History Of The Devils Of Loudun Nicolas Aubin 1693

HISTORY OF THE DEVILS OF LOUDUN, or of the possession of the Ursuline nuns, and of the condemnation & torture of Urbain Grandier, priest of the same city. AMSTERDAM, Abraham WOLFGANG, Original Edition of 1693 One volume, in-12, of (1) f., 473 pp., full contemporary binding in brown calf, decorated ribbed spine The affair of the demons of Loudun, or affair of the possessed of Loudun, is a witch hunt launched by Cardinal Richelieu in the 1630s, against the priest Urbain Grandier of the city of Loudun. Accused of having made a pact with the devil, the priest sees his name evoked by the sisters of the Ursuline convent possessed by the demon during their crisis of delirium. France was then in the context of the Counter-Reformation and in the political manipulation orchestrated by Richelieu who wanted to eliminate the priest he considered too close to the Protestants and who had published a pamphlet against him. Acquitted a first time by an ecclesiastical tribunal, Urbain Grandier was subjected to the Question, and condemned to the stake on August 18, 1634, he was executed after public penance and new torture the same day.