounted to sufficient evidence, and burned Renard to death in 1692.

Written by

Tim Flight

I am a freelance historical and literary writer based in West Yorkshire, UK. I read for a funded PhD in English at the University of Oxford (Magdalen College) and graduated in 2016. I am a former lecturer in Medieval English Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London. My publications include peer-reviewed articles in academic publications, and pieces in mainstream magazines such as History Today and Fortean Times. For more information, please see www.drflight.co.uk