The Legend of Basil the Bulgar-Slayer by Paul Stephenson (review)

REVIEWS 282 fies demonic copulation as the origin of witchcraft” (55). Why this obsession with the corporality of demons then? Why was it so important to prove that they were real? This is where the “Crisis of Belief” found in the title becomes so critical. Stephens lays out his argument in chapter 4. From the twelfth century, theologians were interested in reconciling Aristotelian disbelief in the supernatural with church teaching. There was an increasing need to find worldly proof of the supernatural, and in each generation writers grew more and more skeptical. Even though these writers wrote extensively about demonic copulations to convince others, if one reads between the lines, it becomes apparent that the authors were first and foremost trying to convince themselves. Although witches were needed to prove the corporality of demons, this led eventually, in a rather circular logic to the construction of the Western European concept of witch. Stephens writes that “theologians” need to verify the possibility of corporeal contact with demons provided the nucleus around which many other ideas, including the reality of maleficium, were pulled into orbit” (125). This is for example, how witches fly: it is the power that they get from demons that enables them to fly. In the final chapters, Stephens demonstrates that witches and demons were useful in proving the efficacy of the sacraments . Briefly, the general argument is that the construction of demonic countersacraments proves and thus restores faith in the sacraments. Hence, a Hansel and Gretel trope of the witch-as-child killer was useful in “defending the sacramental efficacy of baptism and, by extension, the goodness and providence of God” (241). Similarly, by stealing penises (chap. 11), the witch acted as the demon’s human conspirator in an attempt to block the sacrament of marriage , thereby reinforcing the sacrament itself. In the conclusion, Stephens finally mentions the “prohibited” word that hangs heavily over the entire book, atheism. He does not accuse all the witchcraft theorists of being atheists, but writes that “the thought was lurking in the logic of their arguments and actions” (366). This is a heavy charge to make, and some will certainly challenge some of Stephens conclusions as anachronistically premature prior to the seventeenth century. Similarly, others may not be satisfied with his rereading of what has been traditionally considered the misogyny of the witchcraft sources. Yet Stephens’s book is so well researched, argued, and written, that the few who walk away from it unconvinced will, nevertheless, be challenged to respond to it. This book will very quickly establish itself as a “classic” work not only for those interested in witches and demons , but also for all students of early modern European history. EDNA RUTH YAHIL, History, UCLA Paul Stephenson, The Legend of Basil the Bulgar-Slayer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2003) xvii + 163 pp. The legend of Basil II, Byzantine emperor from 976–1025, is a traditionally told tale, entrancing and horrifying undergraduates and casual readers alike: in the course of subduing the rebellious Bulgarians in 1014, under the leadership of the tsar Samuel, a climactic battle between the Byzantine army and the dwindling forces of the Bulgarians led to a huge defeat of the Bulgarians in the Belasica mountains at Kleidion. To exact his revenge and to make a pointed REVIEWS 283 statement about what happens to those who rebel against one of the greatest military emperors of the Byzantine empire, Basil II had the captured Bulgarian soldiers gathered, approximately 15,000, and had every man blinded, save every hundredth man. The one hundredth had only one eye blinded, that he might lead the other ninety-nine home to Samuel, who had escaped to Prilep. This human chain of misery returned to Samuel, who, seeing them, reportedly asked calmly for a glass of water before collapsing and dying two days later. Thus Basil II earned the historical moniker “Bulgaroctonus”—Bulgar Slayer26 —and this battle was seen as one of the turning points in Byzantine subordination of the Bulgarian threat. Stephenson begins with this story and proceeds to dismantle it systematically as mere myth. This is not a new claim; Byzantine scholars have long recognized it as fiction, arguing that there are...