After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal - The King's Witch Trial: North Berwick Witches

Episode Date: October 31, 2024

Maddy and Anthony have a new TV documentary out all about King James VI of Scotland's witch hunts, available on History Hit TV.When James VI of Scotland's new wife, Anne of Denmark, is almost lost in a storm at sea he thinks he knows who is to blame. Witches. The King personally leads the investigation that follows, coming face-to-face with at least one of the accused, Agnes Sampson. What on earth is going on here?Anthony and Maddy are joined by Dr Louise Yeoman, historian of witchcraft and radio producer for BBC Scotland who latest series is House of the Lion.Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.Enjoy unlimited access to award-winning original documentaries that are released weekly and AD-FREE podcasts. Sign here for up to 50% for 3 months using code AFTERDARKYou can take part in our listener survey here.After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal is a History Hit podcast.

Monopoly Double Play is back in McDonald's, and it's easy to get into the win. First, you peel on pack. This is me winning a universal theme park vacation! Then, again in app. And me, in a new Chevrolet Equinox RS. There are millions of prizes, including a chance to win cash every minute in the app. Cash doesn't make any noise, but it's awesome! Get into the game with Monopoly Double Play at McDonald's.

Wall supplies last one in five chances to win GameCube prizes at outset, chances to win Double Play prizes based on time of code entry and draw prizes based on number of entries in each draw. See rules in app. Noah and Sarah have been trapped miles below the Denver International Airport. They've faced horrors from aliens to human experiments and a shadow government agency hell-bent on their demise. This season on Escaping Denver, the tables turn as the hunted become the hunters and

Noah and Sarah go on the offensive to protect the fate of the world. I don't think you brought enough men. I'm not scared. Then why do you sound scared? Escaping Denver, batch four. Listen on Apple podcasts, Amazon music, Spotify, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts. It was here, at the Old Kirk, that Agnes Samson allegedly came on Halloween night. She was joined by over a hundred other alleged witches, here to commune with the devil. This was the perfect spot from which to summon a storm.

The storms of 1589 wreaked havoc on land and sea, but for the women of Scotland they blew in a far more dangerous consequence, a new paranoia about magic, about the supernatural, about witchcraft. supernatural about witchcraft. The witch trials that took place in and around Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1590, were remarkable for the fact that they directly involved a king, both as the supposed target and the investigator of the witchcraft in question. Now the king in question here is, of course, King James the sixth King of the Scots, who came face to face with a woman accused of being a witch. Her name was Agnes Sampson. Picture them now together. They're so close that they cannot be overheard

by onlookers. In that tense head to head, Agnes supposedly whispers to James secrets only he could know and as he listens so the story goes he is convinced that she is a witch. It's a moment in time that's hard to fathom if it really happened at all of course. Why would Agnes provoke a king? Why was James so directly involved in a matter that was surely beneath his divine attention? But this is also a moment that would have far reaching and long lasting consequences not just in Scotland but in England too, once you became King James I across the border in 1603. But all of that is yet to come. across the border in 1603. But all of that is yet to come. Our story begins at sea, on the dark and stormy waters off the coast of Denmark, with a ship

troubled by a storm. This is After Dark, and today we're talking about the King, Agnes Samson, and the North Berwick witch trials. Hello and welcome to After Dark, I'm Maddie. And I'm Anthony. And we have some exciting news. We have gone and made a whole other documentary all about the North Berwick witch trials and it's going to be out now on History Hit TV from Halloween onwards. So if you want to watch it, go to historyhit.com, sign up for the TV subscription to watch that and we have to say hundreds of other original history

documentaries from History Hit. Not only this, you can get 50% off. We are working hard today on selling the old History Hit TV but tell them the offer Maddie. You can get 50% off. We are working hard today on selling the old history of TV. But tell them the offer Maddie. You can get 50% off for three months using the code afterdark. Afterdark all one word. Now, when we filmed for this documentary, we went up to Edinburgh. We had a jolly old time, it has to be said. We went out along the coast including to the beautiful, what is now a beautiful seaside town of North Berwick and we got the privilege of talking to so many wonderful experts including our guest for today. We are joined by none other than Dr Louise Yeoman. Louise is totally brilliant. If you don't know her work, she is a historian

