A Relation of the Diabolical Practices of Above Twenty Wizards and Witches (c. 1697) - Anonymous

A Relation of the Diabolical Practices of Above Twenty Wizards and Witches (1697)

Anonymous · London: Printed for Hugh Newman, 1697

Witch-pricking, enchanted effigies, midnight gatherings and a child's terrifying accusations: a rare contemporary window into one of Scotland's last major witch-hunts.

Published in London in 1697, this extraordinary pamphlet records allegations, examinations and purported confessions arising from the Paisley or Bargarran witch trials in Renfrewshire, Scotland. At the centre of the case was ten-year-old Christian Shaw, daughter of the laird of Bargarran, whose convulsions and reported afflictions were attributed to witchcraft. More than twenty people came under suspicion; seven were convicted and executed in June 1697.

Unlike a modern retelling, this is a surviving primary source written during the events themselves. Its language reveals not only what witnesses claimed, but how fear, religion, judicial authority and belief in the Devil shaped accusations of witchcraft in seventeenth-century Scotland.

Inside the original pamphlet

• The examination of accused witches: the writer describes the commissioners' proceedings, attempts to secure confessions and the use of witch-pricking to search for supposedly insensible marks on the body.
• Christian Shaw's alleged afflictions: detailed reports of fits, confrontations with suspects and supposed reactions to touch, prayer and the Bible.
• Effigies pierced with pins: testimony alleges that figures representing particular people were fashioned and stabbed with pins, providing striking evidence of how sympathetic magic was imagined by prosecutors and witnesses.
• The Devil's gatherings: recorded confessions describe a mysterious dark-clothed figure, nocturnal meetings, music, dancing and alleged pacts promising clothing and food.
• The accused and their accusers: named individuals include Margaret Lang, Katherine Campbell, Agnes Naismith, Elizabeth Anderson and members of the Lindsay family.
• Trial and execution: the opening letter recounts the proceedings at Paisley and the sentencing and execution of seven accused people on 10 June 1697.

One particularly unsettling passage describes women being stripped and examined with needles in the search for a 'witch's mark'. Another records allegations of pin-studded images used to harm children. Such passages make the pamphlet a valuable source for historians of witch trials, folk belief, the law and early modern attitudes to magic.

About this edition

This 44-page scanned PDF facsimile reproduces a historical copy of the original pamphlet, including images of the binding, its 1697 title page and the original seventeenth-century typography and spelling. The original printed tract comprises approximately 24 pages; the digital scan includes additional images and preliminary material.

Historical context: The allegations and confessions were produced within a persecutory judicial process. Accounts of diabolical meetings, magic and supernatural harm are claims made in the source, not evidence that the accused practised witchcraft. Some of those accused lost their lives. This document is offered for historical research and understanding, not as an endorsement of the accusations.

The Ancestral Library | Hearthwise Herbals
Historical digital facsimile · 1697 · Anonymous · English · 44 scanned PDF pages