The Burning Times


 * See Burning times for other uses.

The Burning Times is a 1990 Canadian documentary, presenting a feminist revisionist account of the Early Modern European witchcraft trials. It was directed by Donna Read and written by Erna Buffie, and features interviews with feminist and Neopagan notables, such as Starhawk, Margot Adler, and Matthew Fox. The Burning Times is the second film in the National Film Board of Canada's Women and Spirituality series, following Goddess Remembered.

The opening and closing theme music, composed by Loreena McKennitt, was released as the track titled "Tango to Evora" on her album "The Visit".

Numbers of witches killed
In the film, Thea Jensen calls this period in history the "Women's Holocaust" and gives an estimate of a total of 9 million witches burned, admitting that this is a "high" estimate but quoting no alternative numbers. Scholarly "high" estimates range around 100,000, with estimates around 60,000 more common. The nine million figure has a notorious history of misattribution, and ultimately originates with a 1784 article by Gottfried Christian Voigt.

Criticisms of the Church
The movie is inaccurate in other respects, placing Trier in France instead of Germany, dating a stone cross there that is recorded to have been erected in 958 AD to 1132 AD without further explanation. The cross is shown as a "symbol of a new religious cult that was sweeping across Europe," despite Christian presence since 286. Robert Eady, a member of the Catholic Civil Rights League in Canada, has cited the film in a complaint to broadcast regulators, in particular mentioning offense at the movie's quote: "it took the Church two hundred years of terror and death to transform the image of paganism into devil worship, and folk culture into heresy." Eady describes the documentary as propaganda intended to represent the Christian Church as "a wicked, patriarchal, misogynist institution" Kapica adds "Women have genuine grievances with the Church. The Burning Times', however, is not going to help their cause."

Multimedia

 * Watch The Burning Times at NFB.ca