← After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal
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- [00:00]
Anthony Delaney
Hi, we're your hosts Anthony Delaney and Maddy Pelling, and if you would like After Dark Myths, Misdeeds and the Paranormal ad free and get early access, sign.
- [00:10]
Maddy Pelling
Up to History Hit with a History Hit subscription. You can also watch hundreds of hours of original documentaries with top history presenters and enjoy a new release every week.
- [00:21]
Anthony Delaney
Sign up now by visiting historyhit.com subscribe.
- [00:29]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Acast powers the world's Best Podcasts Here's.
- [00:33]
Anthony Delaney
A show that we recommend. We all have bad days and sometimes bad weeks and maybe even bad years, but the good news is we don't have to figure out life all alone. I'm comedian Chris Duffy, host of ted's how to Be a Better Human podcast, and our show is about the little ways that you can improve your life. Actual practical tips that you can put into place that will make your day to day better. Whether it is setting boundaries at work or rethinking how you clean your house. Each episode has conversations with experts who share tips on how to navigate life's ups and downs. Find how to be a Better Human wherever you're listening to this.
- [01:12]
Dr. Mickey Brock
ACAST helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com.
- [01:28]
Anthony Delaney
It was such a fall, such a pernicious height, that he, the enemy of goodness, the father of lies, the Prince of Darkness, the infernal serpent, had fallen. Now the arch fiend who the Almighty had hurled headlong flaming from the ethereal sky with hideous ruin and combustion lies in penal fire in this bottomless perdition. Welcome to Hell, Satan. Deep scars of lightning bolts mark his cheeks. His eyes are cruel, the brows above them, dauntless Lucifer rises, flames on each hand, driving backwards in pointed spires, smoke roiling in billows from his vast darkness. In a voice that shakes the walls of hell, he summons the legions of fallen cherubs who lie like a million leaves on a flaming sea to come to him. He promises revenge and tells them to be sure of one that though victory may be impossible to do aught good, never will be our task, but ever to do ill our sole delight. With that the devil springs upward like a pyramid of fire into the wild expanse. His wings beat as he fights through the dark abyss, labouring upward with difficulty towards a distant point of light, towards the frail orb, toward this world we call home, full of mischievous revenge. Accursed, and in a cursed hour he hurries to find us. Welcome to After Dark. Today we come face to face with the history of the Devil.
- [03:41]
Maddy Pelling
Oh, it's a dramatic one. Welcome to After Dark. I'm Maddie.
- [03:45]
Anthony Delaney
And I'm Anthony.
- [03:46]
Maddy Pelling
And this is going to be the first of two episodes we're doing about the history of the devil. I'm sort of amazed it's taken us this long to get here. But he is a key figure in the history of the Western world and that is the cultural context in which we'll be looking at him today. Today we're going to be speaking about the origins and the rise of the devil. And in the next episode we'll be looking at his fall. And I have written in brackets here for my producer, maybe his rise again we will see. Our guest to guide us through this character study of the diabolical one is Dr. Mickey Brock. Mickey is a historian of religion and the supernatural. She's the author of Satan and the circa 1560 to 1700, the devil in Post Reformation Scotland and is editing a forthcoming collection which is all about the devil and demons. Mickey, welcome to After Dark.
- [04:38]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Thank you so much and thank you, Anthony, for that very exciting introduction.
- [04:42]
Anthony Delaney
Listen, it was all very dramatic. I didn't actually write that. I can't take credit credit for it, but I was enjoying it as I went.
- [04:48]
Dr. Mickey Brock
I mean, I have to say there are endlessly dramatic descriptions that we could pull from. So fantastic to get started. And thank you, Maddy, for the introduction.
- [04:55]
Maddy Pelling
Not at all. We're really happy to have you here. Now we're going to start this episode a little bit differently than the usual format Anthony and I do because Mickey has set us some homework before we begin.
- [05:07]
Anthony Delaney
I'm so excited.
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Maddy Pelling
She has asked us to draw our mind's eye image of evil. So without further ado, we are going to show them to each other. We haven't seen them at this point. I feel like this is some kind of therapy. Anthony, do you want to go first?
- [05:23]
Anthony Delaney
I'm going to get into so much trouble for this. But I'm just going to caveat this, right? I'm not with you, Mickey. I don't think I'm going to get into trouble with you. I'm going to caveat this by saying this is based on a lot of information. Listen, just. You'll understand. Okay, so. So I'm going to hold it up. This is really badly drawn. Why do I feel so nervous? And I will explain what I've drawn for people who are listening. So in the back of my notebook I have drawn, basically it's a roadside thing that litters the countryside in Ireland. And it is various scenes of religious history, basically, or religious iconography. So in this case we have Jesus. He's missing the two crosses either side. He is on the cross, and then beneath him are two. Well, in this case, there's only two. But there's often more people who are weeping beneath the cross because of his crucifixion. And then this is just. I've just drawn a road underneath that. Now, the reason I did that is because those symbols are all over Ireland. You cannot take a journey without seeing that or some kind of grotto to marry or some kind of thing. And in the context of Ireland, prior to Even the year 2000, let's say the church in Ireland was an exceptionally oppressive institution and from which an awful lot of evil, as far as I would see it and understand it, has kind of poured forth. It doesn't just come from Catholicism. I have issues with organized religion across the board, but my experience of it was growing up in Catholic Ireland. So that is my depiction of evil. Maddie, over to you.
