[AlexanderHowl]

It also fits the historical facts. In the period between the beginning of the 14th century to the end of the 18th century, anyone who publicly practiced magic would have been tried and executed as a witch. By the end of the 15th century, when the Vatican officially approved the wholesale slaughter of anyone suspected of practicing magic with the Summis desiderantes affectibus in 1484, the hysteria against magic use reached a high point and people turned against the practitioners of folk magic.

Depending on which estimates are used, the number of people annually who were tried and execute as practitioners of witchcraft may have been as high as 10,000 people per year throughout Europe, though the average was probably 5,000 per year. Any shamanic tradition that survived the madness that surged through Europe during that period of time would have been very well hidden and would have not had sufficient practitioners to be anything more than a curiosity. It would not be until the early 19th century, when the persecution of suspected practitioners of witchcraft died down, that you would have had a minor resurgence, though it was not really until the late 20th century when it was somewhat safe to be a practitioner of magic in the West. Even so, I witnessed people being physically attacked by fundamentalist Christians for publicly practicing magic in the Southern USA (fortunately, I was there to prevent things from getting out of hand, but it was a really nasty episode that frightened one of my female pagan friends into hiding her religion to this day).