Hard to Believe: A Hunt to Find a Scottish "Witch's" Bones

Holy Hathor.  I would say that words fail me, but that would be a lie.  I've got plenty of words about how I'd deal with the men responsible for these atrocities, I just can't write them down here - you'd all be horrified.

From thenational.scot

Bid to find missing bones of Scottish ‘witch’ feared to rise from dead

Nan Spowart, Journalist

August 24, 2019

A CAMPAIGN is to be launched for a national memorial to Scotland’s “witches” as well as the return of the missing remains of the woman given the country’s only revenant burial.

At a special ceremony at the grave of Lilias Adie next Saturday a proposal will also be put forward for a Witches Memorial Trail along the coastal path in West Fife.

Adie, who died in custody in 1704, became the only “witch” to be given a revenant burial as it was feared she would rise from the grave and return to wreak revenge on her persecutors.

The site in Torryburn is the only known witch’s grave in Scotland but it was robbed by curio hunters in 1852 and the last sighting of her skull was at the Empire Exhibition in 1938 at Bellahouston in Glasgow.

Now an appeal is being made for the return of her bones so that a proper memorial can be made to honour Adie and all those who suffered during the witch persecutions in Scotland.

Usually those accused of being witches were burned but because Adie died in custody after being maltreated it was thought her body would be reanimated by Satan and she would come back to terrorise those who had persecuted her.  [I sure hope she did!]  Medieval historians referred to these reanimated bodies as “revenants” from the Latin word “reveniens”, meaning returning, and the related French verb “revenir”, meaning to come back.

“Poor Lilias was treated so harshly but after her death she became almost a celebrity. Part of her coffin was owned by the world’s richest man and her skull was in the Empire Exhibition.”

Wood from the chest containing Adie’s body was taken from her grave in 1852 by curio hunters along with her skull and bones. They were working on the instructions of Dunfermline’s famed antiquarian Joseph Neil Paton who was keen on phrenology, a quasi-science widespread at the time, which postulated that a person’s character could be determined from the lumps and bumps on their skull.

He passed Adie’s skull on to the Fife Medical Association and it then went on to the University of St Andrew’s anatomical collection. Meanwhile some of the wood from her “coffin” was crafted into two walking sticks as trophy momentos.  One of these is in Dunfermline Museum and the other in the Dunfermline Carnegie Birthplace Museum.

Andrew Carnegie was given the walking stick by Robert Baxter Brimer, who had helped dig up Adie’s grave in 1852.

It’s also possible that Adie’s skull features in one of the paintings by Paton’s son, the artist Joseph Noel Paton, who often used items from his father’s collection in the background of his works.

There are old photographs of the skull taken 100 years ago at St Andrews University. This has allowed a facial reconstruction to be created – the only accurate likeness of a Scottish “witch” in existence.

Speirs, who was introduced to Adie’s case in 2014 by historian Dr Louise Yeoman, managed to find the grave on Torryburn’s foreshore. He has since been hunting for her skull and bones.

“I’ve written to various collections in Scotland but so far not been able to find them,” he said.

He said it seemed strange that there was no national memorial or retrospective apology to those who had been persecuted.

“It’s surprising there has been not yet been a degree of interest in the wrong done by the authorities in this case and there is no national memorial to commemorate these innocent people who were persecuted,” he said.

“It seems fitting to erect a memorial both to Lilias and more widely to all those persecuted as it was a horrible phase of historical injustice with a gender bias against women.

“Innocent people were persecuted and tried in an appalling way but that human suffering issue has been lost in the way we talk about witchcraft.

“The really stunning thing about Adie’s case is that it happened in 1704, the Enlightenment century and century of achievement.

“It’s a horrible reminder of the degree to which there was still a very strong belief in witchcraft.”

On Saturday a wreath will be laid on behalf of Fife Council by depute provost Julie Ford. Another wreath will be laid after a wreath-making workshop in Torryburn Hall led by countryside ranger Lyn Strachan and Councillor Kate Stewart, who has been a key driver in pushing for more recognition of Adie’s case.

