The author make a typical mistake, saying that witches were burned at stake in pre-modern times. Which is not true; surprisingly burning witches was not a big thing in Medieval period; it was actually early modernity when witch hunts have become widespread (not in England though, were witchhunts were far less popular, than say in Germany or some other parts of modern UK).
Per wikipedia: "The period of the European witch trials with the most active phase and the largest number of fatalities seems to have occurred between 1560 and 1630." Which is very pre-modern. And that's the language that was chosen in the essay, not the Medieval.
