Twenty-five thousand years ago Palaeolithic man and woman depened upon hunting to survive. Only by success in the hunt could there be food to eat, skins for warmth and shelter, bones to fashion into tools and weapons. In those days men and women believed in a multitude of gods. Nature was over whelming. Out of awe and resepect for the gusting wind, the violent lightning, the rushing stream, men and women ascribed  to each a spirit; made each a deity...a God of Hunting.       Most of the animals hunted were horned so men and women pictured the God of Hunting also being horned. It was at this time that magick mixed in with these first faltering steps of religion.The earliest form of magick was probably of the sympathetic variety. Similar things, it was thought, have similar effects: like attracts like. If a life-size, clay model of a bison was made, then attacked and "killed"...then a hunt of the real bison should also end in kill. Religo-magickal ritual was born when one of the cavemen threw on a skin and antlered mask and played the part of the Hunting God, directing the attack. There are, still in exstence, cave paints of such rituals, together with the spearstabbed clay models of bison and bear.      Along with this God of Hunting was also a Goddess, though which came first (or whether they evolved together ) we do not know, and it is immaterial. If there were animals to hunt, there had to be fertility of those animals. If the tribe was to continue ( and there was a high mortality rate in those days ) then there had to be fertility of men and women. Again sympathic magick played a part. Clay models were made of the animals mating, and in accompanying ritual the members of the tribe would copulate.         With the development of different rituals-for fertility, for success in the hunt, for seasonal needs-there necessarily developed a priesthood: a select few more able to bring results when directing the rituals. In some areas of Europe these ritual leaders, or priests and priestesses, became known as Wicca-"the Wise Ones". In fact by the time of the Anglo-Saxon kings in England, the king would never think of acting on any important matter without the consulting the Witan; the Council of the Wise Ones. And indeed the Wicca did have to be wise. They not only lead the religious rites but also had to have knowledege of herbal lore, magick, and divination; they had to be doctor, lawyer, magician, priest. To the people the Wicca were plenipotentiaries between them and the gods themselves.

With the coming of Christianity there was not the immediate massconversion that is often suggested. Christianity was a man-made religion. It had not evolved gradually and naturally over thousands of years, as we have seen the Old Religion did. Whole countries were classed as Christian when in actuality it was only the rulers who had adopted the new religion. The Old Ways were very much practice for the first thousands of years. An attempt at mass conversion was made by Pope Gregory the Great. He believed if the new Christian Churches were built upon older temples, more people would come. Actually pagans themselves built these churches because they were the only artisans available.  In the early days, when Christianity was slowly growing  in strength, the Old Religion-wiccans and other pagans-were its rivals. As Christianity grew in strength, so the Old Religion was slowly pushed back. Back until about the time of the Reformation, it only exisited in the outlying country districts. Non-Christians at that time became known as Pagans and Heathens. "Pagan" comes from the Latin word Pagani and simply means "people who live in the country". The word Heathen means "one who dwells on the heath".  The Christians believed that pagans had to be stopped! The God of the Old Religion was horned so this lead to the idea of the pagans must be Devil worshippers!       The charge of Devil-worship, so often leveled at Witches, is ridiculous. The Devil is purely a Christian invention; there being no mention of him, as such, before the New Testament. In fact it is interesting to note that the whole concept of evil associated with the Devil is due to an error in translation. The Old Testament Hebrew Ha-satan and the New Testament Greek diabolos simply mean "opponent" or "adversary".  It should be remembered that the idea of dividing the Supreme Power into two-good and evil-is the idea of an advanced and complex civilization. The Old Gods, through their gradual development, were very much "human" in that they had their good side and bad side. It was the idea of an all-good, all loving deity which necessitated an antagonist. This view of an all good god was developed by Zoroaster (Zarathustra), in Persia in the seventh century BCE. This idea later spread westward and was picked up in Mithraism, and later in Christianity.      In 1484 the book Malleus Malleficrum (the witch hammer) was written by two German monks: Heinrich Institoris Kramer and Jakob Sprenger. In this book instructions were giving for the prosecution of witches. When it was first submitted it couldn't be published because of the appointed censor at the time. So Kramer and Sprenger forged the approdation of the whole faculty which was not discovered until 1898! Well, that started a crazy of witch killing! A rough estimate of the total number of people burned, hung, or tortured to death on the charge of witchcraft is nine million. The book  has three parts the first deals with, "the three neccessary concomitants of witchcraft are the Devil, a witch, and the permission of almighty god" and the rest deals with "how witches can influence lovers, childeren, ect..in a bad way" pretty detailed. The second part of the book is  "treating of the methods by which works of witchcraft are wrought and directed, and how they may be successfully anulled and dissolved" this deals with how "witches use devils to work magick". The Third part "relating to the judicial courts aganist witches and indeed all heretics". "Who are the fit and proper judges for the trials of witches?" is the first question in this section.  It goes on saying how witches should be dealt with in trials. Here is a link to Malleus Malleficrum: http://members.tripod.com/ApocryphalText/page8.html Note: This info came from The Complete Book of Witchcraft by Ray Buckland