Protection from, and exorcism of, supernatural evil in Germany (medieval to 19th century)

[malymin]

Hello!

Writing a fanfiction taking place inside of a fairy-tale kingdom. In-universe, the fairy-tale is a literary fairy tale (aka has a singular author, not a true folk tale), written by a German author, some time in the 18th century at earliest and the 19th century at latest. The author character lived and died in a fictional town heavily based on the real world town of Nördlingen. I'm writing a scene where a character from the fairy-tale setting is feeling guilt about having been "weak" against a supernatural, corrupting force, and is scared that force is still possessing or influencing him.

Most of the information I can find on the topic of exorcism, prayers against demonic/bewitching/etc influence, repentance for having practiced witchcraft, renouncing demonic temptation, etc I can find on my own are specifically resources aimed at modern-day Catholics living in English-speaking countries. (That is, when they're even remotely in the ballpark of what I'm looking for... new-age and non-Christian solutions, while interesting, are not helpful for what I'm writing.) However, I know that a large percentage of Christians in Germany are some flavor of Protestant. Even when it comes to Catholic-majority regions like Bavaria, there might be things that have been done there in the past that would not be recorded on an English-language website for English-speaking Catholics - especially folk beliefs and traditions not officially condoned by religious authorities.

Region:

• Least specifically looking for stuff from German speaking countries in Europe
• Most specifically: looking for things from the Swabia region of Germany, within the state of Bavaria

Religion:

• Christianity mainly, maybe some Germanic pagan stuff if I branch out.
• Protestant or Catholic
• Not just solutions ideally condoned by local religious authorities, but folk beliefs and practices

Historical Placement:

• Ideally, not newer than the 19th century. If people didn't believe it prior to, idk, 1925 or something, it's not as useful to me.
• Must have been practiced at some point after the Christianization of the region, at absolute earliest.
• However! Customs and beliefs that are not strongly attested to in reality, but that appear in fictional and folkloric depictions of the past or present written (or transcribed from oral tradition) within the "target range" (such as "pre-christian times" as they'd be seen in Wagnerian operas, or "feudal society" as depicted in both the feudal period's own courtly literature and later literature), are also helpful, as the fic I'm writing is set within an author-created world that would be influenced by such pre-existing and contemporaneous fiction's distortions of reality.

I hope this isn't too specific. If you know something in this ballpark but don't think it's "good enough" for my nitpicky criteria, please share anyways so I can learn something new! ^_^;

Comments

[malymin]

I mean.

I'm writing fanfic for a children's cartoon aimed at 9 year olds that was made in Japan in 2001. The creators visited a few places in Germany (such as Nördlingen) as part of their research, but the "present day" of the show is intentionally a like... vaguely 19th century with a few anachronistic bits of 20th and 21st century mixed in? (The show's setting was trapped in a sort of reality-warping bubble for an unknown but long period of time, so it's often headcanoned that the show actually takes place in the 90's or 00's and the old-timey-ness is a product of isolation.) The in-universe fairytale author is dressed in a fashion that a fan on livejournal pinned as being around 1730's or 1740's, but his in-universe magnum opus is inspired primarily by real-world bodies of work (literary fairytales, ballet, and opera) that date to various points across the 19th century.

And then "the inside of the story", where I'm setting my fic, is indicated to be something that real people can enter, Never-Ending-Story style, by the show's ending, but the actual place "inside the story" is never shown on-screen. At best, if I want to depict it without leaning entirely on my own American cultural assumptions, all I can ask "what did the average German person assume as the "default setting" time-period-wise for fairytales, circa the 1700s-1900s -- and if said assumption wasn't just "the current, contemporary time," what assumptions did they make about that time period that don't match up to a modern understanding of history?" (The idea of a specific time period in popular culture, whether it be medieval Europe or the Roman empire or Egypt under the pharohs, is so often a hazy romanticization, not quite the same as what experts currently understand!) Which is a less broad time frame than my original post, but still pretty damn broad!

I kind of have to be approximate, with what the source material I'm writing for gives me. And arguably, pinning the time period down too precisely might hurt the fic more than it helps, since I think the source material itself is trying for a 'fuzzy place-out-of-time' feeling, if that makes sense? (I can't remember where I read this, but iirc one of the show's creative leads said that the more overtly obvious anachronisms to even a history-oblivious watcher - like characters occasionally wearing T-shirts or sneakers in a "present day" where the only form of music recording we see is phonographs, radios and tvs don't exist, and electric lighting is an exciting novelty - were meant to create this effect, because they saw it as "fairytale-like.")

Since the actual place 'inside the story' is never shown, what I want to shoot for with my fic is 'depicting a what would have been considered a typical fairytale setting specifically from the perspective of a German writer from the time period (1700's as the early estimate, 1800's as the late estimate) and then how to bring a sense of reality to that fairytale setting to make it feel more like a real world to its inhabitants.' leaving the broad strokes of the setting hazy but bringing it to life in the smaller details, and introducing the types of anachronisms one might see projected into fairytales as they evolve.

[oldshrewsburyian]

Okay! So then it sounds to me as though you don't want anything medieval. But there are plenty of published sources from early modern Germany. If you don't know Daniel Kehlmann's Tyll, you might find it interesting.

[malymin]

(Sorry for the late reply. I've been going through the backlog of replies to threads I've been in, but wasn't in the headspace to answer at the time.)

I looked that book up, and found a historical fiction novel - an interesting sounding one, for sure! However, I honestly find it easier to make time for picking up and putting down nonfiction than fiction these days. (Some of my favorite books of all time, from childhood through teens and twenties, have included The Lore of the Unicorn by Odell Shephard, Mind of the Raven by Bernd Heinrich, and Periodic Tales by Hugh Aldersey-Williams.) Do you have any suggestions for nonfiction reading on folk beliefs about magic (and adjacent topics)¹ early modern Germany?

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_{1: Occult beliefs and practices outside of folk traditions, and concepts of magic and supernatural evil etc as described in fiction written during the period, are probably both distinct topics - but both of some additional interest for the specifics of what I'm writing, and in retrospect are just as relevant as what I initially asked for, if not moreso. Currently for that last thing I've only dipped my toe into it by reading a translation of The Devil's Elixirs by ETA Hoffman. So, the main fiction (as opposed to nonfiction) suggestions I'm interested in using for research are for works regarding the supernatural written during the early modern period.}

[oldshrewsburyian]

I do! The Bedevilment of Elizabeth Lorentz is about a young woman who believed herself to be tormented by the Devil: https://utppublishing.com/doi/book/10.3138/9781442634916. The Trial of Tempel Anneke, meanwhile, is about a woman who appears to have been a sometimes-annoying and sometimes-useful neighbor, and definitely sometimes threatened people for fun: https://utppublishing.com/doi/book/10.3138/9781442634879