Lauren Martin

Julian Goodare

Joyce Miller

This book is a collection of essays on Scottish witchcraft. Unlike most such works, it concentrates on witchcraft beliefs rather than witch-hunting. It ranges widely across areas of popular belief, culture, and ritual practice, as well as dealing with intellectual life and incorporating regional and comparative elements. The editors were members of the team responsible for the recently-completed Survey of Scottish Witchcraft, and the book incorporates a number of pioneering findings from this rich online resource.

Witchcraft and Belief in Early Modern Scotland

The European Witch-Hunt seeks to explain why thousands of people, mostly lower-class women, were deliberately tortured and killed in the name of religion and morality during three centuries of intermittent witch-hunting throughout Europe and North America. Combining perspectives from history, sociology, psychology and other disciplines, this book provides a comprehensive account of witch-hunting in early modern Europe. Julian Goodare sets out an original interpretation of witch-hunting as an episode of ideologically-driven persecution by the 'godly state' in the era of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation. Full weight is also given to the context of village social relationships, and there is a detailed analysis of gender issues. Witch-hunting was a legal operation, and the courts' rationale for interrogation under torture is explained. Panicking local elites, rather than central governments, were at the forefront of witch-hunting. Further chapters explore folk beliefs about legendary witches, and intellectuals' beliefs about a secret conspiracy of witches in league with the Devil. Witch-hunting eventually declined when the ideological pressure to combat the Devil's allies slackened. A final chapter sets witch-hunting in the context of other episodes of modern persecution. This book is the ideal resource for students exploring the history of witch-hunting. Its level of detail and use of social theory also make it important for scholars and researchers.

The European Witch-Hunt, 1400-1750

Michael Wasser

"Bringing together twelve studies, this book provides an overview of the key issues of on-going interest in the study of Scottish witchcraft. The authors tackle various aspects of the question of witches; considering how people came to be considered 'witches', with new insights into the centrality of neighbourhood quarrels and misfortune; and delving into folk belief and various acts of witchcraft. It also examines the practice of witch-hunting, the 'urban geography' of witch-hunting, Scotland's international witch-hunting connections and brings fresh insights to the much-studied North Berwick witchcraft panic. Reconstructions of the brutal and ceremonial punishments inflicted on 'witches' offers a gruesome but compelling reminder of the importance of the subject"--

Scottish Witches and Witch-Hunters

Michael Lynch

The reign of James VI (1567–1625) remains one of the most enigmatic in Scottish history. There are long periods within it that resemble black holes in our knowledge. This study is a concerted attempt by a group of ten scholars of the reign, drawn from three different disciplines, to shed light on its politics and government, viewed through various perspectives. These include the royal court, which is analysed through its literature, architecture and ceremony; noble factionalism; relations with England; a revised model of tensions between church and state; and the relationship between the government and the Highlands, the Borders and the south west, a future region of opposition to Charles I. This study also analyses James as a literary author, correspondent, husband and ‘universal king’. The book offers alternatives to accepted views of the reign, dismissing both Melvillianism and ‘laissez faire monarchy’ as useful tools. It sees the centre of politics as the interaction between an expanded and increasingly expensive royal court and a phenomenal growth of the state, based on a huge increase in legislation and the business of the Privy Council.

