Lilias Adie

Lilias Adie (c.1640–1704) was an elderly woman from the small coastal village of Torryburn in Fife who, in 1704, was accused of witchcraft after a local woman blamed her for a sudden illness. Under pressure and likely sleep deprivation during interrogation, Adie confessed to a catalogue of charges typical of Scotland's witch panics, including attending a witches' sabbath and having sexual relations with the Devil, whom she described in vivid detail. She died in prison before she could be formally tried and executed, possibly by suicide or as a result of her confinement.

Because she died before sentencing, Adie could not be burned at the stake as convicted witches usually were, but the community still feared her. She was buried not in consecrated ground but on the foreshore at Torryburn, between the high and low tide marks, with a heavy stone slab placed over the grave. This reflected a widespread Scottish belief that running or tidal water would prevent a witch's spirit from rising to harm the living, making her grave the only known intertidal burial of an accused witch in Scotland.

In 2014, the historian Dr Louise Yeoman and archaeologist Douglas Speirs relocated the long-lost grave site using 19th-century records, rediscovering the slab and a fragment of an iron ring exactly where described. A memorial service was held at the site in 2019, 315 years after her death, as part of a wider movement to formally remember and pardon Scotland's accused witches.