The Wild Hunt (https://wildhunt.org/tag/witch-trials)
The names of some 4,000 people, all falsely accused of witchcraft, were read aloud in a remembrance event earlier in June. The Creative Coven, a group of female artists whose work has been inspired by the Scottish witch trials, also organized an event to educate about the historical persecution.
Our UK correspondent Liz Williams reports on the Scottish Witchcraft Survey and the new monument in memory of Scottish witches.
UNITED KINGDOM — In the islands of Orkney, a memorial is planned for the victims of the witch trials. The site will open in 2019. The inspiration for the project came when Professor Liv Willumsen of the University of Tromsø gave a talk at Orkney College in 2012. Professor Willumsen made a comparison between the witch trials in Scotland and those in Northern Norway, and she also mentioned a memorial to witches in Steilneset in Finnmark, Norway. Over 100 people were tried in that region, an unusually high number for Norway, with 91 people being burned at the stake.
SALEM, Mass — On Jan. 11, it was announced that researchers with the Gallows Hill Project had definitively identified where the 19 victims of the Salem Witch trials had been killed. Up until this point, the hanging site was ignored, forgotten or left to speculation. Many believed that the hangings actually occurred at the top of Gallows Hill. However, with renewed effort and current technology, the actual location is no longer a mystery.
For some, the phrase “tea party” conjures up images of little girls in pink taffeta dresses, or perhaps angry colonists on tall ships or, better yet, Sarah Palin and Christine O’Donnell. What it doesn’t conjure up is 380 witches convening on the historic grounds of Exeter Castle in the UK. But that is exactly what happened this past weekend at the “Grand Witches’ Tea Party.” On Aug. 31, over 300 witches and others supporters, wearing pointy hats, capes and carrying brooms, arrived at Exeter castle to honor the lives of three British women hanged for Witchcraft.