Evans Pritchard IV

Edward EVANS-PRITCHARD 1976 [1937] Witchcraft !rac"#$ a%d &a'ic a()%' th# A*a%d#+ !,f)rd C"ar#%d)%+ [A.rid'#d with a% i%tr)d/cti)% .0 Ea 2i""i#$+] CHAPTER IV Are Witches Conscious Agents? I ONE of the most remarkable features of European witchcraft was the readiness with which witches sometimes, not under duress, confessed their guilt and gave lengthy accounts of their crimes and their organization . It seems that, to some degree at any rate, people living in a community in which the facts of witchcraft are never doubted may convince themselves that they possess the power with which others credit them. Howeve r this may be, it is of interest to ask whether zande ever confess that they are witches. !o zande the "uestion of guilt does not present itself as it would to us. s I have already e#plained, thei r interest in witchcraft is aroused only in speci$c cases of misfortune and persists only while the misfortune lasts. !he only witch they pay attention to is the witch who is actually causing them misfortune. %hen their mishap is ended they cease to regard the man as a witch, for, as we have seen, anyone may be a witch, but a &ande is only concerned with a witch whose witchcraft is signi$cant to himself. lso, witchcraft is something they react to and against in misfortune, this being the main meaning it has for them. It is a response to certain situatio ns and not an intricate intellectu al concept. Hence a &ande accused of witchcraft is astonished. He has not conceived of witchcraft from this angle. !o him it has always been a reaction against others in his own misfortunes, so that it is di'icult for him to apprehend the notion when he himself is its ob(ective in the misfortunes of other people. !his problem is e#ceedingly di'icult. )ome frican peoples appear to bridge over the di'iculty which arises between a proven act of witchcraft and the witch*s avowed ignorance of the act by asserting that a witch may act without volition. +ut &ande notions do not readily permit this thesis. sk any &ande the straightforward "uest ion whether a man knows that he is a witch and bewitches in full conscious ness of his action, and he will reply that it is impossible that a witch should be ignorant of his condition and of his assaults upon

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Evans Pritchard IV