The possessed women of the Tena valley
From 1637 to about 1642 dozens of young women in Tramacastilla, Sandiniés and other villages of the Tena valley (Aragonese Pyrenees) showed signs of demonic possession; contemporary accounts claimed hundreds.
1637 CE · 42.71, -0.37 · status: official
The account
Locals blamed the lord Pedro Arruebo and two companions, whom the Inquisition prosecuted in 1638. The Zaragoza inquisitor Bartolomé Guijarro died at Tramacastilla in 1640 while investigating, and six women were taken to Zaragoza for exorcism. Historians have documented 62 cases.
The sceptical view
Historians such as María Tausiet and Ángel Gari read it as a collective crisis shaped by exorcism practice, local feuds and expectations of possession.
The researched reading
A well-documented outbreak of possession in a closed mountain valley, spread through exorcism, expectation and local feuds. It is a classic collective crisis, not evidence of demons.
| Explanation | Weight | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Perception, memory or mind | 40% | Dozens of young women in a few connected villages showed the same convulsions, blasphemies and trances once possession had been named and exorcisms began; the pattern spreads along social ties, as collective psychogenic episodes do, and fades when the exorcists leave. |
| A cultural story | 28% | Possession was a recognised script in Counter-Reformation Aragon: the demons named local enemies (the lord Pedro Arruebo and his companions), and historians such as María Tausiet read the crisis through village feuds and exorcism practice. |
| Undetermined | 12% | The share a generic explanation had beyond what has been shown for this case: it fits many cases like this one, but has not been demonstrated for this one. |
| A hoax or fabrication | 8% | Some sufferers may have exaggerated or performed symptoms for attention or to settle scores, which the accusations against Arruebo suggest, but outright fraud cannot explain 62 cases over years. |
| A known natural phenomenon | 7% | Epilepsy, hysteria in the medical sense, or ergot-contaminated rye can produce fits; no contemporary description singles out a physical disease, so this covers only a few cases. |
| Something in the surroundings | 3% | Nothing in the sources points to a toxic or physical feature of the houses or valley. |
| Genuinely anomalous | 2% | Only demonic possession in the literal sense would make this anomalous; nothing in the record requires it. |
Official position: The Inquisition prosecuted the alleged sorcerers in 1638 and treated the women as genuinely possessed, sending some to Zaragoza for exorcism.