An Inquisition against heresy was established by the Roman Catholic Church
1230s
Pope Alexander IV accepted that sorcery and communication with demons was a kind of heresy
1258
Pope John XII issued several bulls identifying sorcery with heresy and pacts with the devil
1316 - 1334
Black Death swept through Europe, adding to the willingness of people to see conspiracies against Christendom
1340s
Errores Gazaziorum, a papal bull, identified witchcraft and heresy with the Cathars
about 1450
William Caxton, Printing Revolution
1476
Pope Innocent VIII issued a papal bull, allowing the inquisition to persecute witchcraft as heresy
1484
The Malleus Maleficarum was published
1486
Many historians point to this period as one in which witchcraft trials -- and Protestantism -- were rising
1500-60
Martin Luther's 95 Thesis: Start of Reformation
1517
Constitutio Criminalis Carolina, by Emperor Charles V, and affecting the whole Holy Roman Empire, declared that harmful witchcraft should be punished by death by fire; witchcraft that resulted in no harm was to be "punished otherwise."
1532
English law made witchcraft a secular crime with the Witchcraft Act
1542
Copernicus publishes On the Revolution of Heavenly Spheres
1543
Publication of De Praestiglis Daemonum by Johann Weyer, a physician to the Duke of Cleves. The second English (and Scottish) Witchcraft Act was passed.
1563
Many historians consider this the period with the largest number of witchcraft cases, with the period of 1610 - 1630 being a peak within this period
1580 - 1650
Discoverie of Witchcraft was published by Reginald Scot, expressing scepticism of witchcraft claims
1584
North Berwick Hunts
1590-91
National Scottish Hunts
1590-97
James VI's Demonologie published, Boy of Burton case
1597
A Discovery of the Fraudulent Practices of John Darrell published by Samuel Harsnett
1599
Act of James I expanded punishable offenses related to witchcraft
1604
Francis Bacon's Of The Proficience and Advancement of Learning, Divine and Human published
1605
Kepler's Astronomia Nova published
1609
The Pendle witch trials in Lancashire, England
1612
A handbook for English judges on pursuing witches was published
1618
Wurzburg and Bamberg witch hunts
1626-31
Cologne hunts
1626-34
Galileo Galilei publishes Dialogue Concerning Two Chief World Systems
1632
The Pendle Swindle
1634
René Descartes Discourse on Methods (1637)
1637
East Anglia Hunts
1645-47
Another Scottish Hunt
1649-50
Thomas Hobbes publishes The Leviathan
1651
Thomas Ady's A Candle in the Dark published
1656
Royal Society formed
1660
Last major Scottish hunt
1661-62
The Demon Drummer case
1662
John Webster's The Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft, 1677