Knowing demons, knowing spirits in the early modern period

This volume explores the manifold ways of knowing - and knowing about - preternatural beings such as demons, angels, fairies, and other spirits that inhabited and were believed to act in early modern European worlds.

Its contributors examine how people across the social spectrum assayed the various types of spiritual entities that they believed dwelled invisibly but meaningfully in the spaces just beyond (and occasionally within) the limits of human perception.

Collectively, the volume demonstrates that an awareness and understanding of the nature and capabilities of spirits - whether benevolent or malevolent - was fundamental to the knowledge-making practices that characterise the years between ca. 1500 and 1750.