The Reign of James VI

Ruth Ellen Grant

This thesis is a study of George Gordon, sixth earl of Huntly, from July 1581 to March 1595, analysing the role he played in the confessional politics of the period (both national and internation) and how a strong Catholic magnate affected the balance of power and wider policy decisions in Scotland. The thesis is a narrative, with comentary on the political events of the reign of James VI, including the relationship Huntly had with James VI and the wider repercussions thereof. Huntly returned to Scotland from France in July 1581, becoming a courtier and an adherent of Esme Stewart, duke of Lennox. He served a political apprenticeship to Lennox and was exposed to covert Catholic politicking, as well as to the nascent Jesuit mission in Scotland. After James was captured by the Ruthven Raiders in August 1582, Huntly entered politics in his own right, becoming influential in the opposition to the rithven regime. Huntly assisted in enforcing the regime change when James escaped from the Ruthven lords in June 1583, his loyalty to the king winning James's trust and close friendship - the dividends of which he reaped throughout his life. Huntly initially supported the new administration under James Stewart, earl of Arran and assiduously attended to his duties in both the locality and the central government. Following Arran's fall in November 1585, Huntly deliberately distanced himself from the Court and the new Anglophile government. He opposed the anglo-Scottish treaty which was concluded in July 1586 and worked hard to counter the rise of John Maitland of Thirlestane. For the first time, Huntly made contact with the European counter-Reformation in Apriland May 1586. The period June 1587 to April 1589 was marked by faction fighting between Huntly and Maitland, who were both instrumental in James' pursuit of diametrically opposed policies. The discovery of Huntly's covert correspondece with Spain in February 1589 made his Catholic politicking public, subsequently colouring the conflict vetween Maitland and Huntly with confessional politics. Events excalated until Huntly mustered troops on the field of Brig o' Dee near Aberdeen, Although Huntly refused to meet the king on the field, Maitland's vitory was only parial. Brig o' Dee was not the manifestation of the politics of the Counter-Reformation in Scotland, but the productof years of faction fighting between Maitland and Huntly. The period of January 1590 to March 1595 was characterised by Hunrly's continuing influence at Court with marked favour from James and his bloodfeud with James Stewart, second earl of Moray. Huntly used his twin centres of influnce, the Court and power in the region, to fight a vivious and protacted bloodfeud with Moray and his faction. The interception of the Spanish Blanks at the end of 1592 brought confessional politics to bear on a purely secular bloodfeud. Political agitation from the Kirk and Stewarts caused James to commission an army under Archibald Campbell, seventh earl of Argyll to pursue Huntly in October 1594. The result was the battle of Glenlivet between Huntly and Argyll which came to represent the fight against Catholicism, although its root cause was Huntly's bloodfeud with Moray and the Stewarts. When James later raised his own army and marched north against Huntly, the early refused to face James on the field and in March 1595 he voluntarily went into exile abroad. This ended the most active phase of huntly's participation in national and international politics; after his political rehabilitation in 1597, he no longer played an influential role in the king's domestic or foreign policies. Overall, the thesis agues that Huntly needs to be understood as a political faction leader, whose Catholicism was a tool he eomplyed to widen his political influence but not the determinant of all his actions.

George Gordon, Sixth Earl of Huntly, and the Politics of the Counter-Reformation in Scotland, 1581-1595

Liv Helene Willumsen

Rita Voltmer

Demonology - the intellectual study of demons and their powers - contributed to the prosecution of thousands of witches. But how exactly did intellectual ideas relate to prosecutions? Recent scholarship has shown that some of the demonologists' concerns remained at an abstract intellectual level, while some of the judges' concerns reflected popular culture. This book brings demonology and witch-hunting back together, while placing both topics in their specific regional cultures. The book's chapters, each written by a leading scholar, cover most regions of Europe, from Scandinavia and Britain through to Germany, France and Switzerland, and Italy and Spain. By focusing on various intellectual levels of demonology, from sophisticated demonological thought to the development of specific demonological ideas and ideas within the witch trial environment, the book offers a thorough examination of the relationship between demonology and witch-hunting. Demonology and Witch-Hunting in Early Modern Europe is essential reading for all students and researchers of the history of demonology, witch-hunting and early modern Europe.

Demonology and Witch-hunting in Early Modern Europe

This book is a collection of essays on Scottish witchcraft and witch-hunting, which covers the whole period of the Scottish witch-hunt, from the mid-16th century to the early 18th. It particularly emphasizes the later stages, since scholars are now as keen to explain why witch-hunting declined as why it occurred. There are studies of particular witchcraft panics, including a reassessment of the role of King James VI. The book thus covers a wide range of topics concerned with Scottish witch-hunting - and also places it in the context of other topics: gender relations, folklore, magic and healing, and moral regulation by church and state.

