On 20 March 1428, at Todi in Umbria, the trial of a woman named Matteuccia di Francesco came to an end. She came from Ripabianca, a small village near Deruta. The record of the proceedings, preserved and studied by historians, is one of the oldest and most detailed documents of Italian witchcraft. It contains a formula that would become famous: the one with which the woman was said to call on her ointment to fly to the walnut tree of Benevento.
The climate: Bernardino's preaching
To understand the trial we must start with a preacher. In the 1420s Bernardino of Siena, an Observant Franciscan and one of the most listened-to preachers of his time, travelled the cities of central Italy giving sermons to enormous crowds. His targets included luxury, usury, gambling and also magical practices, which he described as the work of the devil.
Bernardino preached at Todi in 1426. In his sermons, in various cities, he urged the faithful to denounce those who practised spells and magical remedies. Matteuccia's trial took place a few years later, in a climate that this preaching had helped create.
The charges
The record lists a long series of practices attributed to the woman. Many, on careful reading, are the same activities as those of a village healer of the time, reinterpreted as diabolical work.
- Remedies for illnesses of people and animals, using herbs, words and gestures.
- Love philtres, requested by women who wanted to keep a husband or lover.
- Practices against impotence and to favour or prevent pregnancies.
- More serious accusations, such as having sucked the blood of children after turning into an animal: a stereotyped motif that recurs in the trials of the period.
The document shows clearly the shift from a popular knowledge, ambiguous perhaps but rooted in daily life, to a crime defined in theological terms.
The flight formula
The most famous passage concerns the night flight. According to the record, Matteuccia anointed herself with an ointment and spoke a formula to be carried to the witches' gathering:
Unguento, unguento, mandame a la noce de Benivento, supra aqua et supra ad vento et supra ad omne maltempo.
("Ointment, ointment, send me to the walnut of Benevento, over water and over wind and over every storm.")
Waiting for her, the account continues, was a demon in the form of a goat, which carried her through the air. At the walnut tree other women and spirits gathered, under the leadership of Lucifer.
This formula is one of the oldest attestations of the link between witches and the walnut of Benevento, which would become a canonical place in the Italian witchcraft tradition. The fact that it appears in an Umbrian trial shows that the legend was already widespread well beyond the Sannio region.
Confession and sentence
As in many trials of the time, the confessions were obtained under heavy pressure, and historians read them with caution: in part they reflect what the judges expected to hear, in part they contain authentic fragments of popular culture. Matteuccia was condemned and sent to the stake.
The case has particular value because it falls at a moment of transition. During the fifteenth century the image of the witch as a member of a sect that flies to the sabbath and worships the devil was taking shape in Europe. The Todi trial documents this process as it was happening, in an Italian setting.
What the document teaches us
Matteuccia's record is precious for several reasons.
| Aspect | What it reveals |
|---|---|
| Healing practices | The role of women healers in village life |
| Love philtres | The concrete, often female, requests addressed to magic |
| Flight formula | The early spread of the myth of the walnut of Benevento |
| Theological language | How popular knowledge becomes a crime |
| Preaching context | The weight of preachers in creating the climate of accusation |
A figure to give back to history
Today Matteuccia is remembered in Todi and the surrounding area as a symbol of the women persecuted for witchcraft. Reading her story means looking beyond the stereotype of the witch and seeing a real person, with a trade, clients and a network of relationships, swept away by a cultural change larger than herself.
In short
- Matteuccia di Francesco was tried and condemned at Todi in 1428.
- The trial took place a few years after Bernardino of Siena preached in the city.
- The charges mix healing practices and love philtres with diabolical stereotypes.
- The formula "Unguento, unguento, mandame a la noce de Benivento" is among the oldest attestations of the myth.
- The record documents the birth of the modern image of the witch in Italy.