of witchcraft and a radio producer and if you haven't listened to her two podcast series, Witch Hunt and House of the Lion, you absolutely have to do. Witch Hunt in particular, I found so inspiring. I'm in danger of gushing. So without any further ado, Louise, welcome to After Dark. We are so excited to have you here. Hello, it's lovely to be with you. It's so great to have you. And I was just thinking about the other day to the time that we had when we were up in Scotland, because you and I got to go all the way to Coorras, didn't we? And we filmed there in the incredible palace, which I had not been to before. And we just had the best time

talking about history in an incredible historical setting. Now it's just an absolutely beautiful place, Kurus, but it was a bit grim if you were being accused of witchcraft. Yes, a little bit of a different context back then from today. So let's begin to talk about the North Berwick witch trials and the story that surrounds them because our listeners will, I'm very sure, flood to go and watch us on the TV documentary that we've made but we're gonna do a sort of potted history here. So Louise, let's start at the beginning of this story because it was a very different mood wasn't it in this period that we're talking about. So take us back to that moment in history and the event that kickstarts it all, we've got a ship on

the water, haven't we? It was a dark and stormy night, as they like to say. But we are going back to September 1589 because we have a young, free and single King of Scots. And a young, free and single King of Scots needs a bride. If you don't get a bride, you are not going to have a dynasty and that's going to be the end of the Stuarts. So King James VI of Scotland, well luckily he's found a bride. She is Princess Anna of Denmark. Now the problem is she can't just hop on a flight. She has to come by sea and in September there are some really bad storms and Anna's ship in the middle of the North Sea, its springing leaks, they're really afraid of the weather and they turn back. So what is James to do? He has

been at Seton Palace near Edinburgh waiting for his bride. He's told she's not coming. Well James decides he's going to be really bold. Again, it's no small thing at this time of year to get on a ship and James decides well he'll go to Anna and at first he hits stormy weather and it's a bit touch-and-go but eventually James makes it to Anna, the royal couple are married, they have this lovely honeymoon in Norway and Denmark and they're having an extremely good time. And of course the Admiral who was in charge of Anna's fleet is a bit shame-faced of course. It couldn't be him. He couldn't be the person who'd perhaps not been maintaining the ships or not kept a proper lookout. Must be witches. So by the time the royal couple are going to come back to Scotland, well,

rumours of witchcraft are swirling in Denmark and there's even been witches accused in Denmark. So that's the background as the royals come to Scotland for the joyous occasion of Anna's coronation and Anna settling in as Queen of Scots. And luckily, I suppose, or unluckily for the people involved, not only are there these rumblings of witchcraft in Denmark, but there are initially at least unrelated rumblings of witchcraft in Scotland too at this exact moment in time. Tell us how, tell us what they are as a standalone event before they start to intermingle with this story.

Well, in Scotland, we have had the Reformation. We have gone from being Catholic to being Protestant, or have we? It's not just something that happens overnight. It's a big process. And one of the things that's going on with the Scottish Reformation, with the Scottish Kirk, the Scottish Church, is they're saying, you know, right, we've got a new religion, you all have to shape up, we all want to be more godly, because if you sin, then God punishes you. God may bring you famines, disasters, you may lose in war, you may be occupied by enemy troops, so we've all got to shape up and we've all got to stop sinning. So yes, you stop the fornication, you no golfing on the Sabbath,

you, you over there, what was that funny rhyme you were saying over that cow? You're not a witch, are you? Stop that, stop that at once. We call it the quest for the godly state, the quest for the godly society, and that's all going on in Scotland. So in Scotland we have our Protestant church, our Presbyterian church, it's got a hierarchy of church courts and the church courts at the top are kicking the church courts at the bottom saying, oh you know, have you got witches running around? Please do something about them. And Agnes Sampson is one of those people who the local church courts in Haddington and Dalkeith are being told, hey we've been hearing about this woman for years, we think she's a witch, do something about that woman. So this is all going on completely separately to the Royal Wedding junketings. So Louise, you mentioned Agnes

