On a comedy history podcast I've been listening to, the two hosts went through the story of Matthew Hopkins, a 17th century witch hunter who seems to have inspired a lot of other witch hunters.
The hosts noted that the majority of witches were women and of THOSE quite a few were elderly, and depended on town charity to get by and they suggested towns (who would invite witch hunters to rid the towns of witches) use these witch hunts as a way to kill people who were essentially too expensive to care for (I forget the number they used, but apparently elderly indigent women did actually eat up some portion of the town's budget).
Any truth to this?
Thanks!
Your understanding of it is generally correct, but as you say, it was mostly women and of those mostly elderly. As you've mentioned Matthew Hopkins I'm assuming you're talking about the English witchcraze, specifically East Anglia. It varies considerably - Russia tended to have more men accused of witchcraft, for example.
One of the more interesting accounts I've read recently were about two wealthier men, John Alston and Robert Aylett, accused in my local area of Essex. The accusations there largely seem to come down to family feuding as the families had a history of physical fighting, but there we can clearly see examples where the accused are not female or elderly, and it is not about ridding the town of a burden. If you used the example of Alice Aylett, a younger predecessor to Robert Aylett, you could perhaps argue that she fits the idea of a burden on the village needing to be removed, but even so it takes seven accusations before Alice is finally hanged.
A more typical example could perhaps be Elizabeth Clarke of Manningtree, an elderly widow woman who lived alone, and was accused of bewitching a local man's wife. Clarke was interrogated by Hopkins himself, found guilty and imprisoned. Arguably the elderly and infirm made an easier target for neighbours accusations, especially if they lived alone in the outskirts of a village community that relied in each other to survive.
I would question the idea that these witch hunts were targeted as a way to solve a village economy. Many accusations came from neighbours and relate to the death of farm animals or young children, and personally I see it as a way of people making sense of the world around them. The climate in England was also fragile from religious disputes at the time, and King James I was deeply suspicious of witches himself, which encouraged those like Hopkins to carry out their work.
I would hugely recommend Malcolm Gaskills 'Witchfinders' as a read to find out more, as Gaskill has a wealth of information available on 17th century witch hunts. He tells the story of Elizabeth Clarke in much more detail, especially her interrogation. The story of the Pendle Moor witch trials is fascinating too - those accused, including one witch called Old Demdyke, also fit your generalisations.