Girolamo Tartarotti

Who was Girolamo Tartarotti?

Girolamo Tartarotti was an Italian author.

He is notable for his Congresso notturno delle lammie and Apologia del Congresso notturno delle lammie in which he attacked belief in the existence of witches as depicted by the Church. Tartarotti rejected the idea of supernatural powers related to the popular notion of witchcraft. He argued that supernatural witchcraft is mostly superstition and its effects imaginary, but that practicers of sorcery certainly existed. He suggested that such beliefs derived from a pre-Christian cult of the goddess Diana.

Tartarotti's idea of a pre-Christian cult of Diana was popularized in the 1970s by Leo Martello, who was among the first Italian Americans to reveal a specifically Italian branch of witchcraft known as Stregheria.