The discoverie of witchcraft

Reginald Scot’s 1584 treatise is a landmark skeptical work that argues against the reality of witchcraft as commonly understood in early modern England. Historically significant as one of the first major English defenses of rational inquiry over superstition, it also gathers magical practices, conjuring tricks, and references to folk beliefs, making it a rich source on the culture of the period.

Reginald Scot (c. 1538–1599) was an English gentleman and author best known for *The Discoverie of Witchcraft* (1584), an early skeptical critique of witchcraft, demonology, and magical claims. His work became an important source for later writers on folk belief, occult practice, and the history of witchcraft.