- [07:01]
Maddy Pelling
I mean, I don't really know how I can follow that because that was beautifully put and slightly contentious, potentially.
- [07:08]
Anthony Delaney
So it will be come for me in the comments. It's fine.
- [07:11]
Maddy Pelling
Okay. I have gone for a little bit more of a traditional image, and I only had a Sharpie available, so it's a bit intense. But here is my devil.
- [07:20]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Oh.
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Anthony Delaney
Oh, it looks like an angry dog.
- [07:24]
Maddy Pelling
Yeah, he sort of just. He started off a bit cute. Okay. So for our listeners at home who do not have the benefit of seeing this masterpiece that I've done, it's. Yeah, it kind of looks a bit dog. Like, he's a sort of scary. A scary face with sharp teeth, and he's got kind of maleficent inspired horns, I would say, and a hint of some wings. I sort of ran out of room on the page. I went a bit wild.
- [07:48]
Dr. Mickey Brock
It's giving Beauty and the Beast energy. It is. It is. Right.
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Maddy Pelling
That's my life ambition, to give Beauty and the Beast energy.
- [07:56]
Dr. Mickey Brock
I mean, all you need is a library with a giant ladder that you could swing from and.
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Maddy Pelling
Exactly.
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Dr. Mickey Brock
Actually, the storyline in that movie is quite problematic, but we'll set that aside.
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Maddy Pelling
That's a whole other podcast.
- [08:06]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yeah. These are really fabulous illustrations because I think actually they get at the fundamental question that's underpinning so much of what these episodes will be and about what the devil is in general, which is how do we contextualize, engage with, understand, comprehend human suffering? Right. How do we deal with that? And for a really long time. Right. The devil was, in some ways, kind of the answer to that question. How do we explain why there's so much darkness in the world, why bad things happen, why there's famine, why there are murders, why there are all of these things that go wrong. And the devil in some ways provides an answer there. Right. The devil is the embodiment manifestation of evil, wreaking havoc wherever he goes. But to Anthony's illustration, underpinning that is in some ways this discomfort with this question of if God is all knowing, all powerful, all good, all benevolent, how is it that evil can possibly exist? Right. The idea the devil sort of emerges, I think, to absolve God of that, to say, you know, the devil may be operating under God's direction, but, you know, God is not the author of evil in that circumstance. And this is one of the. This question. The problem of evil, it's known as theodicy, really just befuddled the Catholic Church, and then after the Reformation, both Protestants and Catholics. And you know what to me is so interesting, what's happened over the arc of history is this representation of the devil as the embodiment of evil has sort of moved away from a literal conception of Satan and instead to thinking about evil as something that's human. Right. Hell is other people. Right. That is. That sort of famous quote goes. So I think. I mean, I think y'all actually represented some really worthwhile things for us to think about here. So good job. A. Yeah, wonderful.
- [09:52]
Maddy Pelling
Okay, so I love what you're setting out here, Mickey. This is sort of rise and fall of different ideas of the devil throughout Western history. But let's start at the beginning. Let's start with the biblical idea of the devil and I suppose his origin story. Can you just set that out for us?
- [10:08]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yeah. I mean, the first thing I'll say is that the devil in some ways is a specific product of monotheism. Because again, if you have this singular all power, powerful, all knowing, all benevolent God, the question of how evil exists becomes a really complicated one. And for many pre Christian religions, many ancient religions didn't have a problem with perceiving the world as one in which a lot of different gods existed. And some of those go were good, some were bad, some were both, right. There was room for shades of gray, there was room for multitudes. But in Christianity in particular, the sort of devil is this moral personified evil. That solves that sort of problem of how evil can exist. So to get to the origins, let me just say that the devil is certainly a product of scripture. Right? The ideas that we have about the devil come from the building blocks of scripture. But there's not a coherent narrative that emerges from the books of the Bible. And I think this can be a really challenging thing, but it makes sense, right? The Bible was composed over hundreds of years, right? So there are going to be different ideas embedded in that. So if we think of what we think of as the canon of the Bible, the corpus of the Bible in the Old Testament, or more accurately, we should call it the Hebrew Bible, those scriptures, they describe the devil as a Satan, or, you know, the Satan, but not Satan, capital, you know, capitalized personal noun, energy. And instead, in the Old Testament, the devil is kind of a run of the mill adversary. He's one of many sort of fallen angels who can operate as an antagonist of God, but also as an emissary of God. He's sort of a celestial member of the divine court that can be used to do God's bidding in various ways. So a nefarious creature, but one that's ultimately God's servant. And of course, you think of the story of Job here, the sort of devil doing some tempting of this righteous man on behalf of God. But as you move into the New Testament and as you're getting closer to our sort of more modern conception of the devil, the devil becomes a much more powerful, much more singular, much more sort of frightening figure in certain ways, and operates as this very clear oppositional figure to God, right? Operates as the manifestation of evil, the embodiment of evil. And that's partially because it's only really in the New Testament that you get this picture of this all power powerful, all knowing, all benevolent God, right? So you need the devil to explain some of the horrible things that happen in the world. And also the devil is a really useful foil for the goodness of Christ. The New Testament is all about the good news. Here's, you know, here's Christ, here's the Son of God, this sort of great moment of salvation. And so you need an antagonist for that story to work. So I'm painting with a tremendously broad brush. I'm happy to go into more details, but that's really the shift that happens over the courses of scripture and a lot over the course of the development of the Bible. Lot of the ideas that we have about the devil being a fallen angel, for example, some of those things actually come from the extra biblical scriptures, that is to say, those that are not part of the canon, and instead they're coming out of things like, you know, the apocrypha and other sort of writings, religious writings, early Christian writings that tell an important story. That doesn't necessarily get into the canon itself. It's a hot mess. That's what I'm sort of trying to get at.