“We are wanting a memorial not just for her but for everybody who perished after being accused of being a witch,” said Stewart. “There is no recognition that these people were killed for nothing.’’

“When you dig down it was a horrible, horrible time for ordinary folk, particularly women. The suffering was horrendous and we should recognise that wrong was done and remember them in a respectful way.”

She said a witch trail could link Torryburn with Culross, which was a centre of witch executions and is already attracting visitors after featuring in hit TV series Outlander.

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And so we arrive at the end of the article and get to the gist of this "drive" to recover Adie's remains and create a memorial for these women who were tortured and slaughtered:  TOURISM. MONEY.  Always profits over people. How disgusting.

Don't Think It Can't Happen Again...

From burning "witches" around the world (we had our own witch burnings in Salem, Massachusetts in the 1600s by so-called Protestant "Christians") to hunting down "albinos" in Africa to executing female rape victims for "bringing shame upon their family" in Muslim and other backward countries, to Nazism, McCarthyism and today's Tea Party marching arm in arm with religious fanatics, it's in a country near you!  If you think you're immune from persecution on the turn of a dime, you're a fool.

From Der Spiegel Online

12/16/2011   Burned for Spoiling Beer
Germany Rehabilitates Its Persecuted 'Witches'

By Kristen Allen

Tortured and burned at the stake by the tens of thousands, Germany's alleged witches have been largely forgotten. But thanks to efforts by a small group of activists, a number of German cities have begun absolving women, men and children who were wrongly accused of causing plagues, storms and bad harvests.

It began with the trial and execution of an eight-year-old girl for witchcraft in the spring of 1630. Compelled to name others involved in an alleged nighttime dance with the devil in the German town of Oberkirchen, young Christine Teipel's confession sparked a wave of fingerpointing and subsequent trials. Within just three months, 58 people, including 22 men and two children, were burned at the stake there.

The Oberkirchen trials represent just a small fraction of those that led to the execution of some 25,000 alleged witches between 1500 and 1782 in Germany. The country was a hotbed of persecution, says witch-trial expert Hartmut Hegeler, explaining that some 40 percent of the 60,000 witches who were tortured and killed in Europe during the infamous era were executed in what is now modern Germany. Hegeler, 65, a retired Protestant minister and college religion instructor in the western German town of Unna, is now working to rehabilitate these supposed witches city by city.

"We owe it to the victims to finally acknowledge that they died innocent back then," Hegeler told SPIEGEL ONLINE. "But this is not just about the past -- it's a signal against the violence and marginalization of people that goes on today."

It was mainly women who were targeted, although there were also a surprisingly high number of men as well as a few children like Oberkirchen's Christine Teipel. They were accused of not only cavorting with the devil, but also of causing insect plagues, bad weather, ruined harvests and even spoiling the production of beer.

Flood of Inquiries
"Of course there were no witches, these were all invented crimes," says Hegeler, who has written 17 books on Germany's witch trials. "But in hard times it was a good tool for local authorities to place the blame on others for famines and other problems. The witches were a wonderful scapegoat for whenever things went wrong."

In a time when many regions were fighting for political domination, historians believe that leaders also used the trials as an expression of power, he explains. And, contrary to common belief, it wasn't just the Catholic Church that encouraged witch hunts. The Protestant Church was behind a significant number of trials. "I was stunned to find this out when I first started my research," he says.

Hegeler's efforts, along with those of an informal "working group" of some 40 like-minded activists across the country, have led to what he calls a "snowball effect" in witch exonerations. Eight cities have officially absolved convicted witches of wrongdoing in the last several years, five in 2011 alone. Some seven other cities are also currently processing requests to do so. As word of witch exonerations spreads, Hegeler reports receiving a number of inquiries from concerned citizens hoping to clear the records of falsely accused witches from their own communities' books.

