The Witches Reel

Cummer gae ye afore, cummer gae ye,
Gin ye winna gae, cummer let me,
Ring-a-ring-a-widdershins
Linkin lithely widdershins,
Cummers carlin cron and queyn
Roun gae we.

Cummer go ye before, cummer go ye
If ye willna go before, cummer let me
Ring-a-ring-a-widdershins
Loupin' lightly widdershins
Kilted coats and fleein' hair
Three times three

Cummer go ye before, cummer go ye
If ye willna go before, cummer let me
Ring-a-ring-a-widdershins
Whirlin' skirlin' widdershins
De'il tak the hindmost
Wha'er she be

The Witches' Reel
A song from 1591 and the witch trials of King James VI of Scotland. A time when any woman could be accused of being a witch on a whim. The words came from the transcripts of one of the trials in connection with a plot by Francis Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, and others to kill the king. It is the first written record of a reel in Scotland.

A brief sample of the song can be found on Chantan : Primary Colours.
 

The Berwick Witches

This tale began with the arrest of a maidservant named Geillis Duncan who was suspected by her employer, David Smeaton of Tranent. His reasons for suspicion were the fact that she would secretly go out at night and that this Geillis Duncane took in hand to help all such as were troubled or greeued with any kinde of sicknes or infirmitie: and in short space did perfourme manye matter most miraculous.

Geillis Duncan was tortured with the pilliwinkes on her fingers and by binding or winching her head with a cord or roape. She did not confess until her tortures declared they had found her "devil’s mark"- it being believed at that time that by due examination of witchcraft and Witches in Scotland, it hath lately beene founde that the diuell doth generally marke them with a privie marke. Once Geillis was committed to prison it did not take her long to accuse others of witchcraft. These people were Agnes Sampson, Agnes Tompson, Doctor Fian, alias John Cunningham, Barbara Napier and Effie MacCalyan, to name but a few. In all around 70 people were implicated in this case.

James VI obviously believed in the existence of witchcraft and took a personal interest in the story that these "witches" had conspired to kill him by magic but even he found the stories exaggerated as is shown when "his Maiestie saide they were all extreame lyars". He later changed his mind when Agnes Sampson took him aside and apparently told him the exact words of his conversation with his new wife on their wedding night. This was seen by the King as irrefutable proof that witchcraft had been performed against him.

Doctor Fian was put to more torture but would confess nothing more even though his legs were totally crushed in the "bootes". The King and his Council then decided that he was to be made an example of to remayne a terrour to all others heereafter, that shall attempt to deale in the lyke wicked and ungodlye actions, as witchcraft, sorcery, conjuration and such lyke. Dr. Fian was burned at Castle Hill in Edinburgh in late January, 1591.

It is not recorded what happened to all the accused persons but certainly Agnes Sampson and others were condemned and burnt as witches. At the time Newes From Scotland was published they were still languishing in prison. King James VI was so concerned about the threat that witchcraft posed for himself and his country, that he undertook to study the subject in some depth and published his results in his book Daemonologie, published in 1597.

On the death of Elizabeth I in 1603, he became King James I of England and ruled both countries jointly until his death in 1625. One of his first acts as king in England was to tighten the Witchcraft Act (1563). At that time in England, hanging was the punishment if it could be proved that use of witchcraft had caused death, but James changed the sentence to hanging for any form of witchcraft confessed or proved. Witchcraft trials continued unabated during his reign and only started to trail off in the early eighteenth century. The last recorded burning of a witch in Scotland took place in Sutherland in 1722.