- [13:31]
Anthony Delaney
This is so fascinating for so many reasons. And it's a subject that I'm really, really interested in, actually. But just from a personal perspective, you know, as I said, I grew up Irish Catholic, very much not of that persuasion now. But it's interesting to hear you talk about that origin story and the slight development of the figure and the embodiment of evil within one entity, that is the devil, Satan. Because when I was growing up, he very much was a person and a presence and the antithesis to God and was very genuinely a fearful thing. You would be fearful of him. Now, what I'm thinking, and correct me if I'm wrong here, Mickey, but what I'm thinking is I'm imagining the devil. Satan's power, influence and notoriety becomes more prevalent the more powerful the church becomes. That's me guessing. Tell me if I'm wrong.
- [14:32]
Dr. Mickey Brock
This is a really important and interesting sort of question that you raise here, which is, what's the relationship between the devil's power and the church's power? And embedded in that question is, what does the devil do for the church? Or in other words, why does Christianity need the devil for its theology to work? And why does the church need the devil for its practice of that theology to work? Right. That's sort of what you're getting at. And there are two ways in which I would sort of answer that. So the first thing I'll say is actually the devil becomes really important in early Christian theology, not because Christianity has power, but instead, in the early days of Christianity, it's a persecuted faith. Now, that changes. And it changes actually in sort of with remarked rapidity. Right. By the time you get into the 4th and 5th century, it's really quite dominant. But that idea of persecution and this persecuting narrative, we are persecuted. We are under siege. The devil in some ways explains that for sort of Christians. What's persecuting them, it can't be God. God is good, Right? But the devil is testing them. And because they are righteous, because they are the true faith, they're the natural enemy of the devil. Right. Who else would the devil go after? And this is sort of where, for example, like Ephesians 6:11 comes in, right. Put on the whole armor of God and fight, right? There is this sort of persecuting militaristic mentality. That's part of that sense of being embattled. But I would really argue. What's fascinating about that is, you know, Christianity as we know, becomes dominant by the time you're into the Middle Ages, right? The Catholic Church has a tremendous amount of power, a tremendous amount of sway. And of course, this is true after the Reformation in Protestant areas as well. The church is very much bound up with the political power of the state. But that persecuting, that persecuted mentality, I should say, never goes away. And I think it's important for people to. For the church, it's useful for believers to see themselves as part of a cosmic battle because that makes membership in fealty to engagement with the church pivotal if you want to be on the right side of this holy war and if you want to be able to save yourself from the wiles of Satan. So I think the Devil, because he's such a malleable figure, he's useful for a faith that's in its early days as sort of someone to fight against, a rallying cry and explanation for the hardship. And he's useful for an institution that's at the pinnacle of its power because he serves as a way to remind believers of the necessity of the church. And I don't want to suggest that the Catholic Church, when it was at the apex of its power, was cynical. I don't think it was using the devil cynically. I think it's thoroughly believed in the devil. But just because that's true, it doesn't mean talking to your believers constantly and your members constantly about the devil. That there's this thing going around like a roaring lion, right, Going after them. All these evocative passages from scripture that get trotted out. That's a good way to get butts and seats on Sundays. So both of those things can be true. I think.
- [17:50]
Maddy Pelling
It'S really interesting. You talk about him as a sort of shape shifting tool, I suppose, and that he goes from representing the people trying to oppress and persecute a minority religion to being the thing that is working against a great and powerful institution. And that if you are not in that institution, if you are not contributing to it, if you are a heretic, that you are therefore in league with the devil. And that's fascinating, but I just want to hone in, Mickey, on this idea of the shape shifting. And we obviously have thought about the form the devil might take in those drawings that we did. But can you tell us a little bit about Western religion when, I suppose the medieval period, and certainly around the Reformation, when the devil starts to take on specific, specific characteristics and specific forms that appear again and again in visual culture. So can you tell us a little bit about what that image of the devil looks like in that moment?