Recently he has been in contact with Green Party officials in the Rhineland town of Rheinbach, where they have reportedly proposed the rehabilitation of 130 witches who were burned at the stake in the area around 1631. The city plans to address the motion next week, according to regional daily Express. But no particular party claims ownership to the cause, and inquiries and support have come from officials across the German political spectrum, Hegeler says.

Early this month, Hegeler also filed a request with the city of Cologne to rehabilitate Katharina Henoth, who was strangled and burned at the stake there in 1627 for allegedly causing a plague of caterpillars at a monastery. He has also contacted the office of Cardinal Joachim Meisner, the archbishop of Cologne, in hopes that the Catholic Church too might make a public statement to acknowledge the unjust execution. While city and municipal courts were generally responsible for witch trials, church forces often spurred their progress, Hegeler says.

'Long Overdue'
But not every community welcomes such requests. In November, the western German city of Aachen rejected a request to vindicate a 13-year-old Sinti girl who was tried and killed in 1649.

"I was very disappointed with the politicians there. It wouldn't have cost them anything and would have given them even more credibility," Hegeler says, referring to the fact that the city awards the prestigious Charlemagne Prize each year for distinguished efforts toward European unification.

The city of Büdingen in the state of Hesse also told Hegeler they had more important issues at hand. According to him, the city may have feared upsetting an aristocratic family that allowed the witch trials to occur and still wields significant political clout there. "But most cities say this is long overdue," he adds.

Of all the witch trial cases he has researched, the case of Christine Teipel remains among the most personally moving for Hegeler. Still, he has filed no official request for her pardon. Discussions with Oberkirchen officials proved fruitless, he said, though the city does have a memorial to the victims.
"People don't want to talk about rehabilitation there," he says. "For some reason there are great reservations. They don't want to take the step of saying that those executed were innocent. At least not yet."

Enduring Belief in the Supernatural

Let's take a look at popular television shows on commercial (does not include Cable or Satellite television) today and in the not too distant past:

The Vampire Diaries
Once Upon a Time
Grimm
Supernatural
The Circle
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Beauty and the Beast (fairy tale - see Grimm and Once Upon a Time, above)

These are shows that came readily to mind; I'm sure there are lots more!

I am absolutely fascinated with the reality that today, more than ever, there are such shows being broadcast in prime-time.  All these shows - and we've got the Tea Party religious freaks trying to roll us back to the 18th century - pre French-Revolution!  I think to myself that this is just another form of "escapism" from today's really crappy world -- bad politics, bad economy, USA sinking into third world status, etc. etc. -- but - what the hell is really going on?  I mean - what does this mean? 

Minerva (online) has an interesting synopsis that probably dates to around Halloween (October 31, 2011), on witches -- it doesn't have a date on it, but I suppose it doesn't have to.  A disgraceful episode in American colonial history.  And, unfortunately, "witches" are still being hunted and killed today, all around the world.

The Witching Hour approaches

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Abundant textual evidence in the medieval and post-medieval period attests to the practice of witchcraft. Perhaps the most celebrated case is the Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692. Archaeological evidence pertaining to witchcraft is understandably thinner on the ground than historical testimony given its secretive practice. A recent discovery in Tuscany may alter this perspective.

Archaeologists have recently discovered the skeleton of a woman from the early 13th century at Piombino. The bones were associated with 13 nails apparently driven into the jaw of the deceased. Lack of material evidence indicates that the woman's body had not been interred in a coffin or wrapped in a burial shroud as was customary in the medieval period.

Alfonso Forgione, based at the University of L'Aquila who is directing the excavation, believes that the unfortunate individual was executed for practising withcraft. Other nails were found surrounding the skeleton that had been nailed into items of clothing and the unorthodox characteristics of the burial lead him to his conclusions: 'This indicates to me that it was an attempt to make sure the woman even though she was dead did not rise from the dead and unnerve the locals who were no doubt convinced she was a witch with evil powers.'

