James Sprenger - Association With The Malleus Maleficarum

Association With The Malleus Maleficarum

He was named in the 1484 papal bull Summis desiderantes of Pope Innocent VIII. Popular opinion makes Sprenger the co-author of the Malleus Maleficarum. All editions after 1519 named him as Heinrich Kramer's collaborator.

It has been claimed that Sprenger was not interested in witches and that he cannot be linked to any witch trial. His personal relationship to Kramer was acrimonious and Sprenger used his powerful position whenever he could to make Kramer’s life and work as difficult as possible. Scholars now believe that he became associated with the Malleus Maleficarum largely as a result of Kramer's wish to lend his book as much official authority as possible.

Sprenger died suddenly in 1495.

Read more about this topic:  James Sprenger

Famous quotes containing the words association with and/or association:

    Association with other people corrupts our character Mespecially when we have none.
    Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)

    The spiritual kinship between Lincoln and Whitman was founded upon their Americanism, their essential Westernism. Whitman had grown up without much formal education; Lincoln had scarcely any education. One had become the notable poet of the day; one the orator of the Gettsyburg Address. It was inevitable that Whitman as a poet should turn with a feeling of kinship to Lincoln, and even without any association or contact feel that Lincoln was his.
    Edgar Lee Masters (1869–1950)