Witch hunting or women hunting

Answer 1

Although it is generally thought that the witch hunts were directed at women, the idea may not be entirely true. The entire membership of the Poor Fellow Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon was destroyed in one of the "witch hunts" and they were all male. They were also inordinately wealthy and powerful.

The witch hunts, started as a true attempt to weed out the "undesirable" element within the "faithful". It turned out to be quite lucrative for the crown heads, church and the gentry who ended up confiscating the assets and property of the accused. Is was very rare for women in those times legally own much of anything, so they were not the first choice of targets. As the "witch" hysteria" spread, the disliked, envied, or unwanted members of society started to fall victim to the purges. A masculine slanted church did tend to number women in the undesirable.

It is a medical, scientifically proven fact that there are more women in the world than there are men, and that women tend to out-live men as a general rule. So, if an area is cleaning out the dead wood, getting rid of the disliked and/or disenfranchised there will be what appears to be a disproportionate number of women caught in the "nets". This is not to say that women were not victimised, because they were. Widows, spinsters and single women had no male "head of the house" to protect them, so they fell easily to the hunts, but I do not believe the witch hunts were completely motivated by misogyny.