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Historical The Bewitching of Anne Gunter: A Horrible and True Story of Deception, Witchcraft, Murder, and the King of England by James Sharpe $26.00 / Routledge / 2001 Few 20-year-olds can claim the notoriety that accused witch Anne Gunter was able to achieve in her lifetime. As the central figure in a celebrated investigation, Anne's story would become so well known that physician William Harvey referred to it during his medical lectures, and Ben Jonson was said to have used it in his play, Volpone. With her appearance before the Star Chamber in 1606, she also became a staple for witchcraft studies. For what began as a double murder at a football match in the Berkshire village of North Moreton ended with a vicious vendetta between wealthy Brian Gunter and the Gregorys, a yeoman family. When Brian's daughter, Anne, fell ill and displayed evidence of possession, Elizabeth Gregory, along with two others, were accused of maleficium. The resulting public spectacle eventually drew Oxford dons and ecclesiastics into the matter as well as the recently crowned King James I. James Sharpe's narrative draws from a wealth of period documents that not only breathe life into the village but also into the inner workings of local assizes and the peculiarities of English Common Law through the 17th century. But it is in his discussion of witchcraft and its role in English society that the reader comes to appreciate the dynamics of a phenomenon that claimed an estimated 40,000 lives throughout Europe between 1450 and 1750. —Charles Matza

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