- [18:45]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yeah, absolutely. So there are a couple of trends that I think are fascinating. First of all, we don't have a lot of images of the devil from the early medieval period, but by the time you get to the 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th century, this becomes sort of a heyday of medieval art. The devil is being depicted in paintings, in mosaics, right. On the frescoes of churches, all of those things. Most often in the sort of earlier period, the devil is presented as black to represent sort of darkness and absence from God. And once you get to sort of the heyday of Dante and things, this idea of the red devil being sort of licked by the flames of an inferno becomes increasingly popular. So typically the devil is presented in medieval art as black or as red and is often this sort of monstrous humanoid figure. Right. And actually, Maddie, your illustration was really good in thinking about that because it was a sort of beast like figure that you Dr. And so had horns, had these sorts of goat like features that are often associated with the devil. But there was something a little human and creepy about. Again, this is very like beast from Beauty and the Beast energy that I was getting. And one of the things that's useful to note about why the devil's often presented as kind of, I mean, he's a fallen angel, so he should be beautiful in theory, but his distance from God has made him monstrous. Right. That's why you have this sort of monstrous humanoid aspect. And there are some just really phenomenal illustrations of the devil that come out of that high point period. And one of the reasons these paintings of the devil are so useful is because a lot of people aren't literate. So how do you know what the devil looks like? How do you know who to be afraid of? Right. How you know, so you get these kind of grotesque images of the devil that show up in paintings and in other places.
- [20:30]
Anthony Delaney
This is perfect timing because we have an image, Mickey, which actually we usually do this ourselves, but if you don't mind, we'd like, like to invite you to do it today. And it is an image that's called the Last Judgment. It's from the 15th century, 1431. I'm sure you're way more familiar with this than even we are. But it's Angelico's the Last Judgment, as I said. And we're going to ask you to describe that and the depiction of the devil just now.
- [20:56]
Dr. Mickey Brock
So this 15th century image is, I think, a really phenomenal example of just how evocative and powerful these depictions of the devil can be and could be. I want to say that this image of the devil in hell devouring sinners is part of a much larger painting where sort of Christ is sitting on a throne and pointing to one side where people are going to paradise, to sort of a beautiful garden with lots of good looking angels and other fun things. And he's pointing with his other hand to the left of sort of this image of demons driving the devils into hell. And then this depiction of hell in this Last Judgment painting, which again is typical of the genre, is sort of this really horrific picture that is divided into a couple of different sections representing the seven deadly sins, where really horrific things are happening to people. It's a very sort of Dante esque depiction of hell where sort of people who were in a previous life gluttonous are being force fed toads and bags of gold and other horrific things. People who were wrathful in their life are being forced to bite at and rip the flesh of others. People are being boiled alive and suffering various sorts of sins. So it's this really powerful representation of what bad sins in life can get you in the afterlife. And of course, this is in Catholic Europe, where the belief is your actions on earth, your works on earth are what gets you in or out of hell, basically, and also determine how much time you spend in the fun in between place purgatory. But the image of Satan in this, in this picture, I think is really worth zeroing in on because he's at the very bottom of the image of hell that's presented. And he's consuming humans, right? He's eating their flesh. And this is sort of representing the all consuming nature of evil and of darkness that one would experience in this moment of being absent from God. And he's in this sort of pool of human bodies and excrement and flesh and he's consuming all these things. What this Last Judgment painting really does is manifest that passage from Matthew 13 that talks about the weeping and the sort of gnashing of teeth that one would experience or see in hell. So what I want listeners to think about is if you are like a Jack and Jill peasant, right, you're an average person, you're in Florence, right, and you go to your local beautiful church, which is meant to represent the divinity and goodness of God. It's towering, it's the most beautiful building you'll ever see. There's lots of smells and bells and things you would experience in that space and you're thinking about the majesty of God and you see this painting that really makes manifest what your choice as a believer is. You can go to this beautiful paradise garden or demons can snack on you in the fires of hell for all eternity. So it really is meant to stir in the believer this desire to say, no, I want to go to the good place. Actually, like, how do I make sure that I get there? And for the part of the church, and again, I don't think we necessarily have to see this as cynical, even though of course, some level of social control is the sort of effect. Right. But from the perspective of the church, this is a really good way to make people, to make sure people are doing the repentance that they ought to be doing, are making sure they're following all the various sort of rituals and rites that are necessary for admittance to heaven or shorter time in purgatory in the context of the Catholic Church. So these sorts of images, they have a major impact.
- [24:29]
Maddy Pelling
I'm really, really drawn, Mickey, to what you're saying about the sort of multi sensory experience in which these images would be encountered, I suppose, and enter the imagination of people who are seeing them. You know, I've been looking at this image as well, and to me, my first impression of it was it kind of reminded me of the ancient world. Monsters, it looks like, I don't know, the sort of the Cyclops from the Odyssey, he's got that kind of that look about him. But what you're saying is actually this image has so many more layers and it's being drawn out into the ecclesiastical space or the domestic space, even where these depictions will be met. And with the smells of church. You mentioned the bells there. And thinking about, you know, we are after dark. And Anthony and I often talk about the power of darkness at night and the sort of movement of shadows and candlelight. And you can really imagine the devil in this form leaping off the wall, leaping off the canvas, off the wooden surface, whatever it is, and entering people's lives. And I wonder if you can say something about the reality of the devil for people in the medieval world and the early modern period as well, really, that this is not just an idea, this isn't just a codified image, a visual language that appears again and again. That's a shorthand for being a bit naughty. This is a real threat that's deep in people's bones.
