In the spring of 1626, the legal machinery of Fife turned its attention toward Janet Stark, a resident of the burgh of Kirkcaldy. On April 4, 1626, Janet was formally brought before the authorities under the accusation of witchcraft, an event documented in the judicial archives under case reference C/EGD/2571. At this time, Kirkcaldy was a significant port town where the religious and social anxieties of the early seventeenth century often intersected with the rigours of local justice, and the proceedings against her represent a specific moment within this broader climate of legal scrutiny.
The documentation surrounding Janet remains sparse, leaving the precise nature of the allegations levelled against her to the historical record’s silence. While subsequent scholarship, including references by MacDonald, has noted her case in printed secondary sources, the limited primary archival evidence provides only the foundational facts of her identity and the date of her appearance. Janet thus remains a figure defined by the brief, formal administrative entry of her trial, illustrating the intersection of individual lives with the formal mechanisms of the Scottish witch trials.