We seek to retell the story of our beginnings. Skip to main content. Updated 21 April, - Natalia Klimczak. Read Later Print. Beware the Witch! References: Macfarlane A. Notestein, W. Login or Register in order to comment. Related Articles on Ancient-Origins. Witch trials are among some of the cruelest events in European history.
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On January 17 th , , the simple, unwed house servant Agnes Bowker of Market Harborough, England, was in the throes of giving birth to a secret child. By her side were the midwives Margaret Roose A witch or not? Guilty or innocent?
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She was only nine years old at the time she made her accusations. These trials were documented by a man named Thomas Potts, who wrote the book The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster , which is how so much information is known about them to this day.
A claim was made that one member of the Device family, Alizon Device, was accused of cursing a man who fell ill. The nail in the coffin - so to speak - was the fact that the Device family was full of healers, and the line became blurred between healing and the occult. In her panic, Alizon began to think that she was truly responsible for the ill man's fate. It was this paranoia that caused her to give forth the names of two other women, describing them as 'cunning' according to Wandering Crystal , and claiming they healed people with spells and charms.
Four out of the ten people hanged were from the Device family, and the others were believed to be accomplices to those presumed to be witches. Today, visitors can follow the Walking with Witches Trial through Lancaster, taking people through the most pivotal, and tragic, moments of the trial.
It was in this location that Alizon Device was said to have met John Law, the man many accused her of cursing. Alizon had been on her way to Trawden Forest when she met Law for the first time, and, shortly after, he had what many now believe to have been a stroke. It was believed that the accused who sank was innocent, and those who floated were guilty. The Northhamptonsire trials may have been a precursor to the Pendle witch trials, which began some weeks later.
The trials of the Pendle witches were among the most famous witch trials in English history, and among the best recorded of the 17 th century. The trials began when a young woman called Alizon Device, from Pendle Hill in Lancashire, was accused of cursing a local shopkeeper who soon afterwards fell sick.
The Pendle trial would be used as legal precedence for the Salem witch trials of Credit: James Stark. In all, 10 men and women were hanged as a result of the trials. Those included Alizon Device who, like her grandmother, was reportedly convinced that she was guilty of being a witch.
The Pendle trial would go on to be used as legal precedence to allow the testimony of children in trials of witchcraft. At the Salem witch trials in colonial Massachusetts, most of the evidence was given by children.
The burning of Louisa Mabree in a cage filled with black cats suspended over a fire Credit: Wellcome Images. Witchcraft was particularly associated with women in the early modern period, and this continued into the modern era. In this resource there are several examples of modern images of witches who were women, often riding on broomsticks with a pointy hat: the image that we most associate with witchcraft today.
However, an image of a witch taken from the seventeenth century shows some aspects of this witchcraft stereotype have been around for a long time. Therefore, accusations of witchcraft became another way for women to be oppressed in early modern society. However, men were also suspected and accused of witchcraft, such as the male witches of Edmonton.
Lots of the sources in this resource are legal documents that relate to witchcraft trials. When a person was accused of witchcraft an Indictment would be drawn up, then witnesses would be called, an examination of the accused would be carried out and sometimes a confession drawn out, possibly with torture. Those found guilty would be executed. Not all accusations of witchcraft were believed, however. Even in this period, people were suspicious of attempts to pretend to be bewitched, or pretending to be a witch, and were aware that not all cases of witchcraft were genuine.
Witchcraft caused great fear within society, but it also often became a function of normal life. Somebody new to a community might be accused of witchcraft because his or her neighbours were suspicious of them.
Sometimes a person might pretend to be bewitched because it was a way of making money. People were more suspicious of witchcraft when the harvest failed, as they looked to find a cause.
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