Speaker 1: Welcome to Criminalia, a production of Shonda Land Audio in
Speaker 1: partnership with I Heart Radio. In the King James Version
Speaker 1: of the Christian Bible, which is a translation commissioned and
Speaker 1: sponsored by King James, the first for the Church of England,
Speaker 1: there is a passage in Exodus eighteen that reads, thou
Speaker 1: shalt not suffer a witch to live. And as we'll
Speaker 1: see while we tell the story of Agnes Sampson and
Speaker 1: the North Berwick which is that James pretty much followed
Speaker 1: that rule. Welcome to Criminalia, I'm Maria tram Marquis and
Speaker 1: I'm Holly fry To. Witchcraft trials in north Berwick, Scotland
Speaker 1: were touched off by the confession and testimony of an
Speaker 1: accused witch named Galus Duncan. You might recognize that name
Speaker 1: from Diana Gabaldon's fictional Outlander novels and TV series. In
Speaker 1: real life, though, Gallas was a healer from Trent, Scotland
Speaker 1: who was employed as domestic help for a man named
Speaker 1: David Seaton. Seaton was the local bailiff and played a
Speaker 1: major role in what was likely the beginning of the
Speaker 1: Scottish witch trials. Seton observed a few things about Gailis
Speaker 1: during her time in his employment. She had no schooling,
Speaker 1: so how was she so well educated in the healing arts,
Speaker 1: he wondered. He also noted that he was aware Gayless
Speaker 1: sometimes sneaked away at night, and her whereabouts were unknown.
Speaker 1: Seaton had grown quite suspicious of her, as we can tell,
Speaker 1: and in accused her of practicing witchcraft. She was interrogated
Speaker 1: by Seton and, according to reports quote with the help
Speaker 1: of others, to torment her with the tortures of the
Speaker 1: thumbscrews upon her fingers, which is a grievous torture, and
Speaker 1: binding and twisting her head with cord of rope, which
Speaker 1: is a most cruel to were meant also yet she
Speaker 1: should not confess anything. Whereupon they suspecting that she had
Speaker 1: been marked by the devil, as commonly which is are,
Speaker 1: they searched and found the devil's marked to be on
Speaker 1: the fore part of her throat. After this was found,
Speaker 1: she confessed that all her doings was done by the
Speaker 1: wicked allurements and enticements of the devil, and that she
Speaker 1: did them by witchcraft. Thanks to all of that torture,
Speaker 1: Gallis admitted her guilt, and initially she seemed to be
Speaker 1: confessing to a meeting between Scottish witches and a witch
Speaker 1: from Copenhagen, but she did then go on to confess
Speaker 1: that she went to meetings with other witches. She also
Speaker 1: divulged that those meetings were held at the kirk of
Speaker 1: North Berwick with the Devil in their company. As her
Speaker 1: interrogation continued, Gallis confessed the purpose of the meeting was
Speaker 1: actually to plot how to assassinate the king, as they
Speaker 1: were instructed to do by the Devil. She named many
Speaker 1: many others during the interrogation, including two fairly distinguished people
Speaker 1: in the community, a suspected sorcerer who was actually a
Speaker 1: teacher named John Fion, as well as midwife and local
Speaker 1: cunning woman Agnes Sampson. In fact, according to the pamphlet
Speaker 1: that covered these events, which was called News from Scotland
Speaker 1: under Torture, Galis named numerous individuals, both women and men,
Speaker 1: including we quote Agnes Sampson, the eldest witch of them all,
Speaker 1: dwelling in Haddington's, Agnes Thompson of Edinburgh, Dr Phiam alias
Speaker 1: John Cunningham, master of the school at Saltpans and Lothian,
Speaker 1: of whose life and strange acts you shall hear more
Speaker 1: largely in the end of this discourse. These were by
Speaker 1: the said Galis Duncan accused, as also George Mott's wife
Speaker 1: dwelling in Lothian, Robert Grierson Skipper, and Janet Blandolin's with
Speaker 1: the Potter's Life of Seaton, the smith at the brig Hollis,
Speaker 1: with innumerable others in those parts and dwelling in those
Speaker 1: bounds aforesaid, of whom some are already executed, the rest
Speaker 1: remained in prison to receive the doom of judgment at
Speaker 1: the King's Majesty's will and pleasure. Setons, suspicions and gallis
Speaker 1: is torture driven confessions are considered to be what ignited
Speaker 1: the North Berwick witch trials. We've named several accused individuals,
Speaker 1: but there are many others whose names we just don't know.
