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Cunning Folk

Life in the Era of Practical Magic

Tabitha Stanmore

$24.99

Paperback

Forthcoming
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English
Vintage
29 May 2025
Opens a fascinating new window onto medieval and early modern life - a world where it's possible to meet the devil on the road, control the future through stars, and employ a fairy to help find gold

Cunning Folk transports us to a time when magic was used to solve life's day-to-day problems - as well as some of deadly importance.

'A brilliant book, written with wit and vigour' MALCOLM GASKILL, author of The Ruin of All Witches

'Absolutely fascinating' IAN MORTIMER, author of The Time-Traveller's Guide to Medieval England

It's 1600 and you've lost your precious silver spoons, or maybe they've been stolen. Perhaps your child has a fever. Or you're facing trial. Maybe you're looking for love or escaping a husband. What do you do? In medieval and early modern Europe, your first port of call might well have been cunning folk- practitioners of magic who were a common, even essential part of daily life, at a time when the supernatural was surprisingly mundane.

Charming, thought-provoking and based on original research, Cunning Folk is an immersive reconstruction of a bygone world by an expert historian, as well as a commentary on the beauty and bafflement of being human.

'I adore Cunning Folk. A truly fascinating and human book' Ruth Goodman, author of How To Be a Tudor

'Packed with vivid historical anecdotes, this is an intriguing insight into the magical lives of past people and the history of our own superstitions today' Marion Gibson, author of Witchcraft

'Fascinating . . . opens a window into another world' Tracy Borman, author of Anne Boleyn & Elizabeth I

'Full of such magical tips and colourful vignettes . . . crackles with incident' Kate Maltby, Financial Times

'Spirited and richly detailed' New York Times
By:  
Imprint:   Vintage
Country of Publication:   United Kingdom
Dimensions:   Height: 198mm,  Width: 130mm,  Spine: 17mm
Weight:   204g
ISBN:   9781529931563
ISBN 10:   1529931568
Pages:   288
Publication Date:  
Audience:   General/trade ,  College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  ELT Advanced ,  Primary
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Forthcoming

Tabitha Stanmore is a social historian of magic and witchcraft at the University of Exeter. She is part of the Leverhulme-funded Seven County Witch-Hunt Project, and her doctoral thesis was published as Love Spells and Lost Treasure- Service Magic in England from the Later Middle Ages to the Early Modern Period. She has featured on Radio 3's Free Thinking and BBC 4's Plague Fiction, and her writing has been published in the Conversation.

Reviews for Cunning Folk: Life in the Era of Practical Magic

This is a brilliant book, written with wit and vigour, in which Tabitha Stanmore explores the pre-modern places where magic was real, offering not only practical solutions for ordinary problems but a way of feeling about the world, an emotional relationship between anxious humans, cosmic forces, and the mundane mysteries of their lives * Malcolm Gaskill, author of The Ruin of All Witches * Absolutely fascinating. Cunning Folk is a much-needed book that draws attention to a little-known but important aspect of daily life. Like all good history books, it tells us about ourselves as well as the past. It will both inform and inspire readers * Ian Mortimer, author of Medieval Horizons * Eye-opening ... [Cunning Folk] gives a human face to magic in medieval and early modern England, bringing us closer than ever to the hopes, dream and aspirations of both clients and practitioners * History Today * Tabitha Stanmore’s engaging new social history of magic . . . full of such magical tips and colourful vignettes . . . She’s clearly a sharp reader of social realities, and sometimes offers clear-eyed social assessments of why magical rituals had real-world consequences . . . the result is this cheerful, colourful compendium of stories, which crackles with incident -- Kate Maltby * Financial Times * Illuminating… Cunning Folk shows us that our forebears were seeking answers through the tools they had * Spectator *


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