Movie posters reflect changing views of witchcraft
The Cornell Witchcraft Collection contains documents that are hundreds of years old, including witch-hunting manuals and pamphlets and minutes from 16th-, 17th- and 18th-century European witch trials. In recent years, the collection has been augmented by a decidedly more modern artifact: the movie poster. 'We decided to document the impact of witchcraft on popular culture,' said Laurent Ferri, curator of pre-1800 collections at Cornell University Library's Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections (RMC). 'This allowed us to expand the witchcraft collection in a new direction, as well as build our first collection of movie posters. We knew the power of cinema to shape our worldview, including our view of witches.' The collection, founded three years ago, consists of around 1,200 items - mostly posters, but also related movie memorabilia and advertising such as still photographs, flyers and even a 'vomit bag? distributed at a particularly graphic violent movie. Ferri says the collection is unique in its scope and comprehensiveness, and the largest of its kind in the world. The movie posters complement the older witchcraft materials, acquired in the 19th century by Andrew Dickson White and his librarian, George Lincoln Burr, which include harrowing narratives by accused witches, writings by theologians who opposed the Inquisition and 14 Latin editions of the 'Malleus Maleficarum,' an infamous book used to justify the detection, persecution and torture of suspected witches.