In 2009 a female skull was found near Venice with a stone driven into its mouth. Contemporary superstition implemented such a technique to prevent vampires rising from the grave. Forgione believes that the nails driven into the skull of the woman in Tuscany had a similar intent. Interestingly, another female skeleton was recovered from the same site in Venice surrounded by 17 dice – an unlucky number that was associated with death in medieval times. It is curious that the number 17 can be arranged to create the Latin 'VIXI', meaning literally 'I have lived', in other words, 'I am dead'.

A possible contention against Forgione's hypothesis is that the discoveries outlined above were interred in consecrated ground in churchyards. He refutes this by suggesting 'that perhaps both women came from influential families and were not peasant class and so because of their class and connections were able to secure burial in consecrated Christian ground'. Whatever the truth to this hypothesis it makes a chilling and topical story as we approach the witching hours of Halloween at the end of October. Mark Merrony

A Witch Burial?

I have doubts about the explanation for these burials. I am wondering if something other than "witchcraft" was at work in what sounds like ritualistic ways the three women were buried.

'Witch's graveyard' unearthed in Italy13:30 AEST Mon Sep 26 2011
By ninemsn staff
From news.ninemsn.com.au

Archaeologists have unearthed the skeletal remains of an 800-year-old woman with nails driven into her jaw in what could be a 'witch's graveyard' in Italy.

The bones found at Piombino, near Lucca in Tuscany, were surrounded by 13 nails, were not wrapped in any burial shroud and the woman was not buried in a coffin, Daily Mail reports.

The nails, driven into the woman's jaw, may have been placed there to prevent her from rising from the dead.

Two years ago a female skull was found near Venice with a stone driven through its mouth, which experts said was a traditional way of preventing vampires rising from the dead.

Another female body dug up at the site was surrounded by 17 dice — 17 is an unlucky number in Italy because of its association with death.

When 17 is written in Roman numerals the letters can be easily rearranged to make the Latin word vixi which means 'I have lived' and can be considered a euphemism for 'I am dead'.

Dice were also used in a game women were banned from playing 800 years ago. [What game?]

Alfonso Forgione, an archaeologist from L'Aquila University who is leading the dig, is convinced the women were killed for practicing witchcraft.

"She was buried in bare earth, not in a coffin and she had no shroud around her either, intriguingly other nails were hammered around her to pin down her clothes," Forgione said.

"This indicates to me that it was an attempt to make sure the woman even though she was dead did not rise from the dead and unnerve the locals who were no doubt convinced she was a witch with evil powers."

However, the archaeologist remains unable to explain why the women, if they were witches, were interred in hallowed ground, as the burial site is also the site of an ancient church.

"The only possible explanation is that perhaps both women came from influential families and were not peasant class and so because of their class and connections were able to secure burial in consecrated Christian ground," Forgione said.

Think Burning "Witches" Is a Thing of the Past?

Think again. Ohmygoddess! What a horrible, monstrous story. Report from ABC News.com Woman burnt at stake in PNG: reports Posted 8 minutes ago Updated 9 minutes ago A young Papua New Guinea woman was lashed naked to a pole and burnt to death in what authorities fear may be another sorcery killing in the jungle interior of the country, local media reported. Black magic is still practiced in the highlands of Papua New Guinea and women are often killed for having extra marital affairs, being accused of sorcery, or blamed for spreading HIV/AIDS. Witnesses told The Post Courier newspaper that the woman, aged between 16 and 20, was stripped, blindfolded, gagged and tied to a pole on Tuesday. "The girl was stripped naked and could not shout for assistance or resist as she was tightly strapped and her mouth gagged," witness Jessie James told the newspaper. Truck tyres and firewood were then placed around her, petrol poured over the tyres and wood and set alight, Mr James said. "I don't know the right words to describe it but it's barbaric. Can you find the best words to describe such acts that are rampant here?" highlands police chief Simon Kauba said. The Post Courier newspaper editorial condemned the killing, saying PNG's hysteria over sorcery was creating a climate similar to the 17th century witch trials in America. "If it is alleged she was a sorcerer, this is yet one more example of hysteria and superstition running rampant in parts of our country," the editorial said. "Sorcery is a most difficult crime to prove. "In the witchery trials of America, hundreds of years ago, hysteria took charge and terrible injustices were done. "People were burned at the stake. We are doing the same thing now. "How many of our young are afraid to go home because of these sorcery beliefs and vengeance practices? "Those who say she got primitive justice should pause to think, it could be you next on that truckload of burning tyres." - Reuters

