Witches of Scotland - EPISODE 45 ASH WILLIAM MILLS ON ISOBEL GOWDIE

00:00:00.160 Hi, I'm Clare Mitchell QC. Welcome to the Witches of Scotland podcast.

00:00:05.240 I'm a lawyer who specialises in miscarriage of justice cases and we're bringing you this podcast

00:00:10.120 because we want to tell you about the women who were accused, prosecuted, convicted

00:00:15.240 and ultimately executed as witches in Scotland.

00:00:18.780 I'm Zoe Vendetotsi and I'm a writer who's always had an interest in the witches

00:00:22.780 and I feel that this dark mark against Scotland needs a reckoning.

00:00:26.500 The campaign Witches of Scotland wants three things.

00:00:29.600 Firstly, a pardon for all those convicted of witchcraft.

00:00:33.240 Secondly, an apology for all those who were accused as witches.

00:00:37.420 And finally, a national monument in recognition of all those who were affected by this terrible miscarriage of justice.

00:00:44.420 Over the forthcoming weeks, we'll be talking to a whole host of experts about the history and the modern day connections to the witches of Scotland.

00:00:55.640 Hello and welcome to the Witches of Scotland podcast.

00:00:58.620 i know i say this every week but my shock and surprise at this fact does not dissipate every

00:01:04.880 week in fact it grows we're now on episode 45 claire how is a six-part series growing to 45

00:01:12.260 parts i think the less we talk about it the less my brother will notice i think that ship may have

00:01:19.880 sailed poor david as we've mentioned before signed up to do well he didn't sign up he didn't

00:01:26.460 he was prevailed upon yeah but also i think to save your family honor he felt he had to get

00:01:33.180 involved because the sound was so terrible on our first we're gonna call it an episode but it wasn't

00:01:37.760 really an episode and uh and has been doing our sound recording ever since over all those months

00:01:43.580 and in fact now years so that has been up to 45 episodes that david has given his time up every

00:01:48.820 week as you know we don't have any budget we don't make any money from this whatsoever

00:01:53.300 so david has been doing it basically for gratis apart from anything that sells on our merch shop

00:01:58.540 so we really appreciate you buying merchandise because it just goes straight to david but we've

00:02:03.220 also had a cunning plan we see young people doing this on on the twitters of this the thing where

00:02:09.900 you can buy somebody a coffee and we've set that up so if you feel like buying david a coffee

00:02:15.640 you know he's very nice he's also available to do sound i don't want to sort of pimp him out

00:02:20.520 but he is now freelance doing this so if you do need sound recording done too have a look for

00:02:25.640 david but we'll put up links on our social so you if you feel like buying him a coffee for this

00:02:30.760 fantastic free well fantastic sounding mostly free podcast then you can buy him a coffee there

00:02:37.860 yeah that would be fantastic if you would like to do that now claire i was just thinking has

00:02:43.660 there been anything in the news that you'd like to talk about no okay good day madam

00:02:50.440 yeah we've been in the news zoe um what absolutely now we were the times podcast of the week and that

00:02:59.780 was really incredible and then as a result of that we were on the sunday times seasonal podcast the

00:03:07.380 podcast to listen to and it was actually really nice because i had a lot of kind of like spooky

00:03:12.100 podcasts you know for Halloween but then it said if you want some true life stories of the horror

00:03:18.300 of what happened to women so they weren't treating it as a joke it was really really nice to suggest

00:03:23.000 that people might go and find out more about it by listening to the podcast so as a result of that

00:03:28.320 we've got loads of new listeners so hello new listeners I hope you enjoy we also had a really

00:03:36.280 nice piece written in the observer it was a piece written by sally howard and it was about why the

00:03:42.960 witch hunt victims of early modern britain have come back to haunt us and it said the women killed

00:03:49.560 as witches centuries ago are starting to receive justice but let's not glamorize the murder of

00:03:55.060 innocence and it's a really really good and thoughtful piece on why we might want justice

00:04:00.720 for those victims then what happens away uh-huh is well this is quite exciting yeah then what

00:04:08.800 happened obviously as a result of some researcher reading the weekend papers we had a real flurry

00:04:17.680 of uk interest and ended up in the bbc radio for today's show in the morning then jeremy

00:04:26.300 Vine show contacted us and we're on that then BBC Five Live so it was brilliant to have the

00:04:32.000 opportunity to speak to so many people and to raise the profile of the petition and since then

00:04:37.640 so many new people have gotten contact so many people have joined the podcast and subscribed to

00:04:44.900 the podcast so that's brilliant so it means that we're having the opportunity to really let everybody

00:04:49.580 know about the story of the woman killed as witches. I think it really showed a kind of a

00:04:54.420 change in attitudes about it as well because even though you were on all those different things

00:04:59.180 there was only a tiny tiny like maybe two negative comments you know sort of along the lines of why 0.52

00:05:05.640 now what's the point you're rewriting history the usual sort of very slight niggles but the support 0.55

00:05:11.320 has been huge which is just really really nice to see that it's actually getting out there and 0.67

00:05:16.560 people are understanding about it yeah absolutely I think we were quite overwhelmed at the fact that

00:05:21.600 there wasn't any more negative comments that people seem to be taking it seriously they're

00:05:27.440 engaging with yeah understanding and recognizing the past especially now Claire that you are a

00:05:34.640 public figure you know that you're now that you're a celebrity you know that could have gone much

00:05:41.000 worse it could have been you know really tv star thinks she's cool you know but it wasn't like that

00:05:46.500 which was nice no i thought i was cool long before television zoe but now everybody else is aware of

