In January 1662, amidst the height of the seventeenth-century Scottish witch hunts, Cristian Bonar of Newburgh, Fife, was brought under the scrutiny of the judicial authorities. The legal proceedings against her were initiated on the 23rd of that month, recorded under case file C/EGD/1442. While the surviving notes from her subsequent trial (T/JO/846) provide no specific insight into the courtroom proceedings or the nature of the allegations brought against her, the administrative record confirms that the judicial process moved with the characteristic swiftness of the era.
Within that same month of January, Cristian provided a formal confession. In the context of early modern Scottish jurisprudence, such a confession was a pivotal moment in the legal process, functioning as the primary evidence upon which the court relied. Although the specific contents of her statement were not preserved in the surviving records, this document remains the defining trace of her interaction with the legal system. Following this confession, her history within the official archives concludes, leaving the ultimate outcome of her trial unrecorded in the surviving documentation.