The Witches' Pits of England

From The Times March 10, 2008 Mysterious pits shed light on forgotten witches of the West Simon de Bruxelles Evidence of pagan rituals involving swans and other birds in the Cornish countryside in the 17th century has been uncovered by archaeologists. Since 2003, 35 pits at the site in a valley near Truro have been excavated containing swan pelts, dead magpies, unhatched eggs, quartz pebbles, human hair, fingernails and part of an iron cauldron. The finds have been dated to the 1640s, a period of turmoil in England when Cromwellian Puritans destroyed any links to pre-Christian pagan England. It was also a period when witchcraft attracted the death sentence. Jacqui Woods, leading the excavations, has not traced any written or anecdotal evidence of the rituals, which would have involved a significant number of people over a long period. There are no records of similar practices anywhere else in the world. [Well - do you really think any of the participants would have written them down? Duh!] Ms Woods, an archaeologist who has advised on the discovery in 1991 of Europe’s oldest human mummy, the “Iceman”, in an Alpine glacier, has been digging at the site at Saveock Water for the past eight years. Saveock Water was, in the 17th century, a community of five houses whose occupants worked at a nearby mill. Human occupation of the site dates to prehistoric times but some of the activity uncovered was more recent. A stone-lined spring that may have been a “holy well” was full of offerings from the 17th century, including 125 strips of cloth from dresses, cherry stones and nail clippings. There was evidence that the well had been filled and the site destroyed to hide what went on there. Each of the feather pits, which are“ about 40cm square by 17cm deep (15 by 6in), have been carefully lined with the intact pelt of one swan and contain other bird remains. The pits where the contents were intact also contained a leaf parcel holding stones that experts have traced to Swanpool beach, 15 miles (24km) away, an area famed for its swan population. Ms Woods said: “Killing a swan would have been incredibly risky at this time because they are the property of the Crown.” There was a particularly macabre discovery in one of the feather pits: fifty-seven unhatched eggs ranging in size from a bantam to a duck. They were flanked by the bodies of two magpies, birds that have long been the subject of superstition in Cornish folklore. The organic remains survived because they were preserved in the water-logged ground. Although the shells of the eggs had dissolved, the membrane remained, revealing chicks shortly before they were due to hatch. Ms Woods said: “A lot of the paganism of the Celts was wiped out by the Romans, but not in Cornwall. “Swan feathers had a connection with fertility. It’s possible these offerings were being left. Then, if there was a conception, nine months later the person would return to empty the pit. “Often when secret rituals are abandoned people will talk about ‘things that were done in my grandmother’s day’ but there has been no whisper of this. It really makes me wonder whether that is because it is still going on.” Ms Wood will deliver a paper on the feather pits at the World Archaeology Conference in Dublin in June. Burnt, hanged and drowned — The pits were created in the 17th century when the law stated “thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” — Thousands of women, the vast majority innocent, were burnt, hanged or drowned — The first Witchcraft Act was passed in 1541 — In the mid-16th century, when it was believed that the plague was the work of sorcery, persecution of witches reached a frenzy The death penalty for witchcraft ended in 1735 — Last week the Scottish Parliament was asked to approve a pardon for the 4,000 people killed — The last person to be convicted was Jane Rebecca Yorke, a medium who was fined £5 in 1944 for claiming to be able to contact dead servicemen