00:05:53.080 it people probably don't know i'm not sure what crossover there is between the tv show and this

00:05:58.740 but zoe is referring to the fact that i am currently on channel 4's murder island as you

00:06:05.540 know i'm a qc and i deal with miscarriage of justice cases and i am the prosecutor on murder

00:06:11.160 island so it's giving us no end of marvelous opportunities say to it for for everybody i

00:06:17.240 think it's not just me saying this to claire everybody saying to claire where's the evidence

00:06:21.020 there's your evidence and a kind of voice quite exciting what we should have done if we've got

00:06:30.760 ourselves in gear zoe is got set up to do our true crime podcast at the same time so we could

00:06:37.220 talk about evidence but we're very busy ladies too many things going on too many things so under

00:06:43.380 the heading of things going on what else has been going on Claire that was so professional

00:06:49.240 well under the heading of what's going on I'm going to tell you what's going on Zoe

00:06:55.620 this week we're invited by Professor Nicola Ring we've spoken about her before and in fact we've

00:07:01.180 already recorded with her but that's not come out yet she's going to be in the podcast soon

00:07:05.920 Professor Nicola Ring contacted me when there was first publicity about the Witches of Scotland and said that she wanted to do research on women who were early healers and midwives and carers who, because of that job that they had, became involved in accusations of witchcraft.

00:07:27.000 So as you know, Zoe, they have completed a fantastic bit of research on this, using as a starting point the survey of Scottish witchcraft, but then going into much more detail by looking out the records and taking what they can from that.

00:07:40.880 So in order to kind of present it, we had an online seminar for students of nursing, midwifery and law about the research done in relation to folk healers and midwives accused of witchcraft for helping others.

00:07:53.460 It was a brilliant talk and I can't wait for the research to come out so everyone can read it.

00:07:58.600 We also heard from the lecturer Leslie Dodd. He spoke about the witch trials in the context of religion and his talk was fascinating and he's agreed to come on the show as well. So that's someone else we have to speak to.

00:08:13.500 so as soon as the work of Professor Ring and her colleagues become available we will show that

00:08:21.060 through social media so you can have a look at it Zoe that's not the only news what else was in the

00:08:27.920 news this week well while you were talking to all these national news outlets I also had a wee gig

00:08:34.620 during the week obviously I'm a teacher so when Claire's doing all these glamorous things I am

00:08:39.000 doing the glamorous job of educating the youth so I wasn't doing any of these nice things during

00:08:44.300 the week but it was still exciting but I did get invited along to talk at an event that the

00:08:49.860 Scottish Storytelling Centre had been putting on which is called the Talking Statues Project

00:08:54.800 and that was a really nice event actually where different storytellers came up and spoke about

00:09:00.700 statues that they would like to see happen about people that they think are significant from the

00:09:06.220 past and I think some of them are contemporary too so it ranged from people like Billy Connolly

00:09:11.380 to people that had opened the first gay bookshop in Edinburgh to women in the past that had been

00:09:17.200 involved in in politics in different ways and we were asked to come on and talk about the Witches

00:09:22.500 of Scotland campaign so that was nice to share to a different audience as well and definitely within

00:09:26.800 the context of what really why do we have statues what's the point of them what can they be for and

00:09:32.920 who can they mark so that was really nice to have that conversation as well I know I'm always talking

00:09:37.540 about how we need more statues to women that's absolutely crucial but when you said Billy Conley

00:09:42.260 I was like yeah I would kind of like a statue to Billy Conley yeah no it was quite nice actually

00:09:46.800 because the lady that spoke about it was you know he has he has a big part of Scottish culture for

00:09:51.540 many people you know and it's probably more representative than than politicians you know

00:09:55.780 for example so I think I think that was quite a lovely idea actually yeah Zoe we have one final

00:10:02.200 bit of news in fact the news is getting so big it might actually overshadow everything else

00:10:06.740 next week we'll have no news i'll be like do you have any news no right moving on move on so the

00:10:12.340 other news and it's really quite significant news is that the minor strike pardons scotland bill

00:10:17.860 is being considered by the parliament it follows an independent review into the impact of policing

00:10:23.620 on scottish communities during the minor strike the review was led by john scott qc and it

00:10:30.700 recommends that the Scottish Government introduce legislation to pardon minors convicted of certain

00:10:36.220 offences. Now what's important about this is it's once again the Scottish Government using

00:10:40.640 legislation in respect of a pardon but it goes further than that. The proposed legislation is

00:10:46.700 collective, it's to be given to everyone and it's also specifically to apply posthumously. So we

00:10:53.860 have their precedent for the idea it's both collective and posthumous and that's what we're

00:10:57.820 wanting, obviously, for those killed as witches. I mean, if that's in place, how could anybody

00:11:03.200 argue against asking for the witches to be pardoned? They can't. There's no jurisprudential

00:11:09.720 reason why, if they can't make a collective and posthumous pardon for the minors, they can't make

00:11:17.680 a collective and posthumous pardon for any other group of people. So it's great to have that recent

00:11:23.040 precedent that we can see and also it's great to actually look at the legislation to see how they

00:11:30.040 did it because one of the things about the earlier pardon in relation to same-sex sexual

00:11:37.220 offences as they were at the time was required people to opt in and apply for it now obviously

00:11:44.020 people who were killed as witches cannot apply for a pardon or cannot apply to be part of the scheme

00:11:49.220 but the minor strike was collective you've got it anyway you don't need to apply for it

00:11:54.700 and that is one of the sort of technical issues about how you give pardons to people who haven't

00:11:59.840 applied for it it's just it's being considered just now the legislation's in place and fingers

00:12:05.880 crossed that bill gets passed and is made law for those that were convicted of those offences.

