In January 1639, the legal mechanisms of the Scottish state were brought to bear upon Janet Durie, a resident of the coastal parish of Wemyss in Fife. The official records, catalogued under the reference C/EGD/2271, formalize the commencement of proceedings against her during a period when the Scottish kirk and secular courts were increasingly vigilant in their pursuit of those suspected of maleficium. As a resident of Wemyss, Janet occupied a social landscape shaped by both the local authority of the landed interests and the religious discipline of the parish ministry.
The subsequent trial, documented under reference T/JO/1186, marked the formal progression of her case through the Scottish judicial system. While the surviving archives provide the administrative framework of her appearance before the court on January 24, 1639, they reflect the broader legal context of the seventeenth-century witch trials, where specific allegations were subjected to the rigours of local and central inquiry. Through these brief entries, Janet remains recorded as a subject of the 1563 Witchcraft Act, marking her place in the extensive history of judicial investigations conducted in Fife during this turbulent era.