imagination. Danish influenced witch hunt The international Christian demonology and the Christian interpretation of magic as witchcraft connected to Satan, and the Christian definition of a magician as a witch who was able to master sorcery after a Pact with the Devil, was introduced to Iceland by the clergy (who were often Danes or educated in Denmark) in the 17th century. Belief in the Devil and the Christian definition of witchcraft spread after the publication of the first witchcraft books by Gudmundur Einarsson in 1627, and Pall Björnsson's Characther Bestiae in 1630, and in 1630 Denmark introduced the Danish Witchcraft Act of 1617 on Iceland. One of the first high profile cases was that of Jón Rögnvaldsson. Between 1604 and 1720, there were 120 witch trials on Iceland, which resulted in 22 (confirmed) executions between 1625 and 1685. The most intense period of persecution took place in 1667–1685. Male dominance The Icelandic witch trials were uncommon in Europe because almost all were directed toward men: of the 22 executed for sorcery in Iceland, 20 were men and only two women, one of whom (Galdra-Manga) unconfirmed, and only Thuridur Olafsdottir confirmed to have been executed. The reason for this was the fact that the magic openly performed in the Icelandic society had come to be associated with men. Prior to Christianity, women had performed magic, but during the Catholic Middle Ages, this changed as almost only men were accepted in the convents and Latin schools on Iceland and their literacy gave them better opportunities to attain fjölkynngi ('learning'). These male magicians were respectfully referred to as kunnáttumadur ('wise man' or cunning man) and many of them were heroes to the population, such as the famous Jón lærði Guðmundsson (1574-1658), who allegedly managed to turn away the attacks from Barbary slave ships from the coasts by the use of galdur and who managed to survive a number of witch trials in the 1630s. The end In 1683, Sveinn Arnason came to be the last person executed for witchcraft in Iceland. All witchcraft executions stopped in Iceland after 1686, when a new law was passed by Denmark which stated that all death sentences for sorcery were henceforth to be confirmed by the high court in Copenhagen before they could be performed, and Copenhagen refused to confirm any more such verdicts. Klemus Bjarnason was condemned to death of sorcery in 1692, but the execution