00:12:10.500 The Justice Minister Keith Brown said a collective pardon will restore dignity to those convicted

00:12:16.260 provide comfort to their families and I hope will bring closure to the sense of injustice

00:12:22.240 members of the mining community may feel and that's of course he's referring to those that

00:12:27.620 are still with us. What was also discussed was it was said that there was an intention to provide

00:12:33.040 a collective symbolic pardon which recognised the disproportionate consequences suffered by many

00:12:39.860 miners because of their participation in the strike and again the Scottish government response

00:12:44.680 to our petition was to accept that the Witchcraft Act was discriminatory and people suffered

00:12:51.160 disproportionate consequences so again the same language has been used. The Scottish Government

00:12:56.960 in its response to our petition has already accepted and I quote there are clear similarities

00:13:03.000 between the injustices of those convicted in a discriminatory manner for same-sex sexual activity

00:13:08.800 and the injustices of women classed as witches many centuries ago,

00:13:12.760 which could justify legislative steps being taken in this area.

00:13:18.000 That's really positive.

00:13:19.380 That's a good note to end the news on.

00:13:21.820 Thanks for your news round.

00:13:23.380 We're shuffling papers now, listeners.

00:13:26.040 At the desk.

00:13:26.900 I'm just going to drink from my TVAM teacup.

00:13:30.120 I don't have the TVAM teacup.

00:13:31.420 The Witches of Scotland teacup.

00:13:33.060 I have actually got my Witches of Scotland teacup.

00:13:34.760 So have I.

00:13:37.880 Right.

00:13:38.800 it makes the tea taste better brackets for legal purposes it doesn't make the tea taste better

00:13:44.000 makes you feel good while you're drinking your tea though so thanks for the news so we'll move

00:13:48.700 on now to our next section which is the women not witches and claire in your research this week

00:13:55.180 you've been looking up references particularly to halloween yeah i looked up references to

00:13:59.520 halloween and as you might expect because these people weren't witches and didn't have connections

00:14:04.540 to halloween there really weren't that many but halloween doesn't appear to be the festival

00:14:10.200 then that it obviously was now references are made to halloween on a number of occasions but

00:14:16.840 most of the festivals that things are based around are like samooine and the solstice those kind of

00:14:24.080 appear to be more important in diaries but there are some references to halloween sadly whilst

00:14:30.960 there is some information on the references to Halloween, the detail in relation to the women

00:14:36.960 is very, very scant. So I'll begin with Janet Bowman. We know that she went to trial in 1572

00:14:44.240 and that's really all we know about her except the allegations made against her. It was said she used

00:14:50.280 a shirt for diagnosis, like somebody's shirt she would be able to try and diagnose the person

00:14:56.260 with what illness they had as a result of that she said that she brought the shirt to an elvish

00:15:02.260 well and she charged the spirit in the name of the father the son king arthur and queen elspeth

00:15:09.240 to remove the illness or take the sick man to them so basically calling upon the spirits to

00:15:17.160 remove the illness by using in place of the person their shirt she said that she couldn't do a cure

00:15:22.880 because it was past Halloween, so presumably in some way the theory was that after Halloween

00:15:29.540 cures could not be done. It was said that she predicted the death of an infant because she got

00:15:34.420 a blast of evil wind and that she learned her curing from a woman in the Potter Row who had

00:15:40.580 once cured her. She started her prayer with blessed Benedicti. After she washed her hands

00:15:47.440 at a holy well in St Leonard's, there came to her a man of our good neighbours. She predicted that

00:15:55.060 the regent would die. She bore five bairns while subject to the fairy for seven years and felt no

00:16:02.080 pain. So those are allegations that were made against her and in part confession. We see there

00:16:08.420 an Edinburgh woman who it's said was trying to cure people and unfortunately became involved in

00:16:15.200 these witchcraft accusations we don't know whether or not she beat the rap of being accused of a

00:16:22.160 witch or whether or not she was killed. Zoe is there anyone else? Yeah Isabel Sinclair she had

00:16:29.140 a trial in 1633 in Orkney and she was accused of using rituals for protecting cattle at Halloween 1.00

00:16:36.340 using linen cloth and the hair of the beast. It says she was with the fairy much like Janet Bowman

00:16:42.380 and they gave her second sight to know if any fae body are in the house and that's all the 0.97

00:16:47.240 information that there was for her. And lastly another Jonnet, Jonnet Forsyth, we know her trial

00:16:53.520 took place on the 11th of November 1629 and it was said the allegation against her was that she

00:16:59.660 helped to save a sheep so what she was trying to do was cure that sheep. In order to save his sheep

00:17:05.760 the man was advised by Jonnet to sprinkle drops of blood over one of the sheep by a fire on

00:17:12.300 Halloween. So that is what she was said to have done which got her accused of witchcraft. Sadly

00:17:20.060 we don't know the outcome of that case. So three women that we remember not as witches but as women

00:17:26.260 Janet Bowman, Isabel Sinclair and Jonnet Forsyth.

