Dissenters of the view that elves was a later invention, such as Rudolf Simek and Gabriel Turville-Petre feel rather that " dark " and " light " aspects of the same beings not inherently unlikely, death and fertility cults often being closely related.
32.
The original religions of the peoples of the Maghreb seem to have been based and related with fertility cults of a strong matriarchal pantheon, given the social and linguistic structures of the Amazigh cultures antedating all Egyptian and eastern, Asian, northern Mediterranean, and European influences.
33.
Considering the " benandanti " to be " a fertility cult ", Ginzburg draws parallels with similar visionary traditions found throughout the Alps and also from the Baltic, such as that of the Livonian werewolf, and also to the widespread folklore surrounding the Wild Hunt.
34.
In " Europe's Inner Demons " ( 1975 ), English historian Norman Cohn asserted that there was " nothing whatsoever " in the source material to justify the idea that the " benandanti " were the " survival of an age-old fertility cult ".
35.
It is presumed they functioned as a type of rattle, perhaps " in the rites of a fertility cult associated with the bull, echoes of which may survive in the early medieval tale " T�in B?C�ailnge " ( " The Cattle Raid of Cooley " ) ".
36.
However, various other historians were sceptical of Gizburg's theories; in 1975, English historian Norman Cohn asserted that there was " nothing whatsoever " in the source material to justify the idea that the " benandanti " were the " survival of an age-old fertility cult ".
37.
Moreover, other historians have expressed criticism of Ginzburg's interpretation of the " benandanti "; Cohn stated that there was " nothing whatsoever " in the source material to justify the idea that the " benandanti " were the " survival of an age-old fertility cult ".
38.
He stated his opinion that she was right in claiming that European witchcraft had " roots in an ancient fertility cult ", something that he argued was vindicated by his work researching the " benandanti ", an agrarian visionary tradition recorded in the Friuli district of Northeastern Italy during the 16th and 17th centuries.
39.
In his 1971 book " Religion and the Decline of Magic ", English historian Keith Thomas dismissed Murray's thesis when he asserted that scholarship on the Early Modern witch trials had established that there was " very little evidence to suggest that the accused witches were either devil-worshippers or members of a pagan fertility cult ".
40.
British author John Grigsby contends that the presence of ergot in the stomachs of some of the so-called'bog-bodies'( Iron Age human remains from peat bogs N E Europe such as Tollund Man ) is indicative of use of ergot in ritual drinks in a prehistoric fertility cult akin to the Eleusinian Mysteries cult of ancient Greece.
