In the early months of 1630, the judicial machinery of the Scottish state focused its attention on Katherine McCheyne, a resident of Lochmaben in Dumfriesshire. On the 4th of February, Katherine was formally identified as a subject of legal proceedings under case reference C/EGD/1179. Within the strict framework of early modern Scottish jurisprudence, her arrest marked the beginning of a process that would see her moved from the local jurisdiction of her home parish to the purview of the central legal authorities.
Following her initial identification, Katherine was processed through the trial system under the record T/LA/685. As was customary for those accused of witchcraft during this period, the transition from local suspicion to trial necessitated a rigorous examination of her alleged spiritual and criminal transgressions. While the specific evidentiary details of the proceedings against Katherine remain preserved within these archival identifiers, they stand as a somber testament to the formal mechanisms employed by the Scottish courts to address perceived violations of the covenantal and civil order during the seventeenth century.