00:17:35.760 so our guest today is ash william mills and he's going to be talking about his book the black book

00:17:45.420 of isabel gaudy and other spells and charms so i'll tell you a little bit about ash he has a

00:17:51.680 degree in celtic studies and heritage and is currently studying scottish ethnology and history

00:17:57.080 at the university of edinburgh he's an animist and folk magic practitioner with over 25 years

00:18:02.740 of experience regarding Scottish and Irish folklore, witchcraft and magic. In his spare time

00:18:08.200 he commissions and sells items associated with Scottish mythology, folk magic and witchcraft

00:18:13.300 and other strange and magical curios. So I'll tell you a little bit about the book so you have

00:18:18.400 an understanding of it overall. So The Black Book of Isabel Gowdy and Other Spells and Charms

00:18:23.040 about Britain's most notorious accused witch Isabel Gowdy. She gave such a wealth of information

00:18:29.180 regarding magical practices during her confessions that it would have been worthy of a black book or

00:18:34.100 Svartkunst book as found recently by her Scandinavian neighbours. In this book, Ash has

00:18:39.620 compiled together and translated the charms, spells and magical operations of Isabel Gowdy

00:18:44.320 as were relayed in her confessions in such a way that it's applicable and operational to the modern

00:18:49.620 folk magic practitioner with additional notes to some of the charms tried and tested by the author.

00:18:55.060 The book also includes the spells and charms from other cunning folk in Scotland accused

00:18:58.820 as witches under the Witchcraft Act during the early modern period or recorded by early

00:19:03.860 folklorists from the 18th century to the present day.

00:19:15.880 Hi, I am absolutely delighted to be welcoming to the podcast today somebody who has recently

00:19:22.820 published a book and I think is going to be of great interest to our listeners and that

00:19:27.840 is Ash William Mills who's going to talk to us today about his book The Black Book of Isabel

00:19:33.520 Gowdy and Other Scottish Spells and Charms. Hi Ash, welcome to the podcast. Hi, thank you for

00:19:39.660 having me. I've been quite excited to be on the show. Great, we're delighted to meet you. Could

00:19:44.840 you tell us first of all a wee bit about yourself and your background and what it was that led you

00:19:50.120 to write this book? Right, okay then. It's quite a broad question but yeah, I'll try my best.

00:19:56.840 Don't feel you have to give away anything too personal.

00:19:59.400 You can be as vague as you like.

00:20:01.520 No, no, that's fine.

00:20:02.580 I think I suppose I've got a staff as sort of the professional side

00:20:06.480 is that I'm a student at the University of Edinburgh.

00:20:11.080 I previously, before I went to Edinburgh,

00:20:13.360 did an NC course in Celtic studies

00:20:15.700 and I'm currently doing a course which is Scottish history and ethnology.

00:20:20.780 So it's Scottish history from the period of like medieval to like present day

00:20:25.360 and an ethnology in the the study of belief systems like so what comes into sort of folklore

00:20:31.800 but more into um what people believe and and then it goes into quite a scientific thing of

00:20:38.180 how people believe these folk tales and whatnot me on a personal basis i am uh what you class

00:20:44.280 is an animist i am a folk magic practitioner as you've seen what in my book i try to blend in

00:20:51.300 both the academic side into the practical side so it appeals to both the historian and practitioner

00:20:58.960 and yeah so folklore and folk beliefs is something that I've been interested in over like 25 years

00:21:05.220 now I believe I was 12 13 when I started getting into mythology and witches and folk beliefs it's

00:21:13.620 always been an interest of mine since a younger age that sort of root of history so there's an

00:21:18.700 interesting sort of origin story of how it was that you came to be writing specifically about

00:21:24.240 Isabel Gowdy that you mentioned in the introduction to your book yeah so the book itself has been a

00:21:29.760 process of like two years I have other books in the process well but like I go back and forth

00:21:34.900 when I have ideas and this was coming to completion it was originally just going to be a book a simple

00:21:39.620 book of Spouse and Charms from like a historical context from Scotland at the time like I already

00:21:45.480 had a quite a large section on Isabel Godi and transcribing all her magical content that she's

00:21:51.660 relayed in her confessions into a chapter and then I had like a dream I won't go into into big detail

00:21:59.960 because it's quite a personal dream where she appeared to me and I was like this has to like

00:22:06.460 then the penny dropped and I was like this has to be dedicated to her like she already has a large

00:22:11.540 section as it is and i was already interested in ideas of like you know the the black book you know

00:22:18.180 because within legend and within fact factual history there's always that talk of the black

00:22:23.680 book and the black book is like um you know in legend it's the book that was given to you by the

00:22:28.080 devil in south and contains all the spells and charms that you need to operate in which but also

00:22:33.400 like within recent years like we we used to think this was part of legend but it was only until

00:22:38.000 recently is that these books are starting to peer out people's personal libraries like in attics

00:22:43.380 where you know now it's not just legend these handwritten books are magical recipes a lot of

00:22:49.520 them were just like you know simple and herbal remedies but you know herbal remedies half like

00:22:54.740 sort of magical content so yeah so that's how it came to be and then sort of following up to the

00:23:00.040 book I did like a wee event on Instagram where because it just so happened when I had the dream

00:23:05.620 that it was coming to her the anniversary of her last confession which I found was quite um yeah

00:23:11.400 quite bizarre um so I was like I have to do some kind of like honouring of her because we don't

00:23:17.200 know when she died we don't know her birthday there's very little we know about her personal

00:23:21.040 life so I was like well you know I'll get together this event online and and sort of honour her

00:23:25.980 spirit that the person she is and to honour all those people that have met the same fate as

00:23:31.320 that was great i had a few people sort of performers like singing and and then playing

00:23:37.140 instruments and and poetry so it was a really good night and then it just led on from there

00:23:42.260 to sort of the book sort of transformed itself it sort of took a life of its own and and from there

00:23:48.940 it's become what it is now today so because there's there's a big appetite for this particular

00:23:53.980 area isn't there there's a growing interest and we've had some guests on in the past that work

00:23:58.520 within that area so like the poet and which alice tarbuck she came on and talked about her book

