Gowdie, Isobel (fl. seventeenth century)

Isobel Gowdie, a seventeenth-century Scottish witch, gave a series of confessions, all produced apart from any torture, that seemed to confirm popular theories about Witchcraft, and became the keystone of a new wave of persecutions in Scotland during the reign of Charles II (1660-85). Gowdie emerged out of obscurity in April of 1662 when she gave the first of her confessions relating 15 years of involvement with the Devil. According to her story, she had initially encountered Satan at the church at Auldearne. She made a pact with the Devil that began with her renunciation of Christianity. The Devil placed his mark on her, on her shoulder, sucked some of her blood, and rebaptized her with it. He gave her a new name, Janet. She confessed her new faith while placing one hand on her head and one on the bottom of her foot.

In her four separate confessions given over a six-week period (April 13-May 29), a variety of supernatural elements came to the fore. For example, she claimed that she placed a broom in bed to fool her husband when she left in the evening to gather with other witches. She flew through the air to her meeting, able to slay any passing Christians she met (and who could report her activity) unless they were able to bless themselves first.

Most important were her descriptions of the witches' meetings, as they represent the first clear records of the small groups of 13 that would later become standard fare in witchcraft accounts. Gowdie also introduced the term "coven" into the trial records. Gowdie's stories thus mark the completion of the transition in popular culture of the view of Witchcraft as the surviving religion of the people in pre-Christian Europe into the view of Witchcraft as a new post-Christian Satanic cult that existed as a complete Christian parody. It is this latter view that the authorities had been attempting to use to support their persecution of individuals since the end of the fifteenth century. Gowdie also claimed that she and her fellow witches could change into animal forms as easily as they could affect the weather. If the witches disobeyed the Devil or missed a meeting, they were punished with a whip.

From a contemporary perspective, Gowdie appears to have been mentally disturbed. There is some reason to suggest that the judges who heard her stories also concluded the same, as there is no record of her execution. However, accounts of her confessions would provide substantiation for the last generation of witchcraft trials that culminated at Salem, Massachusetts, a generation later. Interestingly enough, both Montague Summers and Margaret Murray would take Gowdie's accounts seriously in their theoretical analysis of Witchcraft. Murray, especially, referred to Gowdie in her theories of the organization of the Witch cult into covens of 13 members.

Sources:

Murray, Margaret. The Witchcult in Western Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1921.

Robbins, Russell Hope. The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology. New York: Crown, 1970.

Summers, Montague. A History of Demonology and Witchcraft. New York. Alfred A. Knopf, 1926.