Speaker 1: According to Scottish academic and historian Christopher Smout, between three
Speaker 1: thousand and four thousand persons accused of witchcraft may have
Speaker 1: been killed in Scotland in the years to seventeen o seven,
Speaker 1: and although the information is not on record, experts generally
Speaker 1: except that many of the accused actually died from the
Speaker 1: injuries that were inflicted upon them during their torture. With
Speaker 1: that solemn note, we are going to take a break
Speaker 1: for a word from our sponsor, and when we return
Speaker 1: we will talk about how authorities got confessions of witchcraft
Speaker 1: from their detainees. Welcome back to Criminalia. Many of the
Speaker 1: instruments of torture that were used during these witch trials
Speaker 1: were extreme. We're now going to be talking about one
Speaker 1: called the witches Bridal. Being tried and executed as a
Speaker 1: witch in early modern Scotland often began with nothing more
Speaker 1: than a slight or just an insult between a person
Speaker 1: and their neighbor or someone in their community. Because their
Speaker 1: records survived, we know as fact that four named people,
Speaker 1: John phi Am, Agnes Sampson, Barbara Napier and Euphemy Mataelsian
Speaker 1: were indicted for practicing witchcraft. Agnes and John were both
Speaker 1: tried quickly. It's estimated that their trials probably took just
Speaker 1: a single day each. Let's talk about these trials for
Speaker 1: a moment. Before the suspects were imprisoned, they would have
Speaker 1: been interrogated and their depositions would have been taken. The
Speaker 1: accused and accuser were allowed to confront each other before
Speaker 1: the trial began, and that sort of face to face
Speaker 1: confrontation would often also happened during the trial. Similarly, a
Speaker 1: witness could be confronted by other witnesses. While that may
Speaker 1: not sound legit through our modern legal system, this was
Speaker 1: part of the trial process. And when we're talking about interrogation,
Speaker 1: that piece could be conducted more than once and accused
Speaker 1: which would have been given the chance to confess before
Speaker 1: being interrogated. But many of these confessions, though, happened under
Speaker 1: extreme torture. It's really hard to know what was real
Speaker 1: and what was the result of that torture. That confession
Speaker 1: made under durest would be record it and used as
Speaker 1: evidence against them in their trial. There really weren't any
Speaker 1: rules or limitations on what constituted admissible evidence at a
Speaker 1: witchcraft trial. Testimonies full of rumor and speculation, along with
Speaker 1: a person's reputation, were weighed the same as any actual
Speaker 1: factual evidence, maybe even more so if they were salacious.
Speaker 1: During Agnes's interrogation, her torturer shaved her head and all
Speaker 1: of her body hair, and then they fastened a device
Speaker 1: called a witch's bridle to her head. You may have seen.
Speaker 1: This referenced in other historical sources as a gossips bridle,
Speaker 1: a Brank's bridle, or simply branks, whatever name you know
Speaker 1: this instrument by. It was very obviously an instrument of torture.
Speaker 1: It was made of iron and its framework fit around
Speaker 1: the head of the victim. There was a bridle bit
Speaker 1: that was roughly two inches by one inch that's about
Speaker 1: five centimeters by two w a half centimeters in size,
Speaker 1: and there were four sharp metal prongs that would slide
Speaker 1: into the victim's mouth, making it impossible for that person
Speaker 1: to talk. Two of these spikes pressed against the tongue
Speaker 1: and two others against the cheeks. In this tool had
Speaker 1: more than one function. It would obviously silence its wearer,
Speaker 1: and it would also cause extreme pain. There's actually a
Speaker 1: kind of an interesting note about this torture device. This
Speaker 1: instrument wasn't just used on accused witches at this time.