00:24:04.060 about moving through the year and different sort of natural connections that she makes

00:24:08.280 i'm really fascinated by the structure of your book so for people that are going to obviously

00:24:13.540 they'll go and search out after this and they'll be bought and it's thousands but they're they'll

00:24:17.580 have a look at how it's structured so could you maybe break that down a wee bit because obviously

00:24:22.100 there's isabel guided but there's a lot more to the book as well yeah so because like i said when

00:24:26.740 originally wrote um started writing it and it was coming to completion it was just going to be a

00:24:31.540 simple book and spells and charms so it starts with a chapter of obviously talking about content

00:24:37.320 about isabel's gody's life you know the history of black books and magical content in general and

00:24:43.440 then it goes into like i've constructed quite a large chapter which to make it look like as what

00:24:49.240 you would see from a black book so basically deciphered all the magical content from her

00:24:54.720 confessions and structured it into kind of like if you're reading a black book that would have

00:24:59.040 been found in an attic or in someone's personal library and how it would have looked I mean

00:25:03.780 essentially I think you know she ideally I don't think she would have had be literate like she'd

00:25:09.800 be a literate so I don't think she would have had like a black book but I'm presenting to the reader

00:25:15.000 like if she had one with the magical repertoire that she had this is what it would look like

00:25:20.380 this would be tried and and experiments that she's done herself comments you know just what

00:25:26.760 you see in most black books today you know that they're not just like recipes there's people that

00:25:31.020 they've been they've been tried and tested there's comments about it and then I go into content about

00:25:35.600 like um there's a part where it's called the spells and charms of the accused I mean it's

00:25:40.180 really hard when you sift through the whole um witch trials of women Scotland or even within

00:25:44.680 Europe you'll see generic stuff and you think yes this is an innocent person they're probably not

00:25:49.980 a magical practitioner at all but then on the other occasion you'll see you know content where

00:25:55.780 it's like people are talking about charms so it's it's not like it's not it's going off the narrative

00:26:01.080 and they're certainly like well tell me about this what's this like well this charm is used

00:26:05.640 for broken bones or a lot so these are like basically cunning foe or what in scotland wise

00:26:12.060 men wise women that were being convicted under the witchcraft acts because in scotland and england

00:26:19.100 they had very different ways like so in in scotland there wasn't no like definition

00:26:25.940 as such of what is beneficial magic and what is maleficial like so harmful magic whereas in

00:26:33.800 england you wouldn't get convicted as much as being a cunning man because you'd probably get

00:26:39.980 a fine or being a pillory like very like it wouldn't be as supreme as death um because they

00:26:45.900 had very distinctions of what is beneficial magic and what is harmful magic it's sad in a way but

00:26:51.860 also we have more content of cutting folk because of that distinction not being there so we have a

00:26:58.200 lot of context and information of cutting folk working in scotland and then the rest is like

00:27:03.640 it's spells and charms that are collected by the early folklorists of like you know the 20th 19th

00:27:10.340 18th centuries because it's the era of like romanticism and the Celtic revivals coming

00:27:16.720 on along the way quite you know growing quite fast so these folklorists are taken upon themselves to

00:27:22.300 go within like rural villages and collecting content of like stories remedies incantations

00:27:29.280 spells and and from people like cunning folk so the rest of the book is content recording from

00:27:35.840 like the Victorian era I really really enjoyed looking at some of the spells in particular as

00:27:41.020 a lawyer going into court there are a few spells or charms about trying to get yourself a successful

00:27:47.480 outcome and going to stuff like that so there are really interesting ones and we will come to look

00:27:53.500 at them a wee bit later what's so interesting about what you say is that the difference between

00:27:58.680 charmers and people that were involved in witchcraft in Scotland seemed to blur because

00:28:05.160 originally the Witchcraft Act was only supposed to be people who were in cahoots with the devil

00:28:11.860 but what appeared to happen was because they were looking for witches everywhere because we were in

00:28:16.780 the middle of this reformation we were looking for a godly state James V thought the devil was

00:28:22.100 amongst everyone everyone was looking for the devils some people who would have been cunning

00:28:26.800 folk who would have been charmers who would have been doing spells completely separate from devil

00:28:33.300 worshipping or being in cahoots with the devil or having given up their life to the devil and

00:28:38.700 renounced their baptism and all those things they were brought in questioned kept awake for hours

00:28:45.820 usually not tortured sleep deprivation repeatedly asked about the devil and then they would start

00:28:51.780 talking about the devil because they were being asked about it they'd be delirious they would

00:28:57.320 know what their captors wanted in order to stop them torturing them and it appears that people

00:29:02.760 who were otherwise charmers and it might have well have been that Isabel Gowdy was one of these

00:29:08.700 people who had her charms but wasn't in cahoots with the devil then started talking about being

00:29:15.140 in cahoots with the devil and gave us these sorts of confession which were interwoven with parts of

00:29:20.620 her own beliefs about charms and things like that and the devil together and then we have these

00:29:27.040 very colourful confessions.

00:29:29.940 I wonder if you could tell us a wee bit on that basis

00:29:33.600 about what Isabel was,

00:29:35.800 what we know about Isabel herself as a woman.

00:29:38.240 Is it very much?

00:29:39.460 Like I said, as for her personal life,

00:29:41.440 we know very little.

00:29:42.700 We don't know if she had children.

00:29:44.260 She most likely would have.

00:29:45.600 We knew she was married to John Gilbert.

00:29:47.240 We knew that it was from a farming community.

