Johannes Junius

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Johannes Junius (* 1573 in Nieder-Weisel as Johannes Jung; † August 6, 1628 in Bamberg ) was Bamberg's mayor (1614, 1617, 1621, 1624–1627) and councilor (1608–1613, 1615–1616, 1618–1620, 1622–1623) and a victim of the witch hunt in Bamberg .

Life

Johannes Junius was burned at the stake under the reign of Prince-Bishop Johann Georg II. Fuchs von Dornheim after he had affirmed his innocence in a desperate letter to his daughter Veronika on July 24, 1628. He was condemned as a Trudner ( witcher ) and waited in the Bamberg Drudenhaus for the execution. The case of Junius attracted a lot of attention because a letter written by him has survived, one of the rare testimonies from the hand of a victim of the witch hunt . After days of torture, Junius named other alleged warlocks and witches. On August 6, 1628, he was sentenced to death and executed a little later .

confession

In his tortured confession, Junius said that in 1624, when he was in financial difficulties, he was seduced by a woman who later turned out to be a succubus . She threatened him with death if he did not deny God. He got the witch name Krix and the family name Vixen . At this point in time, some townspeople also identified themselves as allies of the devil and congratulated him. From then on he regularly rode a huge, black, winged dog to the witches' Sabbath . He had attended a black mass at which the Beelzebub had appeared. Although other witches and demons ordered him to kill a child on their behalf and beat him, he did not make that sacrifice. He admitted to sacrificing his horse and desecrating the host. His confession is reminiscent of the confession of Walpurga housewife from 1587, for example the baptism in a witch's name and the disappearance of the succubus when the name of God is mentioned.

The interrogation protocol is now kept under the signature RB.Msc.148 / 299 as part of the Bamberg witch trial files in the Bamberg State Library.

Letter from Johannes Junius to his daughter Veronica

In a last letter to his daughter Veronika, Junius described the hopelessness of his situation: “I am guilty of being imprisoned, I have been tortured guiltily, I must die, guilty, because whoever competes in that house must or will be a drutner martyred for a long time, bit that he had to forge something out of his head, and first, that got mercy, vf cover something. [...] Now God in heaven knows that I can neither know the slightest thing, [I] therefore die innocently and like a Merterer. [...] I ask you vmb that the youngest will of the court: stop writing in good hat and pray for me as your father for a real Merterer. After my death, do what you want, but beware that you do not make that writing audible. [...] You can make a clear complaint for me that I am not a trudgeon, but rather a painter and die with it. To a thousand good night, then your father Johannes Junius will never see you. July 24th, 1628 ".

The letter is today under the signature RB.Msc.148/300 in the Bamberg State Library.

See also

literature

  • Britta Distler (née Britta Gehm): The witch hunt in the Bamberg monastery and the intervention of the Reichshofrat to end it Hildesheim, Olms, 2012.
  • Johannes Hasselbeck, Robert Zink: "This is how the entire citizenry is spent ...". The letter from the Mayor of Bamberg, Johannes Junius, from the witch prison in 1628 (Publications of the Bamberg City Archives 15). Bamberg 2013. (Scientific Edition.)
  • Ralph Kloos, Thomas Göltl: The witch burners of Franconia . Erfurt 2012, ISBN 978-3-95400-109-5 , pp. 71-73.
  • Harald Parigger : I am dying as a real martyr: the letter from Bamberg's mayor Johannes Junius from the witch prison of July 24, 1628. In: History in Science and Education. Volume 41, 1990, pp. 17-34.
  • Pieter Minden: [Review by] Johannes Hasselbeck, Robert Zink: "This is how the entire citizenry is spent ...". The letter of the Bamberg mayor Johannes Junius from the witch prison 1628. Bamberg 2013. In: Historischer Verein Bamberg: Report. Volume 150, 2014, pp. 357-359.
  • Wilhelm G. Soldan, Heinrich Heppe: History of the witch trials. Volume 2, revised and edited by Max Bauer, reprint of the original edition by G. Müller, Munich, 1911, p. 5 ff.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ / Britta Gehm: The witch hunt in the bishopric of Bamberg and the intervention of the Reichshofrat to end it . Olms, Hildesheim 2000, p. 178 and 185.
  2. ^ Marjorie Elizabeth Plummer, Robin Bruce Barnes (Ed.): Ideas and Cultural Margins in Early Modern Germany . Ashgate Publishing, 2009, ISBN 978-0-7546-6568-7 , p. 226.
  3. ↑ Johannes Hasselbeck, Robert Zink: "This is how the entire citizenry is spent ...". The letter from the Mayor of Bamberg, Johannes Junius, from the witch prison in 1628 (Publications of the Bamberg City Archives 15). Bamberg 2013.
personal data
SURNAME Junius, Johannes
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jung, Johannes (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Mayor, victim of the witch trials in Bamberg
DATE OF BIRTH 1573
PLACE OF BIRTH Nieder-Weisel
DATE OF DEATH August 6, 1628
Place of death Bamberg