Children of Wrath
Subtitle: Possession, Prophecy and the Young in Early Modern England
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group
Published: 2016
Language: eng
Number of pages: 190
ISBN-13: 9781472443670
Subjects: Christianity; Children, great britain; Dualism; Demoniac possession; Prophecy, christianity; Great britain, social life and customs; Great britain, social conditions
Description: "The work introduces its readers to the dualistic nature of early modern perceptions of their young--they were seen to be both close to devilish temptations and to God's divine finger, as illustrated by published accounts of possession and prophecy. These cases reveal to us moments in which children could be granted authority or in which writers and publishers framed children in positions of spiritual agency. This can tell us much about how early modern society perceived, imagined and depicted their young, and helps us to revise the notion that early modern children's lives, which were often fleeting, may have gone unregarded. Both contributing to, and informed by, some of the most recent historiographical directions taken by early modern history, this book engages with three key areas: the history of extreme spiritual experience such as demonic possession, the 'lived experience' of early modern religion and the history of childhood. In this way, it offers the first scholarly exploration of the dialogue between these three areas of current and widespread historical interest which have, perhaps surprisingly, not yet been considered together"--Provided by publisher.