00:29:50.780 We knew that her husband was in the cattle trade

00:29:54.240 because she talks about her charm

00:29:55.360 about selling commodities and selling beef at the market to get a good price so yeah so I've

00:30:01.220 talked a bit about the definitions of magical specialists on my Instagram basically there's

00:30:06.920 definitions so you could either be a charmer or a wise person a charmer is someone that only has

00:30:12.520 like limited abilities within the magical world so a charmer normally was like oh I only charm

00:30:18.380 warts well that person charms snake bites you know adobites or um that person does this so a

00:30:25.440 charm is somebody who only has like a small repertoire of gifts or charms within them that's

00:30:31.900 passed on through them mostly they'd be people like oh they're from the sixth son or the sixth

00:30:36.300 daughter of a seventh daughter of the seventh daughter or so on what so forth i believe is

00:30:41.960 about godi to be a wise woman simple to the fact you yes you see a lot of healing material

00:30:48.940 or you would see from the charmer but what separates her from the most is because you see

00:30:53.840 other content put aside the devil bit like we'll put that aside for now and then explain that you

00:30:59.600 see stuff like to sell commodities that takes for now from the realms of the charm and now he puts

00:31:04.280 her in this position of being a wise woman because a wise woman would work on quite a wild field of 0.98

00:31:11.320 magical repertoire they put their hands in different bowls basically they put hands to

00:31:15.700 many things so I believe her to be a wise woman I believe that she wouldn't have referred to

00:31:22.140 as being a witch or doing I'm not to say that she didn't do harmful magic because sometimes when we

00:31:29.780 talk about um cunning folk a lot of historians like to you know sort of shy away from that

00:31:34.400 because they counteract witch's spells that's what um a cunning folk do or wise person does

00:31:40.580 if it's an illness you can't explain it is witchcraft so therefore you can counteract the

00:31:45.760 witch's spell so yes of course i don't think she would have called class of a witch i don't think

00:31:50.760 she was doing any kind of devil worshiping however we do have like which is not in the

00:31:55.520 same line of witchcraft but we have evidence of other material where you're using the image of

00:32:02.440 the devil to place in your enemy's hands so you're still being a good christian and you still

00:32:09.000 christian values you're not a satian worshipper or devil worshipper however if someone you find

00:32:14.440 is doing bad against you then obviously they're the works of the devil so then you place them in

00:32:20.000 the works the hands of the devil to be punished so you see charm somewhere like like i give an

00:32:25.740 example from the black books of albium where you know to punish a drifter it's going devil devil

00:32:32.320 take this drifter like so you're placing you're you're not using god to punish them you're using

00:32:37.700 the devil to punish them and you're placing them in the hands of the devil but it doesn't mean that 0.97

00:32:41.840 you're just a worshiper you're actually better christian because you're like that person do

00:32:46.140 wrong things so i'm putting them into the devil to be punished if you does that make sense like

00:32:51.380 so i believe that maybe she would have on the odd occasion you know come across someone who

00:32:57.400 had conflict or um enemies or not enemies but people that disliked her or she disliked them

00:33:03.720 that occasionally the odd curse that the curse can come in form if a spoken thing 0.55

00:33:09.320 uh would have come from her mouth but was she a witch i doubt it was she a devil worship very much

00:33:15.960 not like no um however i do believe the strong influence to show that we've heard knowledge of

00:33:23.140 like local folklore around it,

00:33:25.220 like the king and queen of the fae,

00:33:27.360 like the charms that outgrow,

00:33:29.260 like the healing charms. 0.98

00:33:31.160 It comes into a category of what a typical wise woman 0.86

00:33:34.140 at the Highlands would have been.

00:33:35.660 Yeah, that's my analogy. 0.50

00:33:37.020 Like that's how I see what kind of character she is.

00:33:40.900 And it would make sense because her confessions,

00:33:45.860 I'm always putting them in inverted commas,

00:33:47.760 which is not helpful in the public one,

00:33:49.460 but her confessions,

00:33:50.580 which were taken from her probably under some kind of stress or duress were very detailed

00:33:58.000 and a way that they would have been detailed was of course having the stuff that she did know about

00:34:04.060 as a wise woman interlacing with the stories that they were telling her about the devil because in

00:34:11.120 asking their questions they will say did you meet with the devil how many times would you meet with

00:34:15.900 the devil how many times who would you meet with the devil who would until eventually you know that

00:34:21.180 they want you to say I met with the devil I renounced my Christianity we met on these 0.81

00:34:26.780 occasions we had sex with the devil she spoke in the most detailed and evocative terms but it also

00:34:32.560 seems she was a fairly gifted storyteller had a good imagination because she was able to describe

00:34:39.820 in greater detail

00:34:41.840 or people wrote down in greater detail

00:34:44.020 a lot of things that she

00:34:45.600 described. Her view of having sex

00:34:47.620 with the devil in particular. Yeah, like he was 0.99

00:34:49.700 cold as well.

00:34:51.120 But then that's echoed with the 0.99

00:34:53.400 other women, which makes me think

00:34:55.800 that maybe it's the same man that wrote down

00:34:57.680 both her confessions, isn't it? Is it not?

00:34:59.720 Or have I misread that? Is it John?

00:35:02.080 John Forbes,

00:35:03.720 I think it was. We should say there was

00:35:05.660 another woman tried with Isabel Gowdy.

