Witch-Hunting in Scotland, 1649–1650

Abstract

The dramatic political events in Scotland during the 1640s may seem to give an air of inevitability to the witch-hunting that broke out in 1649–1650. Supporters of the revolutionary National Covenant, and later the Solemn League and Covenant, had gained firm control of Scottish political and ecclesiastical institutions. The National Covenant of 1638 was a contract between the Scottish people and God, in which those who subscribed to it promised to behave in a godly manner. The Solemn League and Covenant of 1643 further cemented this and laid foundations for exporting the ‘perfect’ model of presbyterian church government to England. In the autumn of 1648, after the collapse of the moderate covenanters’ Engagement with Charles I, the radical wing of the covenanting movement seized power. By 1649, protection of the sanctity of the covenants was at the top of the agenda for the regime.