As it’s nearly Halloween let’s take a look at some of our spooky early modern books which describe encounters with the supernatural. One of the seminal works on paranormal happenings to found on the shelves is Saducismus Triumphatus or, A Full and Plain Evidence, Concerning Witches and Apparitions , which was first published posthumously in 1681. Trinity Hall has the fourth edition published in 1726 [1]. It was written by a clergyman named Joseph Glanvil (1636-1680) who was a member of the Royal Society.
Glanvil believed in the existence of witchcraft and the supernatural (like many others in the 17th century) and he set out to provide “full and plain evidence concerning witches and apparitions”. He thought that without the threat of demons and witches, people would see no reason for religion – and worse – that a lack of belief in the supernatural was akin to atheism. The small book was hugely popular and is considered to have influenced Cotton Mather, a New England preacher who stirred up hysteria about witchcraft during the notorious Salem witch trials (1692-93).
Among the book’s numerous tales of ghosts, witches and demons, it includes one of the first descriptions of poltergeist manifestation in ‘The Drummer of Tedworth’. In Glanvil’s version of the story a landowner from Tedworth (now Tidworth) named John Mompesson brought a case against a vagrant drummer for begging with a forged permit. After he had won the suit and confiscated the drum, Mompesson’s house was plagued by inexplicable drumming, eerie lights, scratching noises and unpleasant sulphurous smells. Over several months in 1663, his children’s beds would shake and levitate into the air by themselves, and objects were thrown violently around the room by unseen hands. The drummer was in prison on a charge of theft for part of this time so could be exonerated as the cause of the disturbances.
The case became well-known, and many people visited Mompesson’s house to witness the strange occurrences for themselves. Glanvil himself visited the family to investigate the disturbances in January 1663, and he describes how he heard a strange noise from the children’s bedroom:
“It was as loud a scratching, as one with long Nails could make upon a Bolster. There were two little modest Girls in the Bed, between Seven and Eleven years old as I guessed. I saw their hands out over the Clothes, and they could not contribute to the noise that was behind their heads.”.
Thinking the children too innocent to be the responsible for the noise and finding no “dog or other creature” in the room, he was persuaded that it was made by “some Dæmon or Spirit.” Despite this, he does not appear to have been unduly afraid.
Later the same year, the drummer was convicted of theft and transported to the colonies never to return, and his drum destroyed. After this, peace returned to the Mompesson household. The general verdict now is that the poltergeist activity was a deception by either the children or the Drummer’s mates. Although the family swore at the time that it was not a fraud.
Another noisy spirit can be found in a book first published in 1705 entitled An Historical, Physiological and Theological Treatise of Spirits, Apparitions, Witchcrafts, and Other Magical Practices [2], which was written by John Beaumont (c.1650–1731), a physician (and geologist). In his book he describes his frequent encounters with genii (spirits) who appeared to him, announcing their presence by ringing a little bell in his ear. He writes:
I ask’d one Spirit which came for some Nights together… what his Name was, who answer’d Ariel… the two that constantly attended my self, appear’d both in Womens Habit, they being of a Brown Complexion, and about Three Foot in Stature; they had both black, loose Network Gowns, tyed with a black Sash about their Middles, and within the Network appear’d a Gown of a Golden Colour, with somewhat of a Light striking thro’ it; their Heads were not drest with Topknots, but they had white Linnen Caps on, with Lace on them, about three Fingers breadth, and over it they had a Black loose Network Hood. (p. 92)
First edition of this early account of the supernatural, with wonderful engraved frontispiece of an “Evil Genius,” “Good Genii” and “Jews Going Out in the Moonshine” by Michael van der Gucht.
Beaumont was a firm believer in the occult and one of his main aims in writing his book was to refute Balthasar Bekker’s 1695 work The World Bewitch’d, which debunked the supernatural. Beaumont collected together many accounts of paranormal experiences from respectable narrators such as clergyman and aristocrats as evidence to support his views. He takes his own visitations from these fashionable ghosts in his stride and notes that the spirits would “disswade me from drinking too freely” (p. 394). It is possible that these genii (as he called spirits) may well have come out of the bottle.
Whatever the truth, many of our books do contain the ghosts of former owners in the form of their inscriptions or other notes in their books. Our copy of Beaumont’s text has an ink inscription on the title page: Char: Tollet, 1780″. He can be identified as Charles Tollet (died 1796), a landed gentleman who was appointed High Sheriff for Staffordshire in 1782. The book was donated to the College by Lawrence Strangman (1908-1980) who records in pencil at the front of the books that he purchased it in 1927. Strangman collected a wide range of books which he donated to Trinity Hall, which include several on witchcraft and the supernatural. Some of these are currently on display in the Jerwood library reading room if you dare to look.
Jenni Lecky-Thompson
References
- Glanvill, Joseph, Sadducismus Triumphatus : or, A Full and Plain Evidence, Concerning Witches and Apparitions : in Two Parts. The First Treating of Their Possibility. The Second of Their Real Existence, The fourth edition, with additions.. (London:: printed for A. Bettesworth, and J. Batley, in Pater-noster-Row; W. Meares, and J. Hooke, near Temple-Bar, in Fleet-street, 1726) Old Library J*.7.50
- Beaumont, John. An Historical, Physiological and Theological Treatise of Spirits, Apparitions, Witchcrafts, and Other Magical Practices. London: Printed for D. Browne, at the Black Swan without Temple-Bar; J. Taylor, at the Ship in St. Paul’s Church-Yard; R. Smith, at the Angel without Temple-Bar; F. Coggan, in the Inner-Temple Lane; and T. Browne without Temple-Bar, 1705. Strangman Collection 133 BEA
Further reading
Burns, William E. “Glanvill [Glanville], Joseph (1636–1680), Church of England clergyman.” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. January 03, 2008. Oxford University Press. Date of access 18 Oct. 2023, https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-10790
Mandelbrote, Scott. “Beaumont, John (c. 1640–1731), natural philosopher and collector of geological specimens.” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. September 28, 2006. Oxford University Press. Date of access 18 Oct. 2023, https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-1876/version/1
Prior, M. E. (1932). Joseph Glanvill, Witchcraft, and Seventeenth-Century Science. Modern Philology, 30(2), 167–193. http://www.jstor.org/stable/434078
The Archives and Old Library at Trinity Hall 