In the autumn of 1649, Janet Hendersone, a resident of Blyth in the parish of West Linton, Peeblesshire, found herself entangled in the rigorous judicial machinery of the Scottish witch trials. On the 6th of November, her case—formally designated C/EGD/1998—was brought before the authorities, marking the commencement of a legal ordeal that would unfold across at least two distinct judicial proceedings, documented as T/LA/2036 and T/LA/2140.
The records concerning Janet offer a stark glimpse into the administrative focus of the mid-seventeenth-century legal system. While the surviving documentation does not elaborate on the specific charges or the eventual outcome of her trial, the sequence of references indicates that she was subjected to multiple layers of scrutiny. Janet’s experience serves as a testament to the period’s prevailing socio-legal climate in the Scottish Borders, where concerns regarding witchcraft were increasingly formalised through the diligent record-keeping of local kirk sessions and the central courts.