Sumpson there and one thing that just astounds me about the story of the North Brackwitch trials in particular is that you have the highest people in the land involved. You've got the king and his new bride, but then you've also got people at the lowest rungs of society. Agnes is one of those people and they, in the story, are going to become the victims really of this. Can you tell us a little bit more about Agnes, who she is and where she fits into this story? So, Agnes is absolutely fascinating. People try to put her in modern day categories and say she's a healer, she's a midwife, but she's all kinds of things. If you've asked Agnes to describe herself, Agnes would say she's a wisewife. And what's a wisewife?

Well wisewives, yes they do go for healing. So they might say a charm involving you know, involving the saints over you. They don't just heal you, they will heal your cows. So, you know, they will do what a modern-day vet would do, except they won't use what a modern-day vet would. I mean, Agnes says they have a Maria over somebody's cows while stroking them. Another time she cures somebody with a pickled egg. She knows healing, she knows charms, but she can also talk to spirits. Now, because things get rather obscured when people are being interrogated by witchcraft, we've got to look at other people round about the time of Agnes and say, what do we think she was doing? And I think one of the things wise

wives in this area round about Edinburgh and Luthe and Do, is they reckon they can summon fairies. They reckon they can summon fairies usually at watery places like holy wells and springs. She tries to get a response from a spirit at a well to find out whether a patient will live or die or be healed. So you know, Agnes can talk to the spirit, she can find things out which you know are a wee bit supernatural. You know, Agnes can talk to the spirit. She can find things out, which, you know, are a wee bit supernatural. You know, she's got these sort of methods of healing by charms for you or the cows. And she can probably do ordinary midwifery and healing. She probably has a few tricks like that as well.

First of all, obsessed with Agnes, that she has all of this going on. The amount of side hustles that that woman is carrying on, fair play to her, she definitely knows how to make a living for herself. Just about, I would imagine, because often we find in these situations that poverty and marginalization are a big part of the accusations that come along with witchcraft. But it is nonetheless, the other part of that is the determination somebody like Agnes has to survive and the wit and the intelligence that she has to do all of those things. So poverty and marginalisation is not nearly such a big thing in Scotland as people make

it in England. When we're talking about witches, they don't tend to be the poorest sort in society. You know, Agnes is a fair bit better off than say somebody like, you know, some of the maidservants or beggars who are caught up in this case. It's much more ordinary. In Scotland, you're much more likely to be looking at an older woman in her 40s, but who's not destitute. It's not, I mean, the one you often get in England is somebody was begging and they were refused arms. It's not like that. You know, we do get cases a bit like that, but they're not the big thing. So she's a fairly ordinary person, but she's not destitute. Some of the people who are accused in this case are vagrants and are destitute. And the way you get witchcraft cases encompassing

everyone from people who are destitute, ordinary people, to people right at the top of society is what happens when accused witches get interrogated. Well, let's talk Louise then about some of the accusations that actually happen in this case because you've laid out for us that we have this really tense atmosphere at this moment in time. We've got James himself as king literally believing potentially that witches are cursing him, are trying to end his life, are trying to end his rule, to undermine him as the monarch. But then we've got this very local drama that plays out that Agnes herself is caught up in. So how do we go from rumours, mistrust on a local level with this big political moment playing out. How do we go from that to material accusations getting made and people being essentially tortured

for information and confessions? Well, basically a local Laird finds that his cows are dying. His cows are dying and then one of the farm servants on his land, their daughter, is claiming to be possessed. She's showing symptoms of demonic possession. And that usually shows in Scotland as somebody saying, which is invisible to everyone but them are tormenting them. So the possessed girl's naming names, and one of the names she names is a maidservant to this guy, David Seaton, who is behind the initial stages of investigation at the local level.

