Category: Superstitions

  • Whirlin Sunday (fifth In Lent)

    At several villages in the vicinity of Wisbech, in the isle of Ely, the fifth Sunday in Lent has been, time immemorial, commemorated by the name of Whirlin Sunday, when cakes are made by almost every family, and from the day are called whirlin cakes ; but notwithstanding my frequent enquiries, I have not been […]

  • Witches In Scotland

    The following scarce pamphlet, entitled “News from Scotland,” etc., was communicated by a constant reader. The singularity of it will justify the republication. The title runs thus : ” News from Scotland, declaring the damnable life and death of Doctor Fian, a notable Sorcerer, who was burned at Edenbrough in January last, 1591. Which doctor […]

  • Witchcraft In Yorkshire

    An industrious workman at Sheffield, who had saved seventeen guineas by his labour in working at the steel furnace of Messrs. Hague and Barkin, had the whole stolen out of his house in the night of the 27th of April last. The poor man, almost in despair, employed the crier to make known his loss, […]

  • Witchcraft In Wiltshire

    One Susanna Hannokes, an elderly woman, of Wingrove, near Aylesbury, was accused by a neighbour for bewitching her spinning-wheel, so that she could not make it go round, and offered to make oath of it before a magistrate ; on which the husband, in order to justify his wife, insisted on her being tried by […]

  • Witchcraft In Surrey

    THE WITCHES’ CAULDRON. In the vestry of Frensham Church, Surrey, hangs a huge cauldron, hammered out of a single piece of copper, supposed by Salmon to be a remain of the antient parochial hospitality at the wedding of poor maids. Aubrey supposes it to have been used for the Church Ales. Tradition reports it to […]

  • Witchcraft In Suffolk

    The county of Suffolk was remarkable for the number of Witches which were known to practise their diabolical arts in it. Baxter says he knew more than a hundred at one time. The famous trial of Sir Matthew Hale, at Lowestoft, is well known. The present case is found in a copy of Baxter’s ” […]

  • Witchcraft In Somersetshire

    The following are Copies of Depositions as to certain charges of witchcraft, made in the county of Somerset, in the year 1664. The originals appear to have been wholly written by the magistrate before whom they were sworn.* Yours, etc., W. L. W. Somerset. Walter Thicke, of Bayford, in the county aforesd, yeoman, examined the […]

  • Witchcraft In Leicestershire

    On the monument of Francis, sixth Earl of Rutland, in Bottesford Church, Leicestershire, it is recorded, that by his second lady he had ” two sons, both which died in their infancy by wicked practices and sorcery.” The circumstances which gave rise to this supposition were briefly these. ” Joan Flower and her two daughters, […]

  • First Sunday In Lent

    In the table for 24 years, prefixed to the “hare intemerate beate marie virginis secundum usum romanum,” printed by Thielman Kerver [see note 7], the first column is ” la date de l’année,” the second ” les brandons,” the third ” pasques,” etc., and so afterwards to explain the table ’tis written, ” Qui veult […]

  • Witchcraft In Lancashire

    The murders lately committed at Tring, of which you have given us several new particulars in page 198 of your last magazine, have revived the controversy concerning the reality of witchcraft and enchantment, which appeared to have been determined in the negative by the general consent, to which the sanction of the legislature has been […]