Pardoning 'witches' should recognise the torture that is still used by paranoid states today
TOMORROW, on a day that falls between Mother's Day and International Women's Day, Holyrood's petitions committee must decide whether to back a pardon for nearly 3,000 women and mothers accused of witchcraft 400 years ago... and whether to support a p
ardon for Helen Duncan – a spiritualist imprisoned during the Second World War for feigning supernatural powers.
The two petitions, however, are hardly related and their joint submission has deepened public confusion about witchcraft and provoked a torrent of flippant remarks about Harry Potter, broomsticks and crooked noses.
In fact, according to historians Lauren Martin and Joyce Miller in their study The Survey of Scottish Witchcraft, of the 3,837 people accused of witchcraft between 1565 and 1735, only 4 per cent were healers, 85 per cent were women, 67 per cent were executed and almost all were tortured.
Not very funny is it? Nor very closely related to healing, spiritualism or occult practices.
But then the level of mis-information about Scotland's witch trials is huge.
Take the Nor Loch – a loch created in the 15th century beneath Edinburgh Castle to strengthen castle defences. According to a double-decker city tour I took recently and six history websites I've just visited, the Nor Loch was: "a perfect spot for 'trial by douking' (ducking). This would consist of a suspected witch being ducked on a specially designed 'stool'. If she sank and drowned she would be found innocent.... but if she survived she would be found guilty and burned at the stake."
In reality, according to historian Louise Yeoman, the "swimming test" was never used in Scotland, with the exception of a few months in 1597, after which the authorities decided it was pointless.
So where does that story come from? And in any case, why does the "swimming test" prompt laughter at the righteous authorities instead of sympathy for the terrified victims?
It's too easy to laugh, forget and turn forgotten acts of misogyny into another selling opportunity for black hats, broomsticks and detachable warts at Halloween. And far too easy to overlook the fact that the methods used to extract witchcraft "confessions" four centuries ago are still being used by the US, with Britain looking the other way.
According to the records, women accused of being witches in Scotland were not considered to have been "tortured". No thumbscrews were used. They were not placed in the "boots" or on the "rack". Suspected witches were "only" stripped naked and shaved of all hair, including pubic hair, to look for "devil's marks". The women would then be kept awake for days and "encouraged" to confess. Behaviour remarkably similar to the "interrogation techniques" currently used at Abu Graib, Guantanamo Bay and bases accessed by the US special rendition flights.
The big difference – female victims of state paranoia in 1597 were executed almost immediately, not detained indefinitely.
A site at the entrance to Edinburgh Castle's esplanade, marked by a fountain, does indeed commemorate the place where over 300 women were first strangled and their bodies burned for being witches.
A plaque beside the fountain reads: "The wicked head and serene head signify that some (witches) used their exceptional knowledge for evil purposes while others were misunderstood and wished their kind nothing but good."
This of course is nonsense. Since no part of the Scottish state has believed in the powers of witchcraft since 1753, no "wicked head" that passed within inches of this plaque during its last terrified minutes on this earth could possibly have committed harm by thought or speech alone.
So should they be pardoned?
Helen Duncan spent months in prison for no good reason we would accept today, before being released. More than three thousand women were accused by neighbours, stripped, shaved, questioned and kept awake for days for no good reason we would accept today, before being strangled.
Duncan's case is less extreme, but it is more recent and therefore prompts feelings of identification among spiritualists today.
It's far harder, but maybe more important to tease out the links between modern women and the witches of yesteryear. Why did they cause such offence? A saying at the time observed that "men use knives, women use words". And indeed, the survey found that few of the women accused of witchcraft were poor – 64 per cent came from "middle range" homes. Few were lonely spinsters or widows – 78 per cent were married. But almost all were mouthy.
As Yeoman puts it: "The average witch lived in a small borough town. She had an occupation and brought money into the home in her own right. She had a sharp tongue and might have fallen out with neighbours – in other words, she was us."
A pardon for the 3,837 people accused of witchcraft would acknowledge the terrible miscarriage of justice that took place. But a recognition that torture was used to extract their confessions might help protect citizens around the world today. The main drivers in Scotland's witch hunt were a paranoid state, a suspicion of locally powerful, outspoken women and the politics of envy in small communities. It's a dangerous brew still.
The full article contains 874 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