Now, he is a legal official who's a servant to the big Catholic noble family in that area, the Setons. And these are called the North Berwick witch trials, but none of it happens in North Berwick. That's all imagined stuff coming from people's confessions. Now, where it really kicks off is Trinent. And the people who own Trinent, it's their borough of Barony, are the big Catholic noble family, the Setans. And here's their officer, Bailey David Setan. He suddenly thinks, oh, these people are out to get me. This is breaking out of my lands. And he goes from listening to the possessed girl to by the sounds of it, home torturing his servant, Gillie Duncan. And it's at this time that Agnes is being preceded against by the local church

courts. So, you know, if you think of name the usual suspects, well, boy, Agnes is a usual suspect. I mean, rumours about Agnes being a witch go right back to the early 1580s, in which, you know, we've got a couple of people arguing about she's a witch. No, no, I'm being slandered here. And, you know, the people doing the slandering are going, she hangs out with Agnes Sampson, she must be a witch. So Agnes has already got a not very good reputation for this. And the local church court has basically run her in and they've asked people, have you got any evidence about Agnes? And then, of course, we have our home torturer and the person who's torturing is going, yes, yes, Agnes was part of this. And this is how it happens. And then, you know, you're probably wondering,

well, how on earth does this get to the King? Well, the thing is, remember when James is waiting for Anna, waiting for Anna's ships to come into sight in that stormy September, he's at Seton Palace. This is where he is and this is where all this is breaking out on their land. So you know, our Bailey the torturer goes to his lords at Seton Palace and says, we've got witches. And suddenly someone at some point goes, oh right so you know these witches have they been sinking ships? Yes they've been sinking ships. I bet they were involved in this. I bet they were involved in those storms. You know we

really we'd better look into this. Somebody had better tell the king. It ends up being like sort of throwing a match into a pool of petrol and whoomph! People you know two and two makes five. Oh my goodness, were these witches part of an international conspiracy against the king and queen? This must be investigated. One of the people who decides he's going to investigate this is none other than the king himself, James VI. And we started the narrative and we were introduced to James and Agnes, but in that introduction they were in the same room together face to face, Agnes within whispering distance of the King.

And I know when Maddy and I were investigating this for the documentary, I took the side I mean, I investigated the history of James and how this led him to this moment and Maddy looked at the victims and the people who had been accused of witchcraft. And so from James's perspective, I remember saying to Maddie at the time, there's not a chance anybody be able to get that close to him without anybody else being around that they could whisper in his ear. So my question, Louise, for you is, A, did this happen? Did they get that close?

And B, what are we supposed to take from that story if it is only anecdotal? So we've got two things going on here. One is the tabloid news of the time, the propaganda pamphlet News from Scotland, which gives you this idea that she's whispering in his ear that she knows what went on on his wedding night in Denmark. Okay, so that's sort of, you know, that's jazzing it up a bit. Okay, so let's for a moment put that to one side and say what actually happened. Let's just ignore the propaganda pamphlet for just now.

Now, James is quite, quite commonly, James, you know, will question people himself. He's already, you know, in a previous occasion asked for a witch to be brought to him so he can question her, but he does it in all kinds of other things as well. Scotland at this time is much more informal than England. It's much easier to get into the royal presence, but the King is also keen to speak to you. So if James is interested in something, he'll just hop down to where the prisoners are being held, or he'll have guards bring them up so he can interrogate them in comfort. James is involved in the process of questioning accused witches, and we can see it in their depositions as they're taken down.

And James actually boasts about how effective he was in questioning the witches. So we absolutely know that James is talking to people like Agnes. It's the propaganda pamphlets that put this extra layer on and then Agnes told him mystically what happened on his wedding night and what he and his wife said to him. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's part of the stereotype of the witch at this date. There's the stereotype of witches they prophesy. They prophesy because they talk to bad spirits who tell them things through their devilish knowledge. So that's part of the stereotype, building up Agnes as a big witch.

