Haiek Danak Sorginak
Haiek Danak Sorginak (All Of Them Witches) is a photographic reconstruction of the witch-hunts in the Basque Country based on the imagery that women accused of witchcraft described to the inquisitors when they were forced to confess under torture.
This project was born from a personal need to demystify the figure of the witch and solve the misunderstanding that the excess of fantasy and popular culture has imposed on these women. I intend to eliminate the ambiguity that surrounds this topic and visually portray this persecution, detaching myself from the patriarchal inheritance that has been, until now, the one who have told this story. These years of terror and propaganda sowed the seed of a deep psychological alignment of men regarding women that is still in order today. In a moment in which women are fighting for their rights I consider it vital to share this part of our history to reflect on our past and elevate womankind.
ONGOING
Estevania de Nabarcorena states that her daughter, Joana de Telechea, gave birth to a girl on Our Lady of March. And that after having put on some very fine clothes for the celebration and a new and very fine taffeta-like apron, she took the said child in her arms and the child soiled her and spoiled everything, for which she became furious and told the devil about this. And he advised her to kill the said girl, her grand- daughter, with some toad bone powder that he gave her to do this, and that she should give it to her to eat, saying that it was good for killing worms. They gave it to girl to eat, and then, within a few days, she died.
Florencio Idoate. Un documento de la inquisición sobre brujería en Navarra, 1972
Jeanne de Abadie admitted that she was deflowered by the devil when she was 13 years old and claimed that his member, if extended, would measure approximately one rod (1.188 me- tres), but that it is coiled and winding, in the shape of a snake. When the devil wants to know women in a carnal manner, he separates them from the rest and they are heard to scream like people in great pain, and they return to the Sabbath after a while completely bloodied. The devil was in the habit of knowing beautiful women from the front and ugly women from the back.
Pierre Lancre. Tableau de l’insconstance des mauvais anges et demons où il est amplement traité des sociers et de la sorcellerie, 1612
Catalina de Mercero, aged 29, was asked if there is usually any illumination in the said field; she stated that there are usually many bones on the ground in the said field of the witches’ sabbath, which according to what she has heard spoken in the said field are those of newborn creatures, of which the said Beelzebub usually takes a great quantity in his hands, and carries them to a cavern in the said field. And there he sets them alight, and then scatters them over the said field, and they produce light in the same manner as if they were burning tapers or candles, with which the entire field is usually very bright. 1595
Florencio Idoate. La brujería en Navarra y sus documentos, 1972
Marie de Marigrane, aged 15, said that Menioin was carrying a clay pot, inside of which were fat spiders stuffed with a white drug called reagal and two toads that the accused skinned while the aforesaid Augerot crushed the reagal and spiders in a mortar. After having previously beaten them with a stick to poison them, they sprayed some of the poison on a pasture so that the cattle would die. They then went to the town of Iraurits, took a child from its cradle, strangled it, then placed it on the bed, between the father and the mother, so that the latter would believe that his wife had suffocated it. As if that were not enough, they also killed another son of Menioin de Hirigoien, poisoning him. On 2 October 1576, Boniface de Lasse announced that he condemned her to death by hanging and burning.
Pierre Lancre. Tableau de l’insconstance des mauvais anges et demons où il est amplement traité des sociers et de la sorcellerie, 1612
And they suck the small children by the anus and by their nature; squeezing them hard with their hands, and sucking strongly they extract and suck their blood; and with pins and needles they prick their temples and the tops of their heads, and by the spine and other parts and limbs of their bodies; and they suck their blood there, the devil saying to them: suck and swallow that, which is good for you; from which the children die; or they become ill for a long time; and other times they kill them afterwards, squeezing them with their hands and biting them on the throat until they choke them.
Pierre Lancre. Tableau de l’insconstance des mauvais anges et demons où il est amplement traité des sociers et de la sorcellerie, 1612
An old woman from the village of Corres, called Mariquita de Atauri, who in despair cast herself into a river a few days after she had been reconciled in Logroño. From the declaration of María de Ulibarri, her thirty-six-year old daughter, it appears that her mother had expressed deep repentance and anguish, after she returned from Logroño, her conscience being weighed down by those whom she had unjustly accused. The entreaties of her daughter prevailed upon her to declare the truth and on the advice of her confessor she later went to revoke or amend her statements before the commissioner of Maéstu, the licenciado Felipe Días. The latter, however, not only refused to receive her confession but drove her away with harsh abuse and insults, threatening her that she would have to be burned at Logroño for having maliciously come forward to perjure herself and recant what she had already truthfully confessed. Not many days after she drowned herself.
Gustav Henningsen. The Salazar Documents: Inquisitor Alonso de Salazar Frías and Others on the Basque Witch Persecution, 1611
Jeanette Abadie, aged 16, from Ciboure saw how several witches transformed themselves into wolves, dogs, cats and other animals, for which they washed their hands with a certain water that they stored in a jar, regaining their shape when they desired; and they could not be seen while they were trans- formed, they had already been to the Sabbath, along the roads or in any other place, and they could only be distinguished by a little glow.
Pierre Lancre. Tableau de l’insconstance des mauvais anges et demons où il est amplement traité des sociers et de la sorcellerie, 1612
Maria Juan de Anocibar has been a witch for more than fifty years, and as such, she gave and offered herself to the Devil, and has gone there many and various times at night, going through the doors and windows of her house into the air, smearing herself first on her head and behind her ears with a certain ointment that a scowling man brings her. And smearing herself, she went through the air to a meadow, where she states and confesses that a great number of men and women gathered and worshipped and adored one who was seated on a chair.
Florencio Idoate. La brujería en Navarra y sus documentos, 1978