00:35:08.240 Yes, yes. 0.75

00:35:09.340 yes and both the women say that the same description of what sex with the devil was

00:35:16.080 like and they use the same very particular description which i mean maybe that just

00:35:21.620 was the description for cold liquid in those times in that place maybe that's not such a

00:35:26.300 weird coincidence but the fact they both said the same thing makes me feel that there's some

00:35:31.540 editorializing coming from the person that was writing down the confessions because we've talked

00:35:36.760 before about the hand on the head the hand on the foot and about how the same phrase is often

00:35:42.000 echoed in locations so i mean you can't help but think well how much of that is the man that was

00:35:48.100 writing down the confessions adding his own input so to speak to it oh i like i think i remember

00:35:54.840 what hearing one of your podcasts and you're saying about this constant subject of leading

00:35:59.760 the witness and it's pretty much it so it's like before the evidence presented you're assuming that

00:36:05.980 this is happening and you're questioning the person and that's essentially what's happening

00:36:09.960 so you're trying to lead the witness into the narrative that you want absolutely the question

00:36:15.700 would have gone this way if you've already got a statement from isabel gaudy and you've asked him

00:36:20.680 what temperature was the skin of the devil and the person would say it was hot and you're thinking

00:36:27.700 no no that doesn't fit we need the devil's skin to be cold yeah yeah really okay right are you

00:36:34.960 sure it wasn't cold and we say no no I think it was hot and then they'd come back an hour later

00:36:39.660 and say what temperature was the skin of the devil um I think it was hot oh okay wasn't it

00:36:46.360 cold would the devil not be cold to the touch with the person would ask and then they would

00:36:51.160 ask two hours later what temperature would the devil's skin be and lo and behold the answer now

00:36:55.700 is I think it was cold yeah it was really good yeah and then he'd be nodding you know and then

00:37:00.780 that would be recorded not previously exactly so although it's like the way there were phrasing

00:37:06.820 things was written different the way it was written so you'll be like did you have sex the 0.71

00:37:11.160 devil yes i did i had sex the devil in such and such time like so you'll be like i mean i explained 0.86

00:37:16.660 in an example in the book where how she would be interrogated so and how it would be relayed in

00:37:22.160 confessions because when you read the confessions it pretty much sounds like that like it's coming

00:37:26.960 from her mouth and and obviously it is but it's been interpreted very differently so they're 0.77

00:37:32.880 saying to her like did you have sex with the devil what was the devil like when did you have 0.99

00:37:37.800 sex to the devil and she's saying yes she's replying but then it's written down as as if 0.99

00:37:42.640 she's speaking it so i had sex the devil in such such time the devil's skin was like this 0.98

00:37:47.040 so it's it's interpreted like the context is interpreted very different to what she's actually

00:37:53.100 saying being asked so it's and you see this very typical throughout europe this type of

00:37:59.280 extracting confessions and we say confessions uh which another thing you point on is yes it's

00:38:05.280 it she said of her own free will without use to torture yes that's fine but they're not talking

00:38:12.200 about the interrogation methods that are involved in like sleep deprivation hunger poor conditions

00:38:17.940 like to the point where i think you just wanted to die like you wanted to be released from this

00:38:23.840 this this it is former torture whether you're actually physically using torture instruments

00:38:30.400 that is still torture and we know that today you know sleep deprivation of poor conditions

00:38:35.120 it's abuse absolutely so i think a lot of these in many of these cases you you just wanted it

00:38:40.960 over and done with and you would just you would say yes to anything and go along with any narrative

00:38:45.840 that they want to force on you and I think that's what happened in her case as well but what we do

00:38:51.340 have from it and what your book has managed to eke out is part of the stuff that she was saying

00:38:57.660 may have been things that she would have used as a wise word and spells and as I say I really

00:39:03.200 enjoyed going through the various different folklore spells not just from Isabel Gowdy but

00:39:09.000 from elsewhere do you have any spells in particular or charms in particular that you like

00:39:15.760 from the book I like the ones involving water so the for spoken waters so it's when you are saying

00:39:23.680 a water so you've been affected by the evil eye and it's caused illness so there's a whole ritual

00:39:29.160 about that with for but for spoken waters and woodson sprinkled upon this water like you are

00:39:35.820 magically relieved of that illness there's other ones like the grand right of it on bewitching

00:39:40.840 because there's the whole right to it of getting nettles and then ranging the nettles into a circle

00:39:46.620 and and whatnot but I suppose my most favorite is brunt stones what I talk about in the divination

00:39:53.320 part and it's the use of like three stones that it is a divination right but also it has security

00:39:59.660 of powers as well and it's used in different types like so mostly it's like what spirit

00:40:05.040 caused you illness was it the hill spirit was the water spirit was it the you know the grave spirit

00:40:10.820 like the kirk spirit and determines oh it's the the hill spirit so that you return to your local hill

00:40:16.640 and you'll be washed with the water from the stones and therefore like the enchantment put

00:40:22.200 upon you by that spirit is returned back to them and also this it's used as like other things so

00:40:27.340 like where is the illness at so you'd have stones like the heart the belly the brain and then so

00:40:33.800 whatever hissed in the water from heating up these stones put them in the the body water would you

00:40:39.560 know what the illness came from so if it was like the heart stone oh well that's where the illness

00:40:44.960 lies because there's bubbling going on this noise going from that stone so that's always been

00:40:50.260 curious and that appears in quite a few times within both confessions and folkloric material

00:40:56.440 of the 19th century so that is one of my favorites but in general like I love them all like I'm so

00:41:03.900 glad that you brought up the stones because I read the stones as well and was smiling when I read it

00:41:08.680 because recently I went to a spa and they did hot stone treatments on the body and they said oh

00:41:14.900 where in your body are you sore oh yeah where do you keep your stress at the top of your shoulders

00:41:19.660 etc and then they went about putting the hot stones on where where was sore on you and I thought

00:41:25.880 okay well it's a massage it is a different thing of course they're massaging you with the hot

