dudalb : 29 - How to Burn a Witch (M+/F)

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dudalb : 29 - How to Burn a Witch (M+/F)

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29 - How to Burn a Witch
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By dudalb

Sunday August 23rd 1998 08:49:51

HOW TO BURN A WITCH

Once I helped burn my future wife at the stake at a Renaissance Fair. Jennifer (my future Wife) and I used to take part in a local Renaissance Fair. We were both 25 at the time.

We had fun but had one problem: not enough historical realism. Everything was light and gay, a Disney kind of history and some of us wanted to present the darker side of the 16th and 17th centuries.

We sat around one day thinking of how we could do this when we heard a shout of Burn the Witch! Burn the Witch! We saw a girl wearing a fake long nose being dragged along by a mob. Needless to say they were doing the (very funny) Burn the Witch sequence from “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”

That gave us an idea. What if we were to do a dead serious version of a witch trial.? Soon a friend of ours who shall be called Dave for this story overheard us. Dave choreographed the swordfights at our Renfair, and his main line of work was as a stunt man and FX guy for stage and television. He had worked and done stunts for several famous TV Series. He told us how he could use some effects to safely burn a witch at the stake, so soon we talking about both a trial and execution. We couldn’t do it that fair but at the one next year.....

When Fair time rolled around the year after one of the fair directors who agreed with our desire to inject some realism into the fair got approval for our little skit. Dave donated some equipment and his expertise. From the beginning Jennifer had more or less cast herself as the victim. Jennifer had been a athlete in college so she had was in good shape which would be necessary as a safety measure. She was over six feet which made her good from a spectator’s standpoint. And she was visually right as a young accused witch. We did our homework. The Witch hysteria has been a favorite of medieval and renaissance historians, and a lot of the court records are available in print. But in the end we swiped a lot from Arthur Miller’s great play on the Salem Witch trials “The Crucible” If you’re going to steal, steal from the best.

We did a rewrite on some scenes from Miller’s work and added some 16th century material. There was a post on the site that we decided would do fine as the stake. A couple of nights before the day of the trial, we held rehearsals. Dave set up his material and tested it. Jennifer was tied to the stake (Detailed description when we reach the real thing) and rehearsed an emergency escape although the chances of that were being necessary were small. We took the faggots of wood to be used as props and soaked them with water. We did this for two nights in row and again on the day of the trial. We also turned the area around the stake into a muddy morass. When you read about the effects you will realize this was against a remote possibility. But better to be safe then sorry.

The Day of the skit Jennifer dressed in a standard peasant dress-although it was historically accurate peasant dress unlike most of those at the fair.A long dress, shirt, and bodice..I was dressed in Middle class garb-I was to be one of her judges. Before the fair opened Dave made a final check of the equipment . The dripping wet faggots were brought out and piled around the stake. We were betting no one would notice that the faggots were wet-and it was hard to tell unless you were up close. Some fair guards were posted to keep people away.

About eleven o clock, the fun began Jennifer walked out with her basket doing a great impression of a peasant girl out to do a little shopping. Already of a sudden another girl jumped out, pointed at her and screamed :

“She is the One! She is the one who bewitched our cow so it gives no milk”!

Two fair guards jumped out and grabbed Jennifer pulled her wrists together behind her,, tied them together,and dragged her off. Jennifer yelled loudly, and some of the fair participants crowded around and begun saying“Witch! Witch!” All this was to attract the paying public.

Jennifer was dragged with her hands bound all throughout the fair and when they reached where I and the other judges were waiting we had about a hundred people in the audience and more coming up all the time.

I won’t go into detail on the trial. Jennifer was accused of witchcraft by three witnesses:The girl who made the initial accusation that led to her arrest; another one accused her of causing her mother to be sick, and a third who laid down the big one: Jennifer’s character had taken her to the witches Sabbat and tried to make her sell her soul to the Devil. The testimony of the last was taken almost word for word from “The Crucible”. It was pretty ludricious but the sickening thing was that thousands of people died in the Witch Mania on this kind of testimony. We took pains to insure that the accusations were based on actual testimony.