- [25:52]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yeah, Maddie, I'm so glad you bring that up because I think for us, to a large extent, for many people, anyway, the devil has become sort of relegated to the realm of symbolism, right? The devil is a symbol, a pop culture figure, a feature in a Rolling Stone song, whatever, right? It's hard for us to access just how visceral and how real this stuff was. So I think that's a really important point that people, people in the medieval world and into the early modern period, as you say, the devil wasn't just something they read about in the Bible. It's not something just. It's not something they just heard their preachers, you know, fulminate about from the pulpit on a Sunday. It's not something they just saw on walls. The devil was a figure they thought they might encounter. Their devil is someone that they thought could tempt them to do really horrific things that would lead to them being sort of banished from heaven and from the grace of God. They felt that the devil could possess their bodies. I mean, there are seven examples, right, in the Bible of Christ expelling demons from people's bodies. Christ is really the original exorcist, right? That's a really clear physical manifestation of the devil, right? If someone is possessed and speaking in tongues and, you know, writhing about. We've all seen the Exorcist, we know that. Which is actually the Exorcist is fascinating because of course, it's a wildly conservative film in a lot of ways. It's meant to sort of try to prove the existence of the devil and demons. At this moment, where America's becoming sort of more liberalized. I mean, Rosemary's Baby serves the same function. We can set those, those movies aside. But I mean, actually this is a good example. When we watch the Exorcist, right? We're like, okay, that's creepy. She's crawling down the stairs backwards and like, you know, projectile vomiting everywhere. And like, that's not ideal, but. But we don't see that and think, oh my God, is this guy going to come into my bed tonight? Is this something I need to be guarded for? But people in the pre modern period, this guy was. The devil was really real. And there are still actually, of course, a lot of people for who that's true. I think we have to take really seriously the fear that people felt when they thought about the devil and the comfort that they sought from their church, from their religious officials, from the good Book in terms of countering that fear that they really had.
- [28:05]
Anthony Delaney
You know, it's so interesting. We're often talking about belief and beliefs that have passed through, and it irks me Often that I can't quite grasp that belief. But this is one of those ones that I absolutely can because until the age of 15 or whatever, this was a very present person. And you said, you know, wouldn't necessarily be thinking that they could come into your life. Well, in my life and in my contemporary's life up until that point he was very much somebody who probably was in our lives to whatever extent. It's so bizarre now Even you know, 20 years later to go, oh I believed that, truly, truly believed it at the time, Nevermind going back 500 years, you know.
- [28:44]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Well, and I think what's so powerful about this is so one of the reasons the devil is such an effective tool, right, such an effective sort of symbol is A, because of his malleability, but B is because the devil is not a lone operator. And I think the reason people are so fearful of Satan in the pre modern past and in some circumstances today is they see the devil as a figure that will recruit a bunch of people to his side, right? That might be heretics. If you're talking about the medieval period, it might be sort of groups who broadly have heterodox beliefs that deviate from the norms of the church. By the time you get into the early modern period, that's witches. There's this sense that people who are enemies, either internal enemies or external enemies, are by their very nature, by their very evilness in league with the devil. And I think this is really, really crucial, right? People throughout history have othered people, right, have, have talked about difference in various ways. But I think what belief in the devil does and what Christianity does is say not only are you different from me, but you are also morally other, right? You are not just someone who looks different, is opposite, believes different, but you are also in league with the devil because the whole world is this cosmic battle. You're on the side of Satan or you're on the side of God, right? And that's the picture that's painted in a large part by the Bible, by revelation, by this sort of story of the world moving towards an apocalyptic end times. And if you think the world is this sort of piebald picture, right, people are good or bad of Satan or of God. It means you're not just fearful of the devil himself, but you're also fearful of all of the enemies that might be at his disposal, right? You're fearful of sort of the anti church that he presides over. And that I think is really crucial to understanding why you go from having this like scary guy in a painting and this sort of singular figure to viewing the devil as no, someone who's commanding legions. And you know, there's this fundamental idea that comes from Second Corinthians, it's even the devil can disguise himself as an angel of light. So you don't know who to trust either. That's how you see these things get so embedded.
- [31:08]
Maddy Pelling
Mickey, that's the most fantastic place for us to start to zoom in. Now we've got this sense that you're giving us of the mentality of people in medieval, early modern period and the way that they might have interacted with the devil and thought about him in their daily lives. And the eagle eyed or eagle eared. Listeners amongst you will have noticed at the start that we talked about Mickey's other book titles and that she is an expert in particular on the history of Scotland. So that is where we're heading next and Anthony is going to take us right into the thick of it.