Speaker 1: It actually was not unheard of her husbands as a
Speaker 1: form of public humiliation to muscle wives who they thought
Speaker 1: gossiped or nagged too much. Some accounts include an additional humiliation.
Speaker 1: These wives, while wearing a leash with a bell, were
Speaker 1: then led around the center of town. The earliest known
Speaker 1: use of this device is in Scotland during the sixteenth century. I.
Speaker 1: This was fastened to the wall of her cell by
Speaker 1: a witch's bridle. She was not allowed to sleep, and
Speaker 1: she was additionally restricted with a rope tied around her neck.
Speaker 1: And it was after enduring all of this that she
Speaker 1: confessed to fifty three indictments against her. According to the
Speaker 1: transcript of her interrogation and torture, the record of which
Speaker 1: was dated January, she confessed that the first time she
Speaker 1: saw the Devil was after the death of her husband.
Speaker 1: Motivated by poverty and children to feed, she said she
Speaker 1: was taken in by his offers of riches as well
Speaker 1: as revenge on any enemies. He would take care of everything,
Speaker 1: she continued. It was then she confessed that she took
Speaker 1: the devil as her master. She admitted she did summon
Speaker 1: the devil to ask if a specific noble woman should
Speaker 1: be allowed to live or die, and she described the
Speaker 1: devil as appearing as a black dog in her home.
Speaker 1: The transcript continued with additional confessions. Agnes confessed to making
Speaker 1: a spell to help a woman deal with her difficult
Speaker 1: father in law. She made it was described quote a
Speaker 1: picture of wax and raised a spirit at a water
Speaker 1: side beside a briar bush, desiring her to enchant it
Speaker 1: to serve for his destruction and send it to the
Speaker 1: said woman to be put under his bed sheet or BedHead.
Speaker 1: Agnes was sentenced to execution by being burned at the stake,
Speaker 1: which was the only punishment for witches. We read that
Speaker 1: the cost of Agnes's execution was accounted for as six pounds,
Speaker 1: eight shillings and tenpence. Also, I want to note that
Speaker 1: you may have noticed that we've referred to slight differences
Speaker 1: in the date of her execution. The Treasurer's paperwork listed
Speaker 1: the date as January six, for instance, while the transcript
Speaker 1: of her interrogation was dated. As we spoke about earlier,
Speaker 1: the trial was really well recorded, but with more than
Speaker 1: four years between us and her execution dates, sometimes these
Speaker 1: dates aren't exactly perfect. With that in mind, we're going
Speaker 1: to take a quick break and when we come back
Speaker 1: we will talk about how the North Berwick witch trials
Speaker 1: were the first major trials of witchcraft under criminal law.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Criminalia. This is when King James the
Speaker 1: sixth of Scotland starts to seriously seek out traders among
Speaker 1: his people. King James the sixth of Scotland was paranoid
Speaker 1: that he would be assassinated, and that made him paranoid
Speaker 1: of the dark arts and magical spells. In nine James
Speaker 1: and his new bride, Princess Anne of Denmark were unable
Speaker 1: to make their trip from Oslo to their home in
Speaker 1: Scotland due to dangerous storms that had developed. Party had
Speaker 1: to turn back, and to the Danes and Ann and
Speaker 1: James well, this was clearly the fault of witches. It
Speaker 1: might be difficult for some of us to believe that
Speaker 1: the king could have become so convinced that a small
Speaker 1: group of Scottish women were to blame for conjuring the
Speaker 1: storm that got in the way of his travel plants,
Speaker 1: but he did. He ordered those who conspired to assassinate
Speaker 1: him to be executed. The king became convinced that the
Speaker 1: devil was his greatest enemy. In just a few years
Speaker 1: after these witch trials came to a close, James published
Speaker 1: a work called Demonology, in which he explored the topics
Speaker 1: of witchcraft and demonic magic. He also always advocated for
Speaker 1: the death penalty to be given to any individual who
Speaker 1: has proven to practice these arts. The North Berwick witch
Speaker 1: Trials were the first major trial of witchcraft that took
Speaker 1: place under criminal law. The Act against Conjurations, Enchantments and Witchcrafts,
Speaker 1: which if you've been with us since earlier in this
Speaker 1: season you have heard us talk about, is an example
