Priapic Ride

Parmigianino’s drawing of a witch riding a prodigious phallus, known today through two late print versions, has often been excluded from studies on early modern witchcraft and sexuality but is in fact indispensable to both. Its outward bawdiness belies a multilayered commentary on witchcraft lore and praxis. In each layer the phallus assumes a different function, oscillating between the literal and the figurative, the real and the fantastic. It relates, severally, to a man dominated by a witch, a castrated male organ, a demonic disguise, and a shielding amulet. Harboring sober ideas behind a superficially amusing facade, Witch Riding on a Phallus in effect canvasses a range of alternative reactions to the witchcraft phenomenon.