- [31:47]
Anthony Delaney
Ayr is a seaside town in the west of Scotland. It's the birthplace of Robert Burns, with Robert the Bruce's castle and a once and future American president's golf course, both called Tunberry. Not far away. It's got an old bridge and a very old church, a race course and a bench that stretches for a mile. It's a popular spot with tourists. Sure, it has something for everyone. Yet in the 1600s, Ayr was a place mired in sin, a place where Satan's corruption had seeped in and every good was turned to evil by his hand. At least that's how it seemed to its minister, one William Adair, who was convinced that the malignancies he saw in his flock flowed from a deeper root than the common corruption, that the devil was at work in Ayr. Amongst the devil's instruments in that hapless town, none was more determined than Janet Sawyer. A woman of low station but high repute. She had long been marked as a servant of Lucifer. William looked down the list of charges against her. She had been seen floating in the sea, sucking at the air like an udder to conjure a storm that sank a ship. She'd argued with a man of the kirk in the street and then when he'd passed the same spot again a little later, a bale of wool had landed on his head and killed him. She'd slung her arms round the neck of the horse and it had died, admittedly 20 days later, but still. She'd shaken a neighbour's baby in anger and its mother had yelled out at Her. Avoid thee, Satan. Get down the stairs, witch. Thief. As she fled, Janet called back curses most damning of all. The mark of Satan had been found on her body, a sign of her unholy covenant with the Prince of Darkness. To William, it seemed Janet's maleficence was not confined to these events, but had seeped into the very fabric of air, staining its streets and alleys, even lapping its foulness in the surf. He thundered from the pulpit that the townsfolk stood upon the threshold of apocalypse, that the Antichrist's shadow lay upon the land, and that theirs was a struggle against the forces of perdition. But what remedy could suffice such a blight? Only the purging fire could cleanse air. Only the flames could sunder the pact between flesh and fiend. It was time, William believed, to deliver Janet Sawyer and her ilk to the purifying embrace of judgment, to commit their bodies to ash and their souls to the keeping of the infernal master. Master they served. So with grim resolve, the minister prepared to light the spark that would banish darkness from air. Or so he had prayed.
- [34:51]
Maddy Pelling
Now, Mickey, we know that this is a story, you know, inside out, and you spent a lot of time thinking about the people in this archivally, narratively. But before we get into who some of these characters are, just tell us a little bit about what the devil meant to people in Scotland in this particular moment.
- [35:11]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yeah, so let me kind of set the mid 17th century scene here. Scotland and all of the sort of British Isles, the three kingdoms have come out of this period of warfare, Right? There's been a raging civil war. That is wildly complex. I know you've talked about this on the podcast before. During the 1640s and in 1649, probably the most shocking act happened that one could have imagined, one that would have been impossible to think of, you know, years before that. And that's, of course, the regicide of Charles I. And I say all of that to say that from the perspective of the Scots, who had, in the early part of the wars of the three kingdoms, fought on the side of the parliamentarians, had been opposed to Charles I by the late 1640s, that tide has shifted. Their allegiances have changed, and they were very shocked by this regicide that seemed like an apocalyptic event, that a king would lose his head. So from the perspective of the Scots, immediately after the regicide, they declared Charles II to be king, which Oliver Cromwell, of course, took as a declaration of war. And the reason that is relevant to this moment is Cromwell and his army immediately begin marching north. And by the time Janet Sawyer finds herself jailed for the crime of witchcraft, Scotland is overrun by the Cromwellian army. And the Cromwellian occupation is a wildly understudied part of Scottish history. But that's neither here nor there. What is important about this is that William Adair and ordinary people in this town of Ayr thought to themselves, the apocalypse seems like it might be nigh. Here are the examples of sort of religious independence under the Cromwellian army sort of run amok. We can't really trust them. These Puritan types have gone too far. The King has caught his head cut off. Hundreds of our own people have been killed in war. There have been periods of lack of food, bad weather, all of these things that are leading to this mounting moment of people thinking God, the Devil really seems loosed from his chains in these final moments. And for them, they lived in a very Protestant, very Presbyterian world. Right? It's a Calvinist theology that's underpinning life in Scotland at the time. And so for them, interestingly, the Devil does not make or break one's salvation. Calvinists believe that that's predetermined by God prior to the creation of the world. But what the devil does do is test one's godliness. And the devil does have the ability to really bring about profound amounts of wrath to the community. So witches, to people like William Adair, and even probably ordinary people who were involved in these trials seem like the latest and greatest manifestation of the Devil's dallying in their. Their daily lives. And that's really important because it means that anything Janet did is viewed through this lens of, is this a testament to, A, her involvement with Satan, but B, this growing malevolent influence in our town, in our country, in our world.
- [38:19]
Maddy Pelling
I work primarily on the 18th century, and every single time I speak to people who work on the 17th century, I think maybe I've picked the wrong century, because the complete upending of world beliefs and hierarchies in that moment is just. It's so enticing. And whenever people speak so passionately about it, it always draws me in. So you've sold this to me.
- [38:39]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Let me just say, as a brief side note, I have obviously been alive for the last 40 years, and the period between 2016 and 2024 has nothing on the 1640s. So sometimes I'm like, you know, things are kind of crazy, but I guess they could be crazier. I don't know if this is a comforting thought at all, but There you go.
- [38:58]
Maddy Pelling
Yeah. You think you've got it bad now? No, no, no.
- [39:00]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yeah. Well, there you go. I'm. The bar is very low. If we're like, oh, that could be worse, could be the 1640s.
- [39:06]
Maddy Pelling
Yeah, yeah. The bar is on the floor for that. Absolutely.
- [39:08]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yes, indeed.
- [39:09]
Maddy Pelling
So let's get into some of these characters then. So you mentioned there William Adair and Janet Sawyer. So just give us a sense of who these people are in their community, what's their standing?