Speaker 1: of a high witchcraft sentiment at this time, during the
Speaker 1: reign of Queen Elizabeth the First of England and twenty
Speaker 1: eight years before the North Berwick witch Trials, this document
Speaker 1: made witchcraft punishable as a crime. Specifically, the act of
Speaker 1: killing or severely injuring a person with the use of
Speaker 1: witchcraft was punishable by death. Lesser practices, such as causing
Speaker 1: a mild injury, were to be punished with one year
Speaker 1: in prison and to be determined on a case by
Speaker 1: case basis a number of appearances in the public pillory
Speaker 1: for a dose of public humiliation. When King James the
Speaker 1: Sixth of Scotland also became King James the First of England,
Speaker 1: which took place in sixteen o three, a few years
Speaker 1: after Agnes had been put to death, he passed a
Speaker 1: new law that made all forms basically ninety nine percent
Speaker 1: of all forms of witchcraft punishable by execution. This act
Speaker 1: made it illegal to kill or harm an individual with witchcraft,
Speaker 1: and it also made it illegal to consult with evil
Speaker 1: spirits quote for any intent or purpose. And it was
Speaker 1: also illegal to dig up grapes in order to use
Speaker 1: the dead bodies in witchcraft practices. In the Crowns search
Speaker 1: for any traitors among its people, James turned his attention
Speaker 1: to those who were suspicious, at least according to rumor
Speaker 1: or to those who were named in criminal interrogations. A
Speaker 1: man named Dr John Fion mentioned earlier, was a respectable
Speaker 1: scholar and teacher, and was now accused of being the
Speaker 1: leader of an assassination plot against the King. Here's how
Speaker 1: that came to be and how he found himself on
Speaker 1: the King's radar. So to do that, we have to
Speaker 1: jump back to Galis and her testimony. Galis Duncan testified
Speaker 1: that it was John who presided over Sabbaths that were
Speaker 1: held in North Berwick. There, she testified, the witches danced
Speaker 1: about the church always counterclockwise. She detailed before On let
Speaker 1: them inside, and his key was actually really quite something.
Speaker 1: Galis described that he entered the building by blowing into
Speaker 1: the keyhole of the front door. Once inside the church
Speaker 1: and in the company of the devil. The witch Is
Speaker 1: planned to kill the King. The devil, as some sources
Speaker 1: suggest Galis described him, was disguised as a tall man
Speaker 1: with a rabbit's nose, a hawk speak, a long tail,
Speaker 1: and dressed in a black robe and skull cap. According
Speaker 1: to reports and testimony about John's involvement in sorcery, we
Speaker 1: quote Fian confessed that by his witchcraft he did be
Speaker 1: which a gentleman dwelling near the salt pens, where the
Speaker 1: said doctor kept school, only for being enamored of a
Speaker 1: gentlewoman whom he loved himself. By means of which his sorcery,
Speaker 1: witchcraft and devilish practices, he caused the said gentleman that
Speaker 1: once in every twenty four hours he fell into a
Speaker 1: lunacy and madness, and so continued one whole hour together,
Speaker 1: And for the verity of the same, he caused the
Speaker 1: gentleman to be brought before the King's Majesty, which was
Speaker 1: upon the twenty third day of December last, and being
Speaker 1: in his Majesty's chamber, suddenly he gave a great screech
Speaker 1: and fell into madness, sometimes bending himself and sometimes capering
Speaker 1: so directly up that his head did touch the ceiling
Speaker 1: of the chamber, to the great admiration of His Majesty
Speaker 1: and others then present, so that all the gentlemen in
Speaker 1: the chamber were not able to hold him until they
Speaker 1: called in more help, who together bound him hand and foot,
Speaker 1: and suffering the said gentleman to lie still until his
Speaker 1: fury were past, he within an hour he came again
Speaker 1: to himself. John was detained and interrogated. The instruments of
Speaker 1: torture you used on him may have differed slightly among
Speaker 1: the accused witches, but the outcome was the same. His
Speaker 1: fingernails were forcibly removed and thumb screws were put in
Speaker 1: their place. This torture was known as the pillar winks
Speaker 1: and used to crush fingers and toes in a vice
Speaker 1: kind of device. John was also forced to wear what
Speaker 1: was called the boot, which was a boot shaped instrument
Speaker 1: created to squeeze the wearer's feet until their bones shattered.
