Hundreds of years ago the hills & valleys of Scotland were shrouded in mystery and it is a corner of the world were stories of scorcery and withcraft abound.

During the 16th & 17th century the courts in Scotland ignored the Anglo Saxon law of innocent until proven guilty and where witchcraft was concerned confessions were extracted by torture and punishment was swift. The condemed were usually tied to a stake & burned.

Like most of the Aberdeen witches Janet Wishart was an old crone who is said to have put a curse on Alexander Thomson and Andrew Webster. Her victims had fits of shivering and fever ( like the fevers that were around at that time ) When Webster died the fate of Janet was sealed.

Her examiners were led to believe that she used dismembered bodies of felons hanging from the gibbet for obscene purposes, invoked spirits from the grave of those not long buried, used spells to torment her victims and raised storms by throwing burning coals in the air.

Janet was burnt at the stake along with Isobel Crocker.Who was also convicted of witchcraft. The account below relates to their execution.

20 loads of peat to burn them. 40 shillings.
A boil ( 6 bushels ) of coal 24 shillings
4 tar barrels 26 shillings & 8pence.
Fir and iron barrels 16 shillings & 8 pence.
4 fathoms of tows.
(hangmans ropes) 4 shillings.
Carrying peat & barrels
to the hill. 8 shillings & 4 pence.
One justice for their execution 13 shillings & 4 pence.



Information taken from a book called Tales of Witchcraft & Sorcery by Ken Radford

At various times, witch hunts have been a way of demonising and silencing women who practiced European pre-Christian paganism or just did anything else that the Church/Rich people didn't like.

Aberdeen is still full of them.

What a world eh.

This reminds me of the post that someone made about the priests torturing children in Africa this very day to rid them of evil.

Sickening.