From the middle of the sixteenth century to the middle of the seventeenth, Catholic and Protestant theologians and ecclesiastics vied with each other in detecting witches guilty of producing sickness or bad weather; women were sent to torture and death by thousands, and with them, from time to time, men and children.

On the Catholic side sufficient warrant for this work was found in the bull of Pope Innocent VIII, and the bishops' palaces of south Germany became shambles,--the lordly prelates of Salzburg, Wurzburg, and Bamberg taking the lead in this butchery.
In north Germany Protestantism was just as conscientiously cruel.

It based its theory and practice toward witches directly upon the Bible, and above all on the great text which has cost the lives of so many myriads of innocent men, women, and children, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." Naturally the Protestant authorities strove to show that Protestantism was no less orthodox in this respect than Catholicism; and such theological jurists as Carpzov, Damhouder, and Calov did their work thoroughly.

An eminent authority on this subject estimates the number of victims thus sacrificed during that century in Germany alone at over a hundred thousand.
Among the methods of this witch activity especially credited in central and southern Europe was the anointing of city walls and pavements with a diabolical unguent causing pestilence.

In 1530 Michael Caddo was executed with fearful tortures for thus besmearing the pavements of Geneva.