The Scottish Witch-Hunt in Context

The European Witch-Hunt seeks to explain why thousands of people, mostly lower-class women, were deliberately tortured and killed in the name of religion and morality during three centuries of intermittent witch-hunting throughout Europe and North America. Combining perspectives from history, sociology, psychology and other disciplines, this book provides a comprehensive account of witch-hunting in early modern Europe. Julian Goodare sets out an original interpretation of witch-hunting as an episode of ideologically-driven persecution by the ‘godly state’ in the era of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation. Full weight is also given to the context of village social relationships, and there is a detailed analysis of gender issues. Witch-hunting was a legal operation, and the courts’ rationale for interrogation under torture is explained. Panicking local elites, rather than central governments, were at the forefront of witch-hunting. Further chapters explore folk beliefs about legendary witches, and intellectuals’ beliefs about a secret conspiracy of witches in league with the Devil. Witch-hunting eventually declined when the ideological pressure to combat the Devil’s allies slackened. A final chapter sets witch-hunting in the context of other episodes of modern persecution. This book is the ideal resource for students exploring the history of witch-hunting. Its level of detail and use of social theory also make it important for scholars and researchers.

The European Witch-Hunt

Sharon Adams

The seventeenth century was one of the most dramatic periods in Scotland's history, with two political revolutions, intense religious strife culminating in the beginnings of toleration, and the modernisation of the state and its infrastructure. This book focuses on the history that the Scots themselves made. Previous conceptualisations of Scotland's "seventeenth century" have tended to define it as falling between 1603 and 1707 - the union of crowns and the union of parliaments. In contrast, this book asks how seventeenth-century Scotland would look if we focused on things that the Scots themselves wanted and chose to do. Here the key organising dates are not 1603 and 1707 but 1638 and 1689: the covenanting revolution and the Glorious Revolution. Within that framework, the book develops several core themes. One is regional and local: the book looks at the Highlands and the Anglo-Scottish Borders. The increasing importance of money in politics and the growing commercialisation of Scottish society is a further theme addressed. Chapters on this theme, like those on the nature of the Scottish Revolution, also discuss central government and illustrate the growth of the state. A third theme is political thought and the world of ideas. The intellectual landscape of seventeenth-century Scotland has often been perceived as less important and less innovative, and such perceptions are explored and in some cases challenged in this volume. Two stories have tended to dominate the historiography of seventeenth-century Scotland: Anglo-Scottish relations and religious politics. One of the recent leitmotifs of early modern British history has been the stress on the "Britishness" of that history and the interaction between the three kingdoms which constituted the "Atlantic archipelago". The two revolutions at the heart of the book were definitely Scottish, even though they were affected by events elsewhere. This is Scottish history, but Scottish history which recognises and is informed by a British context where appropriate. The interconnected nature of religion and politics is reflected in almost every contribution to this volume.SHARON ADAMS is Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Freiburg. JULIAN GOODARE is Reader in History at the University of Edinburgh.Contributors: Sharon Adams, Caroline Erskine, Julian Goodare, Anna Groundwater, Maurice Lee Jnr, Danielle McCormack, Alasdair Raffe, Laura Rayner, Sherrilynn Theiss, Sally Tuckett, Douglas Watt

Scotland in the Age of Two Revolutions

Martha McGill

This book is about other worlds and the supernatural beings, from angels to fairies, that inhabited them. It is about divination, prophecy, visions and trances. And it is about the cultural, religious, political and social uses to which people in Scotland put these supernatural themes between 1500 and 1800. The supernatural consistently provided Scots with a way of understanding topics such as the natural environment, physical and emotional wellbeing, political events and visions of past and future. In exploring the early modern supernatural, the book has much to reveal about how men and women in this period thought about, debated and experienced the world around them. Comprising twelve chapters by an international range of scholars, The supernatural in early modern Scotland discusses both popular and elite understandings of the supernatural.

Julian Goodare

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