Editing Modern paganism (section)

===19th and early 20th centuries===
{{Quote box|width=25em|align=right|quote=Great God! I'd rather be<br />A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;<br />So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,<br />Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;<br />Have sight of [[Proteus]] rising from the sea;<br />Or hear old [[Triton (mythology)|Triton]] blow his wreathèd horn.|source=— [[William Wordsworth]], "[[The World Is Too Much with Us]]", lines 9–14}}
One of the origins of modern pagan movements lies in the romanticist and national liberation movements that developed in Europe during the 18th and 19th centuries.{{sfn|Strmiska|2005|p=42}} The publications of studies into European folk customs and culture by scholars like [[Johann Gottfried Herder]] and [[Jacob Grimm]] resulted in a wider interest in these subjects and a growth in cultural self-consciousness.{{sfn|Strmiska|2005|p=42}} At the time, it was commonly believed that almost all such folk customs were survivals from the pre-Christian period.{{sfn|Strmiska|2005|p=43}} These attitudes would also be exported to North America by European immigrants in these centuries.{{sfn|Strmiska|2005|p=43}}

The Romantic movement of the 18th century led to the re-discovery of [[Old Gaelic]] and [[Old Norse literature]] and [[Germanic poetry|poetry]]. The 19th century saw a surge of interest in [[Germanic paganism]] with the [[Viking revival]] in [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|Victorian Britain]]<ref>{{cite web| url = https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/revival_01.shtml| title = The Viking Revival |first=Andrew |last=Wawn |website=BBC Homepage| access-date = 23 December 2019| archive-date = 7 November 2017| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20171107200719/http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/revival_01.shtml| url-status = live}}</ref> and [[Scandinavia]], and the [[Völkisch movement]] in Germany. These currents coincided with Romanticist interest in [[folklore]] and [[occultism]], the widespread emergence of pagan themes in popular literature, and the rise of nationalism.{{Sfn|Hutton|1999|p=22}}

[[File:Memorial for Dievturi (Latvian pagan) victims of Soviet rule 1942-1952, Forest Cemetery, Riga, Latvia.jpg|left|thumb|upright|Memorial stone at the [[Forest Cemetery, Riga|Forest Cemetery]] of [[Riga]] to Latvian [[Dievturi]] killed by the [[Communism|Communists]] 1942–1952]]
{{Quote box|width=25em|align=right|quote="The rise of modern Paganism is both a result and a measure of increased religious liberty and rising tolerance for religious diversity in modern societies, a liberty and tolerance made possible by the curbing of the sometimes oppressive power wielded by Christian authorities to compel obedience and participation in centuries past. To say it another way, modern Paganism is one of the happy stepchildren of modern [[multiculturalism]] and [[Religious pluralism|social pluralism]]."|source=— Religious studies scholar Michael Strmiska{{sfn|Strmiska|2005|pp=44–45}} }}

The rise of modern paganism was aided by the decline in Christianity throughout many parts of Europe and North America,{{sfn|Strmiska|2005|p=43}} as well as by the concomitant decline in enforced religious conformity and greater [[freedom of religion]] that developed, allowing people to explore a wider range of spiritual options and form religious organisations that could operate free from legal persecution.{{sfn|Strmiska|2005|p=44}}

Historian Ronald Hutton has argued that many of the motifs of 20th century neo-paganism may be traced back to the utopian, mystical [[Counterculture|counter-cultures]] of the late-Victorian and [[Edwardian era|Edwardian]] periods (also extending in some instances into the 1920s), via the works of amateur folklorists, popular authors, poets, political radicals and [[alternative lifestyle]]rs.

Prior to the spread of the 20th-century modern pagan movements, a notable instance of self-identified paganism was in Sioux writer Zitkala-sa's essay "Why I Am A Pagan". Published in the ''Atlantic Monthly'' in 1902, the Native American activist and writer outlined her rejection of Christianity (referred to as "the new superstition") in favor of a harmony with nature embodied by the Great Spirit. She further recounted her mother's abandonment of Sioux religion and the unsuccessful attempts of a "native preacher" to get her to attend the village church.<ref name="Glynis Carr">{{cite web|last1=Bonnin|first1=Gertrude|title=Why I Am A Pagan|url=http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/gcarr/19cUSWW/ZS/WIAP.html|website=Bucknell.edu|publisher=The Online Archive of Nineteenth-Century U.S. Women's Writings|access-date=5 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171017211555/http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/gcarr/19cusww/zs/wiap.html|archive-date=17 October 2017|url-status=dead}}</ref>

In the 1920s [[Margaret Murray]] theorized that a [[Witch-cult hypothesis|secret pagan religion had survived the witchcraft persecutions]] enacted by the [[ecclesiastical court|ecclesiastical]] and secular courts. Historians now reject Murray's theory, as she based it partially upon the similarities of the accounts given by [[Witch trials in the early modern period|those accused of witchcraft]]; such similarity is now thought to actually derive from there having been a standard set of questions laid out in the [[witch-hunt]]ing manuals used by interrogators.{{Sfn|Hutton|1999|pp=194–201}}

In the transition between the 1800s and 1900s, efforts to incorporate pagan-Roman rituals into the Italian national identity were made by archaeologist [[Giacomo Boni (archaeologist)|Giacomo Boni]] and esoteric circles in Rome.

In 1927, philosopher and esotericist [[Julius Evola]] founded the [[Gruppo di Ur]] in Rome, along with its journal ''Ur'' (1927–1928), involving figures like [[Arturo Reghini]]. In 1928, Evola published ''[[Imperialismo Pagano]]'', advocating Italian political paganism to oppose the [[Lateran Pacts]]. The journal resumed in 1929 as ''Krur''.

A mysterious document published in ''Krur'' in 1929, attributed to orientalist [[Leone Caetani]], suggested that Italy's [[World War I]] victory and the rise of [[fascism]] were influenced by Etruscan-Roman rites.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Sandro Consolato |date=18 October 2017 |publisher=Tempi |title=La Grande Guerra degli esoteristi |url=https://www.tempi.it/la-grande-guerra-degli-esoteristi/}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref>