Tamminen examines how medieval demon beliefs shaped views of women, race and medicine

Gaudeamus has published Keskiajan demonit (2026) by Miikka Tamminen, PhD and docent of medieval cultural history at Tampere University, according to a press release from ePressi. The book examines how beliefs about evil spirits and the devil shaped medieval thought across Europe.

Tamminen argues demons were central to medieval worldviews and intertwined with religious tensions, racism and misogyny. He describes how demons were believed to haunt unpleasant places such as caves, ruins, forests and latrines, murdering, causing disease, producing strange illusions and sometimes taking the form of animals or humans. They could be deadly.

"According to medieval beliefs, women were at greatest risk from demons, and female victims are overrepresented in the era's possession cases," he says. He attributes this to contemporary gender stereotypes promoted by clerics, who saw women as physically and mentally weaker and more given to sinful thoughts and deeds. The book examines how exorcists, physicians and healers sought methods to expel demons and cure victims.

He traces debates about demons among clerics, doctors, philosophers, scientists, lawyers and poets, and shows how these discussions shaped ideas about the cosmos, the end times, creation, the existence of evil and the meaning of free will and morality. He highlights the physical imagery around demons, including horned bodies, hooves, fur, fangs, claws and deformities, and notes that the devil and demons were sometimes depicted as brown-skinned Africans, reflecting racist attitudes of the period.

The book draws parallels with modern anxieties: "In the Middle Ages demons were thought to get under the skin and cause harm; in contemporary theories implanted microchips are blamed for affecting health and behaviour, and in darker futures AI turns against humans," he writes, arguing that while the terms have changed, the underlying pattern of fear remains. Keskiajan demonit is published by Gaudeamus (2026), ISBN 9789523453654. More information and the table of contents are available on the publisher's website.