As the climax we judges decided to test Jennifer to see if she had a witches mark on her. Jennifer has a small discoloration on her left upper arm. We rolled up her sleeve, pointed on it, crossed ourselves, and declared this was proof beyond doubt She was a witch. The sad thing was this was a damn accurate portrayal of legal procedure in witch trials. The sentence was that she be immediately burned at the stake--and may God have mercy on her soul.

Jennifer was dragged off on another round of the fair to get an even bigger audience. Dave ran over and made a final check of the stake to see all was in place. Finally Jennifer was dragged around the corner and came into sight of the stake.

Jennifer had decided not to scream and yell, she felt sobbing and trying to create a air of her character being in Shock and not fully realizing what was to happen would be more effective. Sobbing, she was dragged to the piles of faggots, pulled over them and placed next to the stake. Her hands were briefly untied, pulled behind the stake, and retied. Another long length of cord was used to tied her body right below the breasts to the stake. Another length of roped secured her waist of the stake. Two more lengths of rope tied her knees and her ankles to the stake. Finally a knotted cloth was used to cleave gag her. The gag was historically accurate. People condemned to the stake for witch craft often were gagged to A. Prevent them pronouncing any curses on their judges and B. To spare the spectators their screams of agony. Weird mentality: the sight of someone dying in agony was okay but their screams were distressing. ....

We let Jennifer twist and turn in her bonds and sob through her gag for a few minutes to allow an even bigger crowd to gather. Finally the time to “light the fires” had come. Dave had a hood on his head as the executioner. A word of warning. Dave was and is a professional. He is good enough to be hired by television and professional theater groups to do his work. Unless you have someone of similar experience don’t try this at home-or at you local small renaissance fair.

Dave had placed several containers of dried ice in among the faggots. When activated the dried ice makes a vapor that looks like smoke. This is very much a standard stage technique. In the front of the pile of faggots he had placed a steel box with some propane jets in it. Once again this is a standard technique for producing flames on stage and in television. Dave and a couple of other executioners had flares that had been disguised to look like torches. They went around the wet faggots and pretended to touch the faggots while activating the dried ice creating “smoke”. Finally Dave set off the propane torches so that their was a small area of actual flame--but controlled. Two guards stood as close as possible to Jennifer with cloaks on-and Fire extinguishers under their cloaks. (They were off duty firemen. We had cleared this whole thing with the fire department).

It looked very real. Jennifer was twisting in her ropes and making horrible noises that the gag could not completely stifle.(The gag had been made a little loose exactly for that effect.) The flames seemed to be rising and dry ice smoke was rising in several areas. Jennifer seemed doomed.

All of a sudden a voice shouted “Halt in the Queen’s Name!” Out came the royal bailiff of our fair and we could hear-on cue-the royal procession coming up. Dave threw a bucket of water near the propane flames while reaching down to turn them off. Other executioners and guards doused the dry ice smoke. Jennifer continued to twist and sob. The royal procession came up and the Queen asked what the hell was going on. The actual statement was in fair speak.

“I pray thee sirrah, how does thou presume to pass judgment without my royal consent?”

You know, the gawdawful phony combination of pseudo Shakespeare and Pseudo King James Version of the Bible English that is Renssaince Fair speak. The upshot was that the Queen examined the evidence, found it wanting, and ordered Jennifer set free. The person playing the Queen like to present her as an enlightened Monarch. It was a damn effective skit .

It was probably just as well we put in a deux de machina happy ending rather than a more realistic conclusion. As it was the skit was not repeated, a few of the fair directors felt it was too strong.

Jennifer and I still go to the fairs in costume but no longer as official participants. We've found better things to do Like the American Civil War and I’ve a couple of stories about bondage in the Blue and he Gray to tell also....

dudalb

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