Swearing Justice in Henry Goodcole and The Witch of Edmonton

Abstract

This essay demonstrates how the dual plots of The Witch of Edmonton and Henry Goodcole's related pamphlet are unified by their common concern with the legal and performative power of words. Both play and pamphlet emphasize the power of speech, in particular the swearing of oaths and confessions, to constitute and to transform identity. Though patterned after its source pamphlet, the play ultimately diverges to demonstrate how speech legitimated by the processes of law often awkwardly coexists with its more popular expression, thereby simultaneously critiquing early modern law while laying claim to the very power that enables it.

Undergraduate Students’ Experiential Motives when Expressing Bajingan as Their Expletive

“…Anderson and Trudgill (2007;Vingerhoets, Bylsma, & De Vlam, 2013) define the expletive as a language used refers to swearer's culturally stigmatized expression, which is used to express strong emotions or attitudes. Reflecting the phenomena of bajingan meaning, this accordingly substitutes the negative connotation of indicating bastard or uncivilized persons, as Butler (2010) apparently believes that bastardy was considered as a crime against a community's moral values.…”

<i>The Witch of Edmonton</i>: Witchcraft, Inversion, and Social Criticism

“…However, the title demands that we think about the role of witchcraft in the play. 1 What matters about witchcraft? And what is important about the truth of the story?…”

Blasphemy, Swearing, and Bad Behaviour in <i>The Witch of Edmonton</i>

“…11 This was the world Frank Thorney, fearing loss of inheritance, concedes at the start of the play: 'beggary and want' are 'Two devils that are occasions to enforce / A shameful end' (1.1. [18][19].…”

“…The first was 'voluntarie, rash and unnecessarie swearing' issuing from a profane heart and careless of God; the second was judicial swearing, such as compurgation, which was equally wrong because men so often break oaths or swear things they cannot know: 'For Conscience not grounded upon sure Knowledge, is either an ignorant Fantasie, or an arrogant Vanitie'. 19 Rous, writing in 1623, wanted swearing outlawed by parliament because it endangered the state: 'the wrath of God issues out against a Land for swearing' (citing Hos: 4) risking pestilence, decay of trade, shortage of money, dearth, and bad weather. 20 The aim of such laws, as Robert Pricke had put it earlier in the reign, was to assist magistrates to ensure 'The good order and behaviour of the subiects one towardes another; that so they may live together sweetlie and honestlie, to the mutualle helpe and benefit one of another'.…”

“…Old Banks urges him to set it on fire and once done, Elizabeth immediate appears cursing them all (4.1. [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28], proving to all and sundry ('as good as a jury', 32-3) that she is a witch. If the playwrights knew the work of the period's most prolific and arguably most influential Calvinist author, William Perkins, they would have known that he considered thatch burning to be 'weake and insufficient' proof, although at least not as blasphemous as trying to protect oneself by making the sign of the cross performed by one of Cuddy's Morris dancing friends (2.1.108).…”