Pendle Witches

The trial of the Pendle witches in 1612 is the most famous and best-documented witch case in English history. In the shadow of Pendle Hill, two rival families headed by the aged 'cunning women' known as Old Demdike and Old Chattox stood accused, with several neighbours, of a string of murders by witchcraft. The case grew from a beggar's curse that supposedly struck a pedlar lame, and unravelled into accusations of a witches' gathering at Malkin Tower on Good Friday.

Much of the testimony came from nine-year-old Jennet Device, whose evidence helped condemn members of her own family, including her mother. Ten of the accused were hanged at Lancaster and one died in gaol. The proceedings were recorded in extraordinary detail by the clerk of the court, Thomas Potts, in 'The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster' (1613) — which remains our fullest window onto a Jacobean witch trial. Today Pendle Hill is inseparable from that history, drawing visitors to a landscape that has become a byword for English witchcraft.