What were jacobean beliefs about witchcraft?
King James I of England(1566-1625) ascended to the throne in 1603. He had previously ruled as King of Scotland since he was a year old. James became interested in witchcraft after attending the trial of the Berwick witches in 1590 where it was claimed that some of the seventy or so accused attempted to sink a ship on which he was travelling. After many confessed to the act under extreme torture, James became obsessed with the idea that witchcraft was a real threat to his reign. He wrote a treatise on witchcraft and demonology based on the Malleus Maleficarum that was used to condemn hundreds of Scottish people to death. Many of their bodies were found in Nor Loch, now Princes Street Gardens in Edinburgh. James’ beliefs were based on a long history of Christian paranoia about witchcraft. The Malleus Maleficarum was published following a papal bull in 1484 that condemned witchcraft as heresy. Previously, the Catholic church had condemned belief in the existence of witchcraft but public h
