Synopses & Reviews
This volume provides a valuable introduction to the key concepts of witchcraft and demonology through a detailed study of one of the best known and most notorious episodes of Scottish history, the North Berwick witch hunt, in which King James was involved as alleged victim, interrogator, judge and demonologist. It provides hitherto unpublished and inaccessible material from the legal documentation of the trials in a way that makes the material fully comprehensible, as well as full texts of the pamphlet News from Scotland and James' Demonology, all in a readable, modernised, scholarly form. Full introductory sections and supporting notes provide information about the contexts needed to understand the texts: court politics, social history and culture, religious changes, law and the workings of the court, and the history of witchcraft prosecutions in Scotland before 1590. The book also brings to bear on this material current scholarship on the history of European witchcraft.
Review
“Witchcraft in Early Modern Scotland will be immensely useful for scholars of witchcraft, demonology, early modern women, as well as those who study Scottish political, religious, legal, and social history. The contextual information in Part One is clearly presented and accessible for scholars with only a cursory knowledge of early modern Scotland; and detailed annotations of the documents make them readily comprehensible for readers unfamiliar with Scots dialect. The book is a case-study that becomes cultural history . . . Such rich and carefully read evidence of intimate interactions between members of elite and popular cultures makes an important contribution to our understanding of sixteenth-century social history.” -
Albion, Vol.34, Issue 2, Summer 2002
Albion
About the Author
Lawrence Normand is principal lecturer in English at Middlesex University. Until his death in 1999, Gareth Roberts was senior lecturer in the School of English, University of Exeter, where he was Course Director of the MA in The History and Literature of Witchcraft.
Table of Contents
List of the Documents
List of Maps
List of Illustrations
Introduction
Discussion of the Texts and Editorial Conventions
Chronology
The Court and Politics
The Royal Marriage
Bothwell
Social Contexts and Cultural Formations
The Kirk
Scottish Witchcraft Before the North Berwick Witch Hunt
The Legal Process
Aftermath
Witch Hunting: Examinations, Confessions and Depositions
Texts of the Examinations, Confessions and Depositions
Records of the Witchcraft Trials (Dittays)
Texts of the Witchcraft Trials (Dittays)
Witch Hunt Propaganda: News from Scotland
Text of News from Scotland
Theorising the Witch Hunt: James VIs Demonology
Text of Demonology
Appendix: Privy Council Orders Relating to the Legal Processes of Witch Trials
Bibliography
Index