In the spring of 1626, the judicial machinery of Fife turned its attention toward Janet Pirie, a resident of the coastal burgh of Kirkcaldy. On April 4, Janet was formally brought before the authorities to face an inquiry into the charge of witchcraft, a legal process documented under the archival reference C/EGD/2570. At this stage in the seventeenth century, such an investigation represented a serious intersection of local civil administration and the rigorous ecclesiastical oversight prevalent in post-Reformation Scotland.
While the surviving records for Janet are brief, they situate her within the broader, harrowing context of the Scottish witch trials that characterized the early modern period. Her case serves as a fragment of the extensive legal scrutiny faced by women in Kirkcaldy during the early seventeenth century, a time when communal anxieties were frequently funneled into the formal accusation and trial of individuals. Though the details of the specific allegations against Janet remain limited to her entry in the historical register, her involvement in the legal proceedings of 1626 stands as a matter of official record within the court system of the era.