Alice Nutter | |
|---|---|
 Statue of Alice in Roughlee, Lancashire | |
| Born | c. 1560s |
| Died | 20 August 1612 Gallows Hill, Lancaster, Kingdom of England |
| Cause of death | Hanged |
| Nationality | English |
| Known for | Falsely accused as a Pendle witch |
Alice Nutter (died 20 August 1612) was an English Recusant noblewoman accused and hanged as a result of the Pendle witch hunt. Her life and death are commemorated by a statue in the village of Roughlee in the Pendle district of Lancashire.
Unlike many accused of witchcraft, Alice was a member of a wealthy and noble family who owned land in Pendle. [1]
She was accused of being present at a witch's coven on Good Friday, 1612, and later causing the death of Henry Milton. Her principal accuser was a nine-year-old girl called Jennet Device. Nutter protested her innocence [2] although others pleaded guilty.
Nutter's trial began at Lancaster Castle on 18 August where the accused were denied access to lawyers or the right to call witnesses. She was subsequently hanged at Gallows Hill in Lancaster on 20 August 1612. The others hanged were Anne Whittle ("Old Chattox"), Ann Redfearn, Elizabeth Device ("Squinting Lizzie"), Alison Device, James Device, Katherine Hewitt, Jane Bulcock, John Bulcock and Isobel Robey.
Alice Nutter is one of the main characters in William Harrison Ainsworth's Victorian Gothic novel The Lancashire Witches .
In 1982, one of the members of the music group Chumbawamba changed her name to Alice Nutter by deed poll, feeling "an affinity" to the historical figure. Since the band's breakup, one of her writing projects is a play based on the same Pendle Witch Trials. [3] [4]
The 1990 novel Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman (later adapted for television) features several witch characters named after the original Pendle witches, including Agnes Nutter, a prophet burned at the stake, and her descendant Anathema Device. [5] [6]
In 2012 a statue of Nutter was unveiled in Roughlee by local celebrity Bobby Elliott. The statue was commissioned following a campaign led by a local councillor. Local artist David Palmer researched local history and the fashion of Nutter's times to create the statue, which is made from steel and brass. [7]
In the same year, Jeanette Winterson published her novella The Daylight Gate whose main character is Alice Nutter. The book is about the events, but Winterson is keen to point out that her character is not the Alice Nutter of history. [8]
In 2018, it was reported that the Knights of St Columba had made a ruling that Alice Nutter, a Recusant during the religious persecution of the Catholic Church in England, was in reality a Catholic martyr. According to the Knights, Nutter had in reality been attending a secret and illegal Mass at the time of the alleged Good Friday witches' coven and her prosecution was a frameup by a corrupt judge who coveted the Nutter estate, but who could not prove that Nutter was a Catholic. Accusing Nutter during the Pendle witch hunt, according to the Knights, was an easy alternative. [9]
English author Joseph Delaney in his books series Spook's , incorporated a character named Alice Deane, who is a witch. [10]
Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch is a 1990 novel written as a collaboration between the English authors Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman.
Esmerelda "Esme" Weatherwax is a fictional character from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. She is a witch and member of the Lancre coven. She is the self-appointed guardian of her small country, and frequently defends it against supernatural powers. She is one of the Discworld series's main protagonists, having major roles in seven novels.
Higham is a village in the Borough of Pendle in Lancashire, England, south of Pendle Hill. The civil parish is named Higham with West Close Booth. The village is 2 miles (3 km) north-east of Padiham and about 4 miles (6 km) south-west of Nelson along the A6068 road.
Tiffany Aching is a fictional character in Terry Pratchett's satirical Discworld series of fantasy novels. Her name in Nac Mac Feegle is Tir-far-thóinn or 'Land Under Wave'.
The Spook's Apprentice, published as The Last Apprentice: Revenge of the Witch in the United States, is a 2004 children's dark fantasy novel by Joseph Delaney. It was published by The Bodley Head and Red Fox in the United Kingdom, and Greenwillow Books in the United States. It is the first story in The Wardstone Chronicles arc of the Spook's series. The book has sold over 3 million copies and was the winner of the Sefton Book Award, Hampshire Book Award and Prix Plaisirs de Lire. It has been adapted into various mediums, including a play script, feature film titled Seventh Son, and a French graphic novel.
Spook's, published as The Last Apprentice in the United States, is a children's dark fantasy series by English author Joseph Delaney. It is published by imprints of Penguin Random House in the United Kingdom and HarperCollins in the United States. The series has been published in 30 countries, with sales exceeding 4.5 million copies. It started in 2004 with The Spook's Apprentice, which has been adapted into a play script, a feature film titled Seventh Son, and a French graphic novel.
