We, Laurentius the Captain aforesaid, (…) decree that the said Matteuccia, having been personally brought before us, that she may not glory in her wickedness and depravity, nor that others, desiring to attempt like deeds, may take example from her, shall be made a public example:
with a mitre placed upon her head, and her hands bound behind her back, she shall be set upon a certain ass, and shall be led and conducted personally to the public place of justice accustomed, where such judgments of justice are wont to be executed (…).
And there she shall be burned with fire, in such wise and manner that she shall utterly die, and that her soul shall be separated from her body.
[translation and emphasis (bold) are mine]
We know very little about Matteuccia di Francesco, who was sentenced to death by fire as a witch in the Umbrian town of Todi on March 20, 1428.
What we do know comes from the trial records: Matteuccia came from the small village of Ripabianca, in the countryside around Todi, a modest community in central Italy.
Her biography is brief; the list of accusations against her, much longer.
Hers is among the earliest documented witch trials in Italy, decades before Europe’s great wave of persecutions swept through the sixteenth century.
The Accusations
Matteuccia di Francesco (…) a woman of evil life and reputation, a public enchantress, sorceress, and witch, against whom, by the manner and procedure of inquisition, we have proceeded formally, because (…) it came to the ears and notice of the said lord Captain and of his court that the said Matteuccia had not God before her eyes, but rather the enemy of humankind.
(…) many and innumerable times she did enchant the bodies, heads, and other members of the afflicted, both personally and also by signs which she carried upon herself, such as girdles, caps, and other like things, for the aforesaid and other infirmities; and with bands or cords, measuring the said girdles, she would utter her enchantments to many and diverse persons, in divers places and times.
[translation and emphasis (bold) are mine]
The cold, methodical language of the notary strikes like a hammer: slow, rhythmic, inescapable.
Each new “Item non contenta predictis…” (“not content with the crimes already described”) adds another blow, pushing Matteuccia further into a corner.
Then comes the climax: the confession. Voluntary, the notary insists.
And since it is manifest to us and to our court that all and every of the aforesaid things contained in the said inquisition are true, in the places and times expressed in the said inquisition, as appears from the lawful confessions of the said Matteuccia, inquisited, made before us and our court, spontaneously and lawfully in judgment.
And because she has thus spontaneously confessed, she has declared herself to renounce her defence and the time granted for her defence.
[translation and emphasis (bold) are mine]
What follows is the formal condemnation, the humiliating procession through the town, and the fire.
The story of Matteuccia ends here: one of the first, not the last, of an age that was beginning to call itself “modern”.
Frans Hals, Malle Babbe (1640)
Matteuccia’s Remedies
Matteuccia was a woman of the people, and it was to her that people turned for relief from pain or for a cure for a wounded heart.
From the surviving papers emerges a small world where the ailments of the body and of the soul blend with ritual religion, superstition and sensuality.
She is said to have spoken incantations to ease her clients’ suffering: some, apparently, worked; others, apparently, brought death.
There is a paradox here: spells intended to heal also became evidence of a pact with the devil.
Matteuccia’s specialty was love magic: wives seeking to rekindle desire, betrayed women, those wishing to avoid pregnancy and men yearning for another man’s wife —all turned to her.
For each of them, Matteuccia had an answer.
A certain man and his wife from the castle of Collismedio, in the county of Todi, went to the castle of Ripabianca.
The said wife went to Matteuccia, complaining of her husband and saying that he treated her badly; therefore she begged Matteuccia to give her some remedy whereby her husband might restore to her the gifts he had formerly given and cease to despise and insult her, as he did every day.And the said Matteuccia gave to the aforesaid woman an egg and an herb called “costa cavallina”, and told her to cook them together and give them to her husband to eat, assuring her that thus he would fall in love with her again.
And after some days, as the said woman did according to her instruction, the husband, enamoured and almost mad with love, remained in such condition for three days.
[translation and emphasis (bold) are mine]
Her remedies ranged from harmless (hair, water, salt) to disturbing (the belt of a virgin girl) and macabre (the bones of pagan dead exhumed from their graves, the fat of a drowned man, the blood of children).
Sacred and Profane
In the formulas Matteuccia spoke, Christianity was far from absent. She invoked Christ, the Virgin, saints and holy women who blessed, commanded, protected.
In 1426, it is said, she healed the sick by throwing three grains of salt into the fire while reciting this spell:
Worm, little worm, who holdest heart and soul,
who holdest little lungs,
who holdest little liver,
who holdest the moving of the nose,
who holdest the moving of the head,
who holdest the moving of the feet,
who holdest every good of man.Saint Susanna casts linen forth,
Saint Jolecta throws linen forth,
Saint Bruna turns to the backside and throws linen forth —
one by one, until none shall remain.
Amen.[translation, formatting and emphasis (bold) are mine]
The spell has the cadence of a prayer: saints called by name, and an Amen to conclude. It borrows from the liturgy, learned by heart and repurposed to heal a body, or to bind a heart.
It is religion (and medicine) spoken in the idiom of ordinary people, reusing familiar symbols like candles and wine and imbuing them with magical meaning.
Sacred and profane coexisted in the same hand, a woman’s hand.
And it is precisely in that confusion between prayer and spell, between blessing and curse administered by someone outside official authority, that suspicion quietly took hold.
March 20, 1428
The sentence was carried out on March 20, 1428.
Matteuccia was led through the streets of Todi on the back of a donkey, her hands tied behind her, a mitre of infamy on her head.
The procession wound through the city before the final act: the public burning, both warning and spectacle, both punishment and purification.
Those who watched her pass that day were the same people who had once turned to her, seeking a remedy, a word, a fragment of hope that poverty had denied them.
Many of them had become her accusers.
The act was completed and order restored. The notary recorded the execution, signed, and closed the file with the usual formula.
That is all that remains of Matteuccia.
Bibliography
Peruzzi, Candida. Un processo di stregoneria a Todi del ‘400. Lares, vol. 21, no. 1–2, Leo S. Olschki Editore, 1955, pp. 1–17.
“Matteuccia di Francesco da Todi” Enciclopedia delle donne, accessed October 2025.
Poor Matteuccia and all the innocent people, unfairly condemned throughout history.
Thank you for this. While reading, I noticed that "costa cavallina" may be "coda cavallina", commonly known as common horsetail (INCI: Equisetum arvense). It has many helpful medicinal benefits (i.e. high in antioxidants; high in silica, so helpful for skin, hair, nails, bones); spiritually, however, it is often used for protection via purification/expelling negative energies. If Matteuccia recommended it be consumed by a cruel husband, the spiritual reason would have been to expel the cruelty that seems to have developed over the course of their marriage. Eating it would have certainly caused no harm -- to this day many people steep it as tea, or take it in capsule form. Thank you again for sharing this text.