Hatred of the Elderly as a Motivation for Witch Hunts

The era of witch hunts (1480-1700) exhibited a noticeably smaller life expectancy than the modern age, and living until an age even as advanced as sixty was extremely rare. Older individuals were seen as abnormal and thus, to the conformist mindset prevalent at the time, a threat.

W. Fulbecke expressed this view in writing, claiming that the bodies of the old become increasingly decayed and impure, and thus susceptible to corruption and evil. Having no rational, scientific explanation for the aging process, Fulbecke suggests that people senesce because they are "by the Devil whetted for such a purpose."

The scientific ignorance of the witch-hunting period thus provided fuel for the creation of severely negative stereotypes on the basis of which aged individuals were persecuted. H.C. Erik Midelfort's statistics show that the median age of accused witches across Europe was most frequently sixty, and at least fifty-five.

Given a general state of physical incapacitation among the elderly of the pre-modern era due to the lack of adequate medical knowledge, another reason for the frequent witch hunts against the senile may have been the inability of many of the latter to support themselves independently.

An English householder, as described by Thomas Ady, had a reputation for accusing of witchcraft those elderly beggars who had come to his door asking for assistance. The householder considered it his religious duty to give his aid to the poor, and would ask God's forgiveness for denying it to an elderly woman, but would subsequently accuse the same woman of witchcraft. Perhaps, by the invention of such charges, the householder attempted to eliminate those elderly beggars whom he would otherwise have been compelled to support out of his Christian principles, likely to the detriment of his own economic well-being.