Witch hunt

Witch hunts in the literal sense went on from the Early Middle Ages to the 1700s. Today of course, the expression is only used metaphorically as a persecution or drive to attribute blame or guilt to someone or other, sometimes unfairly. The first use of the metaphorical sense according to the OED is attributed to George Orwell in Homage to Catalonia (1938) when he described political persecutions in Spain at the time of the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) as witch hunts.