Abstract:
Belief in witchcraft is found across the world and in some societies alleged witches are persecuted
and killed. This article explores the rise of false accusations of witchcraft and the resultant killings
in South Africa in the last three decades; as many as 20 000 may have died between 2004 and
2008. The article considers these lynchings in the light of killings associated with witch-hunts in
Europe (1450–1750) focusing on the witch-hunts of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In
many cases, people’s credulity is abused by those who accuse others of practising witchcraft. The
accusers often stand to gain in some way and exploit the vulnerability of those they accuse. This
article explores witch-hunts as a reaction to disaster as related to gender bias and relational
problems. It shows that such persecution is difficult to control with social institutions; it is a selfpropagating
discourse with potentially tragic results for the victims.