But she did indeed talk to James and James talked to her. that must have been an unpleasant experience for her. It seems to me we've got sort of two versions haven't we of this meeting? We've got this theatrical mythologised version that's reported in News from Scotland. But then we have these two human beings coming together who both are buying into invisible ways of seeing the world. You know on the one hand we have the hierarchy that exists here. We've got the king coming into contact with a subject and whilst that hierarchy has very tangible effect on the world and is imposed in all different kinds of ways, it's a sort of invisible contract, I suppose, that the king and his subjects buy into. We have that

power dynamic. Then also, we have James, who you say Louise is very interested in meeting witches, in interrogating them, in really investigating these supernatural claims and ideas that are rife in the period that he's living in. And of course we know that he drives them in Scotland in this moment. Do you think he would have been afraid to come into the presence of a woman he suspected of witchcraft though? I mean, is this a terrifying moment for both of these people? Oh, absolutely not. Absolutely not. Because James believes the minute a witch is apprehended,

she loses her power. And anyway, he's the Lord's anointed, the Lord's holding his hand over him. I mean, you know, obviously if it, you know, the witches had been able to do their thing in secret and use poisons like the toad venom, well it might have gone very badly for James, but the point where they're in custody, nope, the magic has gone. It's one of these amazing things the demonologists come out with because, like, well if these people are witches, why don't they just use the magic to break out of jail? Well, the demonologists have an answer for that. When they are imprisoned and apprehended by the magistrate, they lose all their power. Conveniently enough. Actually, Louise, one of the things that's striking me as I listen to you talk here,

that we have this image, if people know this story already of, you know, this dark dungeon in Agnes is coming really close. I love the way we're like really old woman in our 40s, not old at all. But she's coming really close to James, the king, you know, God's anointed. And she's whispering these things in his ear. And it's all very atmospheric. And it's, you know, you're in a dungeon, you're in Scotland. It's very gothic altogether. What do you think that encounter might actually have looked like? I know we're going into Conjecture a little bit here, but if you'll follow us into the world of Conjecture, what do you think that that probably looked like

more than that dramatised version? Well, I think James likes to interview people with an eye to his own comfort. I mean, you know, there's a later story without going into my working on it, which gives you the idea that he sometimes will just call for a prisoner in the middle of the night and have them brought up to the bedchamber and question them. So, probably James is sitting in quite a nice chamber and there's a scribe scribing away, taking down the depositions. And he has a couple of his privy councillors and a couple of ministers, you know, all standing around. They'll stand, James will sit. I mean, maybe the scribe gets to sit to scribble away and, you know, then you'd

have, you know, probably a couple of burly guards to drag Agnes in and, you know, she might well be in chains. That's quite common with accused witches. So, but they'd probably, you know, stand to the side and then James would sit and as we'd say in Scots, he'd spear at her, he'd ask her questions. You know, this torture sort of goes on as well, but the main way they torture people that gets results is sleep deprivation, so it might be a very tired, scared Agnes. Now the way they check people for the devil's mark is they shave old people's hair off, so you know, she might be bald. She will not have had easy access to people looking after her. So you know, her clothes are probably dirty, not much chance to wash them or change them. You know, and so you know, she's probably sort of looking exhausted and frightened.

And you know, James, James will have had a good dinner or whatever, depending on what time of day it is. He's probably got a glass of wine, a glass of claret there going. And he'll be looking very resplendent. James likes jewellery, so he's got some nice sort of chains on. If he's wearing his hat, it'll have lovely hat jewels. So James will be looking glorious. And James is very quick witted. And he's very scholarly.

Here's this exhausted, drained, maltreated woman. It's really quite an awful scene when you think about that. LAREE It's no surprise then that Agnes does give away some details of a supposed witch gathering at North Berwick in the kirk there, doesn't she? So tell us a little bit about what Agnes actually admits to. is that witches have been having conventions, they've been having meetings, they've been having meetings with the devil, they've had a number of them. The big one is at North Berwick Kirk, this sort of old church in the borough of North Berwick. The devil preaches a sermon and the witches all probably can dance about in the graveyard and they allegedly, this is all the sort of fantasies that come out of torture, they allegedly dig up the bodies

and joint them, take finger joints and toe joints for sort of grinding up to put into magical ointments for doing bad magic and this sort of thing. And they're very keen to get the devil to help them go after James. So the actual storm magic is actually, and don't try this at home, actually involves baptizing cats and chucking them into water. It's very cruel to cats. You wouldn't want to be a witch's cat in the 16th century if such things actually happened. But the way they actually succlaimed that the ships were attacked by the storms were that cats were used in rituals where they were passed through the iron chains of the pot hanging at the chimney and then baptized and then thrown off the pier at Leith or thrown into the