Speaker 1: He did confess under torture, but he also recanted after
Speaker 1: the torture ended, claiming, quote, what he had done and
Speaker 1: said before was only done in said for fear of
Speaker 1: pains which he had endured. John was convicted on the
Speaker 1: King's explicit orders and the testimony of one woman that
Speaker 1: being gay less, he was placed in a cart and
Speaker 1: taken to Castle Hill in Edinburgh, where he and his
Speaker 1: fellow North Berwick witches were garretted and then burned alive.
Speaker 1: The accused were arrested and many confessed things like having
Speaker 1: packs with the devil, devoting themselves to generally doing evil,
Speaker 1: including poisoning the King and other royals, and attempting to
Speaker 1: sink the King's ship. Somewhere between seventy and two hundreds
Speaker 1: so called witches were put on trial, tortured and executed
Speaker 1: from the town of north Berwick alone, which hysteria and
Speaker 1: witchcraft trials continued in Scotland until seventeen thirty five, when
Speaker 1: it became illegal to try a person as a witch
Speaker 1: in both Scotland and in England. Instead of sentences that
Speaker 1: included brutal torture and execution, punishment for purporting to have
Speaker 1: the powers of a which that became fines or imprisonment
Speaker 1: or both. What a terrible story, UM. I would like
Speaker 1: to follow you into the cauldron and take take, just
Speaker 1: do something else. Let this terrible story O UM I
Speaker 1: was in trying to come up with something for this one.
Speaker 1: I kind of wanted to develop something that hearkened to
Speaker 1: this idea of coercing people to talk, that also had
Speaker 1: a little bit of a bite, and so I came
Speaker 1: up with a drink which I am calling the witches Bridle.
Speaker 1: It is not nearly so painful as a witch is
Speaker 1: Bridle would be, although I'm going to tell you now
Speaker 1: this drink is not for everybody, and you'll see why
Speaker 1: in a moment. Okay, So, first of all, the primary
Speaker 1: version is for coffee drinkers, so if you're not a
Speaker 1: coffee probably out. But I do have an alcoholic but
Speaker 1: non coffee version that's easy enough to do. It will
Speaker 1: start with one ounce of coffee. This is a chill drink,
Speaker 1: so you want cold coffee. Then you're gonna put that
Speaker 1: in a cocktail shaker and add an ounce of double
Speaker 1: espresso vodka. I like to also throw in like a
Speaker 1: dot of brown sugar or a splash of brown sugar
Speaker 1: syrup or vanilla syrup. And then the crowning glory for me,
Speaker 1: and this is where I'm going to lose people, an
Speaker 1: ounce of yeager. Mister. Now, before you get weird. Let
Speaker 1: me just tell you I didn't invent really this combo.
