In January 1578, a resident of Ross named Keanoch Owir was formally brought before the legal authorities to answer for allegations of witchcraft. The surviving records of the proceedings, cataloged under case reference C/JO/3365, provide only a sparse outline of the events that transpired during this period of the Scottish witch trials. While the archival documentation is limited in its narrative scope, legal scribes categorized Keanoch within the proceedings as a *ductricem seu principalem incantatricem*. Translated from the Latin, this designation identifies her as a leader or a principal practitioner of incantations, a classification that underscored the gravity with which the court viewed her involvement in the case.
The trial, indexed as T/JO/2159, represents a distinct moment in the judicial history of the region. As with many cases involving Gaelic-named individuals in the sixteenth century, the name Keanoch Owir remains preserved in its original form, reflecting the linguistic landscape of the era. Despite the brevity of the extant records, the formalization of her case on January 23, 1578, highlights the structured, bureaucratic nature of the witch-hunting process as it functioned in late sixteenth-century Scotland, where specific designations of leadership within local folklore or occult practices were sufficient to initiate the full weight of the judicial apparatus.