The Burning Times and the Islands

There's a lot of heated debate surrounding the "Burning Times", the Inquisition, Witch hunts and everything associated with it.

I grew up in a place where they did burn witches and heretics. They burned them, hung them and more. Burning, as in the infamous image of burning them at the stake, was largely a European practise, though not a British one. The British preferred that their witches 'hang by the neck until dead'.

Except in the Channel Islands. There hanging was only one of several methods of punishment meted out to those convicted of witchcraft. Other sentences included banishment - for life or for a fixed term, burning, disfigurement or lashes.

There's a book, Witchcraft and Devil Lore in the Channel Islands that not only tells the story of witchcraft in the islands but also details the names and sentences of those accused of witchcraft and brought before the courts. The list is taken from the original french court records that still lie in the island archives.

"June 4th, 1624.

Ester Henry, wife of Jean de France.

This woman was burnt alive. The sentence states that her flesh and bones are to be reduced to ashes and scattered by the winds, as being unworthy of any sepulture."

The witch hunts, and witchcraft, are just one part of the history of islands steeped in myth, legend and history.