00:41:30.440 stones I thought but there were similarities you know that even in the 21st century you can go

00:41:35.400 somewhere and people will be trying to cure your ailments by the use of hot stones not using it in

00:41:41.840 the same way but I thought how funny that that's come through the centuries no definitely like I

00:41:46.880 think we have a lot of European links you know with immigration and like being in contact with

00:41:53.320 different cultures we're swapping we're sharing practices we're sharing beliefs and you know

00:42:00.200 religion that's going amongst like the people that are importing things to the country the 0.99

00:42:05.180 working class is making that fusion that beautiful fusion of culture that we call Scotland today like 0.72

00:42:12.080 people like to say it's a Celtic country and and in part yes but also you know the Scandinavian

00:42:18.460 roots there there's you know there's anglo roots there's far back as like welsh britannic roots

00:42:24.380 you know like so they all contribute to this beautiful cauldron of culture and folk material

00:42:31.420 so like when you're talking about the um the hot stones now we know that he applied to certain

00:42:37.400 muscle releases tension but then where they first you know in the early modern period where people

00:42:43.400 were using hot stones who've been parts of like eastern culture you know that's seen as magic

00:42:47.560 that is because only until the age of enlightenment we lived in a magical world so if you had an

00:42:54.700 illness you could not put down to um then it's something to do with spirits it's something to do

00:43:00.160 with fairies it's something to do with witches so then you now have to determine within the magical

00:43:05.740 realms who has placed this illness on you and we live and also things like things that we do today 0.94

00:43:11.640 that we take for granted like throwing salt over our shoulder blowing out birthday candles these

00:43:17.120 are remnants of our ancestors before the age of the enlightenment where we did live in a magical

00:43:23.500 world there was spirits about there was witches out to get you and cause chaos and destruction

00:43:30.460 so you needed war you need protection you need a lot of these magical repertoire to keep your

00:43:37.280 family safe especially if you're a working class person because you know crops could fail easily 0.98

00:43:43.380 and that's your that's you've done for the whole year that could be enough to to kill your family

00:43:48.020 because it's your source of income it's your source of food like now like we live in a very

00:43:53.460 different world and we should be very blessed and thankful because that then you know you did live

00:43:58.880 on the edge you know the scales could tip each way you know if you weren't careful and that's

00:44:04.940 why we did mostly resort to magic and coin photo because of these reasons well ash it's been really

00:44:12.600 fascinating speaking to you and i know you mentioned at the beginning there that you're

00:44:16.160 always working on several books so we'll look forward to your next book no pressure because

00:44:20.340 you've only just released this one i know i'm going to see how this goes for now but so it's

00:44:24.460 so fascinating and i would say to anybody that hasn't looked at any of the links yet we'll put

00:44:28.960 the links up the book is totally fascinating for an insight into isabel gaudy for an insight into

00:44:34.500 the world of magic for where people's philosophies were at that time to get a greater understanding

00:44:39.960 of why things happened and why they played out the way they did and also with some guidance that

00:44:44.580 people would certainly find helpful today and we know that this is a growing area of interest we've

00:44:48.960 certainly had lots of listeners who are like yourself are practitioners so I think this book's

00:44:55.220 got something in it for everybody it's absolutely fantastic and would really recommend people to

00:44:59.340 buy it and to read it it's ace yeah thank you really enjoyed it thanks so much for your time

00:45:03.980 no and thank you for your time thanks for inviting me on I've really enjoyed it any chance to speak

00:45:09.280 about the subject and I'm right there well thanks so much and like we said we'll put the links up

00:45:15.420 so people can go and find your work and interact with you in your different places too because

00:45:19.280 you're active on Facebook I think as well as Instagram aren't you yes yeah so people can

00:45:23.320 have a chat with you there and probably ask you millions of questions no I'm always willing to

00:45:28.280 answer people's questions I enjoy it brilliant well thanks for joining us yes take care

00:45:39.280 thanks so much for joining us again this week and as sally howard wrote in her article that

00:45:48.140 was out last weekend if you're heading out trick-or-treating this week with your bism

00:45:52.200 and pointy hat spare a thought for lilius and the tens of thousands of unnamed like her

00:45:56.960 and if you cast a spell make this your demand of the spirits the one day lilius and society's

00:46:02.780 conscience will be laid to rest then that's quite a nice note for us to end on claire that is quite

00:46:08.280 a nice note for us to end on zoe which is why we won't end on that note and always remind people

00:46:12.960 about our socials well when i say end what i mean is like that thanks so much for joining us please

00:46:21.020 um do the the usual thing with the podcast which is follow us on our different social medias

00:46:26.420 we i'd like to say this every week just to make sure that people understand we are best place to

00:46:31.900 catch us for a chat if you want to kind of get into a bit of dialogue is twitter our facebook

00:46:36.260 page is just a page kind of for info it's not a group for chatting on but our twitter definitely

00:46:40.900 is we've also got a youtube channel and we've got instagram that claire you're active on that

00:46:46.680 when i don't use instagram yeah and it's really really busy actually we've got a few thousands

00:46:51.460 people that are interested in it that's great i just know that if i had instagram that i would

00:46:56.360 lose any hours left remaining to me in the day because between facebook and twitter good lord

00:47:01.760 it's a black hole of attention i would say but please do catch up with us in anywhere and if

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00:47:32.560 here yeah it's really really important now we make a real push to persuade politicians

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00:48:10.120 because claire's his big sister so he has to keep doing it thanks so much for listening bye bye

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Witches of Scotland - October 30, 2021

EPISODE 45 ASH WILLIAM MILLS ON ISOBEL GOWDIE

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