In 1607 a witch of the name of Isobel Grierson was burnt after being accused and convicted of entering the…
- Date of account
- Published 1915
- Source
- Human Animals
- Reference
- Human Animals · selected passage 105
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English
- Record updated
- 2026-08-24
Record summary
In 1607 a witch of the name of Isobel Grierson was burnt after being accused and convicted of entering the house of Adam Clark, in Prestonpans, in the likeness of his own cat and in the company of a mighty rabble of other cats, which by their noise frightened Adam, his wife, and their maid, the last-named being dragged…
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlyIn 1607 a witch of the name of Isobel Grierson was burnt after being accused and convicted of entering the house of Adam Clark, in Prestonpans, in the likeness of his own cat and in the company of a mighty rabble of other cats, which by their noise frightened Adam, his wife, and their maid, the last-named being dragged up and down the stairs by the hair of her head, presumably by the devil in the shape of a black man. Isobel also visited the house of a certain Mr. Brown in the shape of a cat, but once being called upon by name she vanished, but Brown himself died of a disease she had laid upon him.
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares motifs and reported features without assuming that a traditional being is a biological species or that similar stories document one external cause.
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