In September of 1666, the life of Margret Horne became a matter of formal judicial record in the parish of Torryburn, Fife. Her entry into the machinery of the early modern Scottish legal system is marked in the records of the Court of Justiciary under case number C/EGD/1721. As a resident of the coastal village of Torryburn—a settlement that would later gain notoriety during the intense witch-hunting climate of the early 18th century—Margret was drawn into a legal process that sought to address allegations of witchcraft, a crime defined under the Witchcraft Act of 1563 as a capital offence.
Beyond the date of 8 September 1666, the archival traces concerning Margret remain frustratingly sparse. While a specific trial reference, T/JO/777, exists within the historical collections, the accompanying trial notes contain no further details regarding the specific accusations levelled against her, the nature of the evidence presented, or the final verdict delivered by the court. Consequently, Margret remains a figure defined by the bureaucratic documentation of her prosecution, representing the many individuals whose experiences during this era were recorded in the ledgers of the state but whose personal narratives were largely silenced by the lack of surviving testimony.