When the local wizard was the repository of all wisdom

What do you do when one of your possessions goes missing? Search behind the sofa cushions? Ask other members of the household where they put it? If you lived in Renaissance England, there’s a chance you would have consulted a local magician for advice, especially if the lost item was of value. In the absence of police to investigate theft or insurance to cover a loss, a wizard tracing the item seemed like a fair choice. Nor was it the entirely foolish idea it might seem now. In a time when belief in magic was widely held, making it known that a magician was on the case could prompt a guilty party to come forward.

In Tabitha Stanmore’s Cunning Folk, these figures played an important social and cultural role in Britain, from the medieval to early modern period. Consulting a local wizard to address life’s challenges was not only a rational decision, but one made by people up and down the social scale. Leaders regularly consulted astronomers and court magicians for guidance, while poor people would turn to cunning folk for healing and answers.

Stanmore recounts the tasks for which cunning folk were hired, from finding lost spoons and table linens to discovering spectacular plots of group assassination designed to vault the client up the royal line of succession. Her account is illuminating, giving us clues to the role that magic practitioners held. It is somewhat meandering, with digressions into royal politics and other non-magical shenanigans. Her survey covers hundreds of years, during which tolerance of magic waxed and waned.

Official attitudes to cunning folk meant there was a tension in which being a witch was illegal but being someone who used magic somewhat helpfully was not necessarily criminal. Stanmore explains that ‘both the Church and the worldly authorities could turn a blind eye when the spells were harmless’.