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On 8th November 1576, at the High Court in Edinburgh, Bessie Dunlop, an Ayrshire woman, was accused of ‘sorcery, witchcraft, and incantation, with invocation of spirits of the devil, continuing in familiarity with them at all such times as she thought expedient, dealing with charms, and jinxing the people with devilish craft of sorcery aforesaid’. But like so many people accused of witchcraft at the time of the trials, Bessie was just an ordinary woman who had never caused harm to anyone.

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