Janet Douglas (died after 1678), was a Scottish woman
who claimed to have second sight.She was apparently mute (the legends
use the word "dumb").
During the 1670s, in the
western islands of Scotland, Janet began publicly "demonstrating" said
sight by seeking out "images", objects allegedly made by witches. The
phenomenon of second sight was often considered witchcraft itself.
Among her exposes was the cause of the death of two sons of
Douglas of Barloch.
The young serving girl arrived at the Pollok estate of Sir George
Maxwell of Auldhouse (see painting), who had suddenly become seriously
ill. She "miraculously" regained the power of speech, pointed the finger
at five people, as well as a 14-year-old girl, accusing them of
witchcraft, and therefore of being responsible for the Laird's sickness.
By the time she moved to Glasgow, travelling alone at the age of
eleven, she was mobbed by people wanting to discover if witchcraft was
the cause of their ill luck, given word already reached the city before
her arrival. After she had told several members of the crowd where they
could [see] the images, the crowd stirred itself into such a frenzy that
the magistrates quickly put her under protective custody.
Soon
the Privy Council of Scotland summoned her. Her arrival in Edinburgh in
1678 was as chaotic as her entrance into Glasgow — if not more so. She
directly accused several members of the crowd of practicing witchcraft.
Judicial officials and other notables unsuccessfully interrogated her as
to her background, parentage, and how she performed.
After
Edinburgh, Janet's trace disappeared. She was eventually released, and
rumour holds that she fled to the West Indies.
Note:
The case of Janet Douglas combines the two phenomenon of witchcraft and
second sight. Janet claimed to use her skill of second sight in order to
find out cases of witchcraft. The form that her 'second sight' typically
took was to identify that a person's suffering was the result of an
'image' created by a witch. For example, George Hickes in his letter to
Samuel Pepys in 1700 claims that Janet told a Goldsmith in Glasgow that
his trade was not thriving because a witch had made an image against
him.
In the later seventeenth century the relationship between second sight
and witchcraft was disputed by different writers. In his letter to
Pepys, Hickes clearly suggests that witchcraft was related to second
sight, whereas Robert Kirk in his classic text 'The Secret Commonwealth'
argues that Second Sight was an entirely innocent skill.
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