Forth at the foot of the burn in Long Nidri. That's your actual storm raising magic. One of them had been hanging a toad and the toad had been dripping venom so they believed and they were allegedly going to use that to poison James. So these are the kind of lurid fantasies that are coming out from these confessions because it's not just Agnes. There's dozens of other people who've been apprehended and thrown into jail. There's about half a dozen people whose depositions you see over and over again. And you can see they're the main people that James is constructing his narrative of what the witches were doing when they were out to get him. Luke McAllister Louise, we have this idea that it's understandable

to a certain extent given the context of the time he's in and some of the things that had happened to him throughout his life. Why James the Sixth at this point would have been interested in witchcraft? A lot of people were interested in witchcraft. It was part of the everyday belief system of Scotland and Europe indeed at the time. His mother was executed in 1587 of course. His father was murdered early in his life. So there's a lot of plots and danger and reason to believe that people are out to get him, which brings him to this particular idea of witchcraft and the potential that witches might be after him. And so he becomes involved in this

trial or these trials as we have seen. But what do you think his legacy of having been involved in these trials is exactly? By him becoming involved, what do you think changes or what do you think is different about these particular trials? EILEEN So King James was really widely read. He'd been reading lots of other European authors who'd been writing about demonology. And one of the key concepts in these elite books about witchcraft and demonology was the witch's Sabbath where hundreds of witches get together. And it's this idea that there's a conspiracy, there's witches' meetings, and there's a lot of demonology that James kind of read and brought this in. There are witch trials before James, there are quite big witch hunts, which James isn't the person behind them. But it really solidifies this idea of, yeah, the way witches work is there's a lot of them, they get together, they work in groups.

And James writes his Daemonology, which is there, it's available for people. It's in Scots. You can read it in your own tongue, you know, and find out what witches are doing and how you ought to watch out for them. So, you know, I think what what witches are doing and how you ought to watch out for them. So, you know, I think what it does is it solidifies this idea in Scotland of, yeah, witches are part of a demonic conspiracy and there's probably a lot of them and we should watch out for them. In case you haven't heard, in the U.S. it's a presidential election year. We're going to hear a lot of, this is America.

No, no, you're all wrong. This is America. But on American History Hit, we're leaving that to the rest of them. Join me, Don Wildman, twice a week, where we look to the past to understand the United States of today, with the help of some amazing guests. Let us introduce you to the founding fathers, guide you through the West Wing of the White House, and shelter you on the battlefields of years gone by to find out just how we got here. American History Hit, a podcast from History Hit.

Monopoly Double Play is back in McDonald's and it's easy to get into the win. First you peel on pack. This is me winning a universal theme park vacation. Then again an app. And me in a new Chevrolet Equinox RS. There are millions of prizes, including a chance to win cash every minute in the app. Cash doesn't make any noise, but it's awesome.

Get into the game with Monopoly Double Play at McDonald's. Wall supplies last one in five chances to win GameCube prizes at outset, chances to win Double Play prizes based on time of code entry, and draw prizes based on number of entries in each draw. See rules in app.

Noah and Sarah have been trapped miles below the Denver International Airport. They faced horrors from aliens to human experiments in a shadow government agency hell-bent on their demise. This season on Escaping Denver, the tables turn as the hunted become the hunters and Noah and Sarah go on the offensive to protect the fate of the world. I don't think you brought enough men. I'm not scared! Then why do you sound scared? of the world. I don't think you brought enough men. I'm not scared. Escaping Denver, batch four. Listen on Apple podcasts, Amazon music, Spotify, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.

