Magical Treasure Hunting in Europe and North America: A History

Palgrave Historical Studies in Witchcraft and Magic

by Johannes Dillinger

The first comprehensive history of magical treasure hunting from the Middle Ages to the 20th century, revealing a magical universe of treasure spirits, and wizards who tried to deal with them. Combining history and anthropology, this study sees treasure hunting as an expression of shifting economic mentalities and changing ideas about history.

Genres: Nonfiction

262 pages, Paperback

First published November 22, 2011

Reviews

[Samuel Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

The conclusion provides a useful overview of all arguments made in the book. Mostly it's a report of research on early modern trials for treasure hunting. The main analytic argument is that treasure hunting effloresced in the early modern period because of "limited good" rural economies, which is pretty thin gruel analytically. Some fun facts intermittently, though. For curious Mormons, there's a fairly superficial treatment of Joseph Smith and Orson Hyde. The author's expertise is early modern Europe, which probably explains the deficits in the few pages on Mormonism.