Abstract
This chapter provides an account of the accused, who predominantly were women, and an analysis of the allegations that was presented during the trials. Differences between the convicted and the acquitted are also discussed in this context. An inserted map displays the outcome of the trials and how each of the sixty-three defendants were indicted. Only seven or eight of them were accused by their neighbours, all the others had been denounced by imprisoned suspects pressured by the court. It reveals how the trials tended to be self-sustaining and that they mainly were driven by the courts. A comparison of the confessions the courts obtained by force with the accusations made by locals demonstrates how the courts’ view of witchcraft and the witches differed from the suspects’ neighbours and other locals. For the latter, witchcraft was mainly about maleficium, while the court was primarily interested in pacts with the Devil.
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Notes
- 1.
The seven known to have been denounced as witches by their neighbours were Anna i Holta (1 of 63 to stand trial), Elin i Staxäng (22), Karin Joens (26), Per Matsson (28), Kerstin i Lövri (49), Marit Anundsdotter (58), and Gunill Toresdotterr (59). Malin på Härön (18) may also have been one of them, but she may also have been denounced by Ragnille i Marstrand.
- 2.
Börta vid Vagnarberget (60) and Marit i Yttene (61).
- 3.
The situation for 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 19, 20, 29, 31, 32, 33, 34, 37, 40, 43, 54, 55, 56, 57, 60, and 61. All but two—Per Larsson i Mollösund (20) and Gunnar i Winnestorp (43)—were women.
- 4.
In Mora in the province of Dalarna, for example, 25 per cent of the accused in 1669 were men, but only 10–15 per cent were men in the Norrland trials (Ankarloo 1984, 270).
- 5.
In his study of German witch trials, Durrant (2007, 77–8, 84) suggests that in his field of study, accusations were often strongly gendered, because that was the reality of everyday life and the division of labour: men and women were expected to live in different spheres. When those accused of witchcraft were forced to denounce other witches, they picked people from their immediate circle, who were generally the same gender. For Sweden’s rural areas in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Hagelin (2010, 132–35, 151–55) has shown it is reasonable to talk of special women’s worlds, meaning social spheres where women gathered to work together or to socialise.
- 6.
See, for example, Sharpe (2004, 449).
- 7.
Rannsakningarna, 19.
- 8.
Linderholm (1918, 195–6).
- 9.
Rannsakningarna, 19; RA, Kommission i Bohuslän, fol. 2.
- 10.
Malin i Viken’s and Karin Sköttes’ mothers had been executed for witchcraft, as had Börta Sunnerborg’s aunt (Rannsakningarna, 91).
- 11.
Mothers and daughters Ingeborg Slakters and Malin Slakters, Margareta Sven Snickars and Kerstin Svenses, Gertrud Simon Madtses and Cidsela Tolle Svendsens, and Marit i Yttene and Gertrud i Kitteröd; mother and son, Malin på Härön and Per Matsson; father and daughter, Per Larsson and Anna Persdotter. Elin i Staxäng and Karin Joens were cousins. True vid Vagnarberget’s daughter, the healer Börta vid Vagnarberget, was accused of witchcraft and executed.
- 12.
Ankarloo (1984, 275–7).
- 13.
Ankarloo (1984, 275).
- 14.
The verdicts of the witchcraft commissions are printed in Rannsakningarna, 255–64.
- 15.
Rannsakningarna, 263; RA, Kommissorialrätt fol. 67.
- 16.
Rannsakningarna, 239–40; RA, Kommissorialrätt, 1 July 1671, fol. 29.
- 17.
Rannsakningarna, 263; RA, Kommissorialrätt fol. 68.
- 18.
Rannsakningarna, 262.
- 19.
Rannsakningarna, 263.
- 20.
Kristiansson (1951, 234–6).
- 21.
For the Göta Court of Appeal’s verdicts, see Rannsakningarna, 301–17; for south Bohuslän, see RA, Kommissorialrätt 10–11 Nov. 1671, fol. 1–18; for north Bohuslän, see RA, Kommissorialrätt 15 Nov. and 18 Nov. 1671, fols. 21–28.
- 22.
Rannsakningarna, 309–11.
- 23.
For example, Ragnille spoke of eating three Thursday evening meals with Anna i Holta, which was the beginning of her contact with the Devil (Rannsakningarna, 8 July 1669, 30; see also Rannsakningarna, 22 Sept. 1669, 63).
- 24.
In some cases defendants said the Devil took the shape of a dog and left his mark on them by biting them (Rannsakningarna, 3 July 1671, 244; Rannsakningarna, 15 Sept. 1671, 291).
- 25.
See, for example, Elin i Staxäng’s confessions above and on a woman on 15 Sept. 1671 (Rannsakningarna, 292) who confessed she had fornicated with one of the Devil’s familiars and then gave birth to ‘a little puppy’ (RA, Kommissorialrätt fol. 227).
- 26.
There was said to be music at the witches’ sabbat at Stenkyrka on Tjörn (Rannsakningarna, 21 Aug. 1669, 106–9).
References
Secondary Publications
Ankarloo, Bengt, Trolldomsprocesserna i Sverige (Stockholm 1984, Inst. för rättshistorisk forskning).
Durrant, Jonathan B., Witchcraft, gender and society in early modern Germany (Leiden 2007, Brill).
Hagelin, Helena, Kvinnovärldar och barnamord: Makt, ansvar och gemenskap i rättsprotokoll cirka 1700–1840 (Gothenburg 2010, Institutionen för historiska studier, Göteborgs universitet).
Kristiansson, Sten, Uddevalla Stads historia, 1: Fram till år 1700 (Uddevalla 1951).
Linderholm, Emanuel, De stora häxprocesserna i Sverige: Bidrag till svensk kultur- och kyrkohistoria, 1 Inledning: Bohuslän (Uppsala 1918, Lindblad).
Sharpe, James A., ‘Magic and witchcraft’, in R. Po-Chia Hsia (ed.), A companion to the Reformation world (Oxford 2004, Blackwell).
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Malmstedt, G. (2021). Accused and Accusations. In: Premodern Beliefs and Witch Trials in a Swedish Province, 1669-1672. Palgrave Historical Studies in Witchcraft and Magic. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-76120-2_3
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