Speaker 1: Mine is a variation on a theme. But yeager Meister
Speaker 1: actually gets used in cocktails in really interesting ways because
Speaker 1: if you only use a little announced it's not that much.
Speaker 1: It kind of offsets other flavors in an interesting way,
Speaker 1: and you actually don't necessarily get the taster association that
Speaker 1: you have probably had if your only experience with Yeagermeister
Speaker 1: is doing so many shots in college that you fall down,
Speaker 1: which is I think everybody's first assumption, right, I want
Speaker 1: to see it grow up, so I'm happy to see
Speaker 1: that it's being used here. It's actually like a very
Speaker 1: complex liqueur, right. It has a lot of ingredients, has
Speaker 1: something like fifty ingredients, and they all will interact with
Speaker 1: other things differently. So when you add it to something
Speaker 1: that's coffee based, it has a natural sweetness to it,
Speaker 1: but it also just brings out other interesting notes in
Speaker 1: the coffee, depending on what kind of coffee you brewed.
Speaker 1: So you just literally shake that guy up, pour it
Speaker 1: and I like it just like that, strained into a
Speaker 1: cold cocktail glass. But if you want it over rocks,
Speaker 1: that's totally fine. You can put it in a rocks
Speaker 1: glass with ice. You know, it's not a big drink,
Speaker 1: it's only a few ounces. But I like the fact
Speaker 1: that you get the energy jolt of coffee which might
Speaker 1: make you talkative, and the jagger maister and vodka combo
Speaker 1: will slap you around a little bit too and make
Speaker 1: it a little looser to tell your your secrets right
Speaker 1: exactly now. If you don't like coffee, you can do
Speaker 1: this with tea, and it's easiest. Pie Maria is making
Speaker 1: a terrified face at the thought of people not like
Speaker 1: a coffee. I know people that don't do coffee, And
Speaker 1: for that one, if you want to make it in
Speaker 1: an alcoholic version but not a coffee version, you can
Speaker 1: instead use black teeth. If you drink that, really any
Speaker 1: kind of tea that has this sort of deeper, spicier
Speaker 1: flavor rather than like a bright herbal. Just use a
Speaker 1: plain vodka instead of that double espresso vodka, and then
Speaker 1: you know your yeager maister goes right in again. Splash
Speaker 1: of vanilla syrup will help you out. I really like
Speaker 1: a brown sugar idea. Oh I love brown sugar in
Speaker 1: a a little coffee because it just it's got a deeper,
Speaker 1: more beautiful flavor. The mock tail for this is super simple,
Speaker 1: although it does I do a little trick here too.
Speaker 1: You'll still use the coffee, but instead of a coffee
Speaker 1: flavored vodka, you're just gonna double up the coffee. So
Speaker 1: two ounces of coffee or tea if you're going that route,
Speaker 1: three quarters of an ounce of annis syrup and then
Speaker 1: one quarter of an ounce of almond syrup. And that
Speaker 1: isn't going to perfectly replicate what Yeager moister tastes like,
Speaker 1: but it does bring out some of the key notes
Speaker 1: and it makes it really interesting and quite lovely. Actually,
Speaker 1: I would make this in a scaled up ounce of right,
Speaker 1: I was trying to drink both of these as t
Speaker 1: um or an iced coffee. It's super super emmers. That
Speaker 1: is the witch's bridle, which hopefully reclaims that horrible thing
Speaker 1: for something slightly more enjoyable that might make you talkative
Speaker 1: talk but among your friends, really, right one one hopes so. Uh,
Speaker 1: speaking of talkative, thank you for joining us this week
Speaker 1: and listening to us talk and talk and talk. It
Speaker 1: was a talkie kind of a week here. We will
Speaker 1: be right back here next week with more Criminalia and
Speaker 1: more libations, and we hope you join us for all
Speaker 1: of that. Criminalia is a production of Shonda land Audio
Speaker 1: in partnership with I heart Radio. For more podcasts from
Speaker 1: Shonda land Audio, please visit at the I heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.