On September 8, 1679, Bessie Ramsay of Mortonhall, Edinburgh, appeared within the legal records of the Scottish judicial system. Her name was entered onto a Porteous roll, a formal list of delinquent dittays—or indictments—that served as the primary mechanism for bringing individuals before the criminal courts. Like many others listed on the same roll that day, the charges brought against Bessie were framed by the severe ecclesiastical and legal framework of the period, encompassing the grave accusations of witchcraft, sorcery, and necromancy.
The documentation associated with Bessie’s appearance reflects the standardized legal language of late seventeenth-century Scotland. These charges specifically alleged a formal renunciation of her Christian baptism, a process described in the court records as the act of delivering herself over to the Devil, both body and soul. While the entry provides the essential details of her residence and the date of her trial in Edinburgh, it stands as a stark representation of the administrative procedures utilized by the courts during this volatile era, capturing the moment Bessie was formally drawn into the machinery of a seventeenth-century witch trial.