- [39:18]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yeah. So, I mean, William Adair, I think this is really important. He has been minister of Ayr since the late 1630s. He was in Ayr when they signed the National Covenant, which was a really important document of rebellion against some of the actions of Charles I, and in some ways was one of the catalysts for what becomes known as the wars of the Three Kingdoms more broadly. So he's a committed Presbyterian, He's a committed Covenanter because of his allegiance to this document, the National Covenant. And he is just a true believer. Later in his life, as he gets older, he's the Minister of air until the 1680s, he becomes more of a pragmatist. He softens a bit with age. But in this moment, right, in 16. 1650. 1651, as there's this scourge of witchcraft happening in Ayr and in neighboring communities, I mean, there is really this massive period of witch hunting in Scotland from 1649 to 1651. That's kind of the culmination of this radical Presbyterian dominance and a response to all the chaos of things. But he absolutely sees himself as someone whose task it is to safeguard the godly identity of the community. And part of that project for him is going to be cleaning house, right. Getting rid of anybody who might be engaged in all sorts of sundry sinful behaviors. So, you know, I don't want to paint the picture of early modern Scottish society as somehow backwards looking or overly stern. I mean, that's always the image of like the, you know, the dour Presbyterian who's perpetually frowning and, you know, this idea that Calvinists are always afraid that somebody somewhere is having a good time. Right. It's not that clean cut, but this is a moment of apocalyptic anticipation. Right. So the standards for godly behavior are really quite high. So William Adair, well known minister, kind of a hardcore guy. I can tell you lots of other stories about him, including things about like the strange naked man doodles he drew in his school notebook, other things I learned about him in the archives. We can lead, we can Come back to this. But he had a.
- [41:18]
Maddy Pelling
Again, that's another podcast. Yes, it is another podcast, yes.
- [41:21]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Very exciting. I love finding a little, little flight pornography in the archives, which is very surprising when it happens. Anyway, he's a, you know, really important figure in the community. Janet Sawyer, on the other hand, we don't know much about her background prior to her being arrested for witchcraft in the summer of 1651. And actually I think that's important. A lot of people who get accused of witchcraft are ordinary women about whom we basically know nothing until they get in trouble with the law. Right. That's why court records are so useful for historians, right? Is they show us ordinary people, but they typically only show us ordinary people when they're getting in trouble. Right. Like Janet Sawyer. So we don't know a lot about her or about her background. She's almost certainly sort of middle age. That's typically common. She is clearly someone who is involved for a long time in series of quarrels with her neighbors, which is a really common profile for someone who gets accused of witchcraft. Right. She's pissed people off. She's, you know, whatever, she's, she's had a lot of long standing grievances. And when those grievances make it to court and become part of these witchcraft allegations, that's when you get the demonic interpretation of the things that she might be doing.
- [42:33]
Anthony Delaney
Well, that's a perfect place for us to start winding down this, our first part. But before we do, I have one more question for you, Mickey, which kind of tries to bring us back to Satan, which is not a sentence I say very often. And that is, we're talking about witchcraft, we're talking about Janet Sawyer and William Adair. Where is Satan in this? And how does he present himself? And how does he make himself manifest in this community at this time, in this particular case, at this particular time?
- [43:02]
Dr. Mickey Brock
I'll give two answers to that. So one, he makes himself manifest by, again, this sense of apocalyptic anticipation. Because one of the things these Calvinist types like William Adair believe is that at the end of days, as they approach, the devil is increasingly empowered by God to bring about wrath, to wreak havoc, to test his servants. So in this moment, when you think the end of the world may be coming, there's also this perception that the devil is operating at his highest level. Right. And he's making himself manifest in a range of ways. So to some extent there's almost a ubiquitousness to the devil, not just in this sort of case of Janet Sawyer, but more broadly but the devil is also making himself present through the allegation of witchcraft itself. Because the fundamental idea was that someone like Janet Sawyer got her powers to do harmful things, to curse horses and, you know, harm babies and all of that through a deal with the devil, through a pact with the devil. And you mentioned in your opener that she was found to have a devil's mark on her. And that was one of the things that early modern Scots really believed was clear sort of evidence and proof that you were the devil's servant if you had received his mark. Now, what the hell is the devil's mark? I mean, what are we talking about here? It's not as obvious as like a strange satanic symbol on your body. They believed the devil's mark was an insensible part of your body that was something that couldn't feel pain. So in reality, this could be a mole, a third nipple, a scar, those sorts of things. But if you were found to have this mark, people believed that this mark was something that you received during the making of the pact to show that you were Satan's servant. And poor Janet found herself subject to one of the really humiliating and painful procedures that was used during some of these mid century witch hunts, which that is witch pricking. And people literally would carry around sort of magistrates who styled themselves as witch hunters, these folding pins, these very long folding pins that they would unfold and use to try to poke parts of the body that they thought were the devil's mark. And of course, you can imagine the damage this did to the modesty of women like Janet Sawyer, who were used to, you know, sort of keeping covered up in various ways. So the devil is very much seen as the vehicle through which Janet becomes a witch, someone who's doing these evil, magical deeds.
