In the spring of 1662, the rural parish of Fossoway and Tullibole, located within the Crook of Devon, became the site of a legal proceeding involving Janet Paton. A married woman residing in this Perthshire community, Janet was formally brought before the authorities on May 5, 1662, amidst a period of intensified scrutiny regarding suspected witchcraft. The records of the High Court of Justiciary, cataloged under case reference C/EGD/1484, document her encounter with the judicial apparatus during this turbulent era in Scottish social and religious history.
While the archival traces left by Janet remain sparse, her appearance in the records reflects the systematic processing of individuals accused under the Witchcraft Act of 1563. As a married woman in the Crook of Devon, Janet existed within a tight-knit community where shifting social tensions and ecclesiastical pressures frequently manifested in accusations of maleficium. Though the specific details of the charges leveled against Janet are not preserved in these particular notes, her case stands as a representative entry in the broader ledger of seventeenth-century Scottish trials, marking the moment when her life intersected with the formal machinery of the state.