Agnes Sampson was taken from the toll booth up Castle Hill to her execution spot. It is impossible to imagine how tired and afraid she would have been at this point, but when she reached the castle foreground, that's when she was killed and her body placed atop a pyre to be burned to erase all trace of her from the earth. It wasn't enough that they had killed her, they wanted her to be eternally damned. So we've just heard there, Antony at the site where Agnes Sampson was executed, but Louise, we know that she wasn't the only person to be killed during the North Berwick witch trials. Can you tell us just the scale of the human loss that was happening here? Louise McDonagh So we tried to count it up and obviously there

are some problems with records not surviving. But the most we could get to was that there was maybe about 30 people executed. Samar It's 30! Louise McDonagh Yes, 30. And you've got to remember that people who are questioned as witches, they're put through horrible torture by sleep deprivation. Sleep deprivation is the big one. We know, however, that some people in the North Berwick trials, only a few, had their legs crushed in a Scottish torture device called the boots. Other people had a rope

tied around their head and tightened. And of course, when people are pricked for the witch's mark, they're stripped naked and their bodies are shaved. And these are not little itty bitty dress pins. They're like big thick hat pins. So people who have been pricked talk about to the effusion of their blood, that they've got blood loss because of it. And they can put those pins in anywhere, and I mean anywhere. So you know, people have been horribly treated by the time they are executed. Now the good thing is that when they are executed they will be strangled and then burned. There's some controversy over one of the executed witches at Northbury because she was sentenced to be burned

alive and then we don't have good accounts of whether that part of the sentence was remitted. But the usual thing is they're strangled and then they're burned. But you've got to remember every one of these people had a family and families are tainted by which accusations. I mean there might be one or two people who, poor people, who were alone in the world but most people will have families and especially the daughters in the family, that will bring them under suspicion in later years and make them more vulnerable to witch accusations and it's a shameful death to die. It will traumatise people. You know, you have the suffering of the people who are executed and you have the suffering and the trauma of their families who have had to witness this and who have to live with the consequences.

Louise, it's as ever been absolutely fascinating to talk to you about this and as I discovered when we filmed in Edinburgh, you are just the most brilliant font of knowledge when it comes to this. Before we go though, I wanted to ask you why you think it's important that we look at histories of witch trials, and the North Berwick witch trial in particular, in our own time? Because I think it's undeniable that we do as a modern society now have a fascination and an inclination to reinvent the figure of the witch, of course. We have this sort of compulsion towards this time period, towards some of these attitudes and maybe trying to understand

them in our own moment or in context. Do you think that we need to continue to look at cases like this and why? Absolutely, because when you think about it, it's a conspiracy theory. And you know, we have conspiracy theories nowadays, and conspiracy theories are impervious to reason, or they sort of make up very good reasons why the normal rules of evidence don't apply, like the idea that, you know, witches become powerless once they're in jail, so you can't observe them doing magic. So, you know, they're unfalsifiable, and it shows you the danger of when you get into unfalsifiable belief systems. And it also shows you how people at the cutting edge of knowledge in their societies, as James was, can go so wrong. We've seen miscarriages of justice in our own society where people said,

we've got this forensic test. It tells you whether there's explosive on somebody's hands. That person had explosive on their hands. The test says so. They're guilty. They go to jail for life. And then it turns out the test was wrong. It didn't work. It didn't say what you thought. So we have to be very, very careful of evidence, of miscarriages, of justice, and we really need to watch out for those conspiracy theories. Well, listener, you heard it here first. If you want to go and watch this film, and I think

after listening to that conversation, hopefully you will absolutely have an appetite for it, you can head to historyhit.com and you can get 50% off your first three months subscription with the code AFTERDARK, all one word. Louise is on the film as well as lots of other experts. We had a fantastic time filming it. It's a really crucially important and fascinating period in Scotland's history, in global history. And we really hope that you join us on that journey. See you soon. Monopoly Double Play is back in McDonald's

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