- [45:19]
Maddy Pelling
It's really interesting, Mickey, to come to this story from the perspective of the conversation that we've been having about the devil, because so often on the show we talk about, talk about witch trials. We've looked a little bit at them before and, and we always focus on the human element and the misogyny that's so often at the heart of them. And the sort of public humiliation of women. It's a humiliation of often middle aged women or women who've been ostracized in some way. And to think about it in terms of the devil specifically, it's giving me a slightly different perspective on it, which is really interesting. We're going to continue our discussion of the devil in Scotland and the havoc that he wreaks in episode Two. But before we go, I just want to ask you, Mickey, what do you think is the role of the devil in this society? Do you think there is any good to come of it in the way that it governs people's lives? Or is it just something incredibly harmful, the belief in it, in who this being or this creepy person is? Do you think there's any advantage to it in 17th century Scotland?
- [46:22]
Dr. Mickey Brock
Yeah. So let me answer this by kind of painting a picture of what the devil would have meant to the average person. And then through that, to answer the question of could any good come of this? I don't want to suggest that this is a world in which people are thinking about the devil all the time. Right? Satan is not always on the brain. They're farming, they're finding loved ones, they're having children, they're living their lives. But they go to church every Sunday. Attendance is mandatory at least once a week in some places, places more. And you're hearing, you know, the minister from the pulpit talk about the Devil, talk about how he can cause you to have impure thoughts, talking about how he needs to be combated as part of your godly duty. If you are one of the elect, if you are one of the chosen, you must constantly be fighting and raging against the devil and being watchful of him in your life. So you're being told this, and you're being told that you as an ordinary person, because of original sin, because of that interpretation of Genesis 3, right, of the serpent as the being that colluded with Eve to bring about the downfall of humanity. Because of that, you don't deserve salvation at all. But God might give you a little bit of grace, so don't ruin it, right? Don't be thinking about the devil. So you're hearing these sorts of messages. You may have had a witch trial in your community. If you're an ordinary Scottish person, you may have seen a witch. Witches in Scotland were usually strangled and then burned. You may have seen that happen. You may have heard her confession about all the things she did, dastardly things with the devil before she was. Was executed. You might have seen occasionally an image of the devil, although, as I think we all know, the Calvinists weren't too keen on images. But maybe you have. Right? You might know some folkloric stories about a devil that's a bit more jovial and a bit less scary than the one the church puts forth. So even if you are not constantly thinking about the devil, the devil is present in your life and you might Deal with him in some way, at least you, at the very least, you'll be tempted, tempted by him. So the question then becomes, does that do any good, that sort of ubiquity of the devil? And I, I would say it mostly made people fearful. It mostly made people turn to the church. So in some ways you could argue the devil helped to create a sense of national identity by really associating Scottishness with commitment to this sort of particular Presbyterian identity. I think you can make the same argument in some way about the role of the devil in Ireland. I think the devil, again, is this lens sometimes through which national identity is viewed. Right. For the Irish, Oliver Cromwell and his folks were a real manifestation of the devil. Right. So anybody can sort of be a servant of the Satan, depending on who you ask in this context. Now, I don't necessarily think national identity is a good thing. So we can sort of leave that up for debate. I do think the devil belief in the devil maybe made people especially introspective because they thought it was really important not just to do evil actions and to say evil things, but it was also important not to have evil thoughts. So maybe it led to some soul searching that made people potentially better citizens. But I think on the main, the devil was a dangerous figure because it caused people to demonize others or at least became a tool for demonizing others, for saying, you're different than me, you're a servant of Satan, you're worse than a mere enemy, you're anti human. Demonization and dehumanization should be seen as synonyms because they were. And that's really dangerous. That's a dangerous legacy. The devil is this useful, movable idea. And a lot of people who you don't like, who the society doesn't like, can be thrown into this sort of rubbish bin of demonic legions. And that I think is a really concerning thing. So it's not great, guys. It's not ideal. I think it probably.
- [50:04]
Anthony Delaney
It's not going well.
- [50:05]
Maddy Pelling
It's fine in conclusion.
- [50:08]
Dr. Mickey Brock
But a lot of great art, you know.
- [50:10]
Anthony Delaney
Yeah, yeah. And a lot of great drama and just other bits and things. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's, you know, there is that.
- [50:15]
Dr. Mickey Brock
And it's hard to imagine Christianity without the devil. The theology doesn't really make sense fully without it. What do you think about Christianity? What do you think about God? And I think, I think as we can all agree, we need at least three to four more episodes to unpack.
- [50:27]
Anthony Delaney
Well, we may not have three to four, but we do have another one. I mean this. You know, I'm enjoying history. I feel like I'm back in a lecture, which has been a long time since I've been an attendee at a lecture. But the heart is racing a little bit. I'm quite excited. I feel like I'm watching a miniseries or something. I'm like, I can't wait to hear what happens next. So we have now the devil kind of rising in power, I suppose. And in the next episode with Mickey, we are going to be talking about a fall. His second fall, let's say his cultural fall, perhaps. Or indeed was it a fall? So thank you so much for joining us for this episode. This has been one of my favorites. I'm happy to say that right now I can't wait for episode two. Let's get into it next week. But thank you again for listening. Leave us a review Wherever you get your podcasts, it helps other people to discover us and come back again next week for part two.
- [51:25]
Dr. Mickey Brock
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- [51:29]
Anthony Delaney
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- [51:32]
Dr. Mickey Brock
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