The Knights of St Columba is a fraternal service order affiliated with the Catholic Church in Scotland, in England and Wales, and, through their Province of Liverpool, in the Isle of Man. Founded in Glasgow in 1919, the Knights are named in honour of Saint Columba, a 6th-century Celtic Church missionary descended from the Gaelic nobility of Ireland in modern County Donegal, who founded Iona Abbey and successfully evangelized both the Picts and Gaels of modern Scotland. The Knights describes themselves as dedicated to the principles of Charity, Unity and Fraternity. There are around 2400 members of the KSC, in over 200 councils across Great Britain — it features in England, Scotland and Wales. Membership is limited to Catholic men aged 16 and over, and promotes the social doctrine of the Catholic Church.
The Late Lancashire Witches is a Caroline-era stage play and written by Thomas Heywood and Richard Brome, published in 1634. The play is a topical melodrama on the subject of the witchcraft controversy that arose in Lancashire in 1633.
Alice Nutter may refer to:
Newchurch in Pendle is a village in the civil parish of Goldshaw Booth, Pendle, Lancashire, England, adjacent to Barley, to the south of Pendle Hill. It was formerly part of Roughlee Booth until its transferral in 1935.
Roughlee is a village in the civil parish of Roughlee Booth, in the Pendle district, in the county of Lancashire, England. It is close to Nelson, Barrowford and Blacko. The village lies at the foot of Pendle Hill, well known for the Pendle Witches, and includes the hamlet of Crowtrees.
The trials of the Pendle witches in 1612 are among the most famous witch trials in English history, and some of the best recorded of the 17th century. The twelve accused lived in the area surrounding Pendle Hill in Lancashire, and were charged with the murders of ten people by the use of witchcraft. All but two were tried at Lancaster Assizes on 18–19 August 1612, along with the Samlesbury witches and others, in a series of trials that have become known as the Lancashire witch trials. One was tried at York Assizes on 27 July 1612, and another died in prison. Of the eleven who went to trial – nine women and two men – ten were found guilty and executed by hanging; one was found not guilty.
Alice Nutter is an English musician, best known as part of the anarchist music group Chumbawamba, and writer for theatre, radio and television.
The Samlesbury witches were three women from the Lancashire village of Samlesbury – Jane Southworth, Jennet Bierley, and Ellen Bierley – accused by a 14-year-old girl, Grace Sowerbutts, of practising witchcraft. Their trial at Lancaster Assizes in England on 19 August 1612 was one in a series of witch trials held there over two days, among the most infamous in English history. The trials were unusual for England at that time in two respects: Thomas Potts, the clerk to the court, published the proceedings in his The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster; and the number of the accused found guilty and hanged was unusually high, ten at Lancaster and another at York. All three of the Samlesbury women were acquitted.
The Lancashire Witches is the only one of William Harrison Ainsworth's forty novels that has remained continuously in print since its first publication. It was serialised in the Sunday Times newspaper in 1848; a book edition appeared the following year, published by Henry Colburn. The novel is based on the true story of the Pendle witches, who were executed in 1612 for causing harm by witchcraft. Modern critics such as David Punter consider the book to be Ainsworth's best work. E. F. Bleiler rated the novel as "one of the major English novels about witchcraft".
Malkin Tower was the home of Elizabeth Southerns, also known as Demdike, and her granddaughter Alizon Device, two of the chief protagonists in the Lancashire witch trials of 1612.
Margaret Pearson, also known as the Padiham witch because she lived in the town of Padiham in Lancashire, England, was among those tried with the Pendle witches in the Lancashire witch trials of 1612. This, her third trial for witchcraft, took place on 19 August at Lancaster Assizes in front of Sir James Altham and Sir Edward Bromley.
The Leicester boy trial was one of Leicester's most notorious witchcraft cases, in which a thirteen-year-old boy publicly accused 15 women of causing a possession within him. The case took place in Husbands Bosworth, a small village not far from Leicester in 1616. John Smith fell into a series of violent fits, not even several men could hold him down. He made strange noises, and, as noted in a letter from Alderman Robert Heyrick to his brother Sir William, he would beat himself with inhuman strength, yet somehow remain unharmed. He gave extensive details on their familiars. The two judges, Sir Humphrey Winch and Sir Ranulph Crewe quickly condemned the women, rounding all 15 of them up. Nine of them were tried, found guilty and hanged for allegedly possessing John Smith. The other six were placed in prison to wait their turn. None of them were named before being hanged. King James I happened to be passing through about a month later, and heard what was going on. He called for John Smith to be questioned, and had little trouble determining the child was fraudulent. He broke down, and confessed the truth. Of the six women who had been imprisoned, only five of them were released, as one of them died inside. According to a timeline, the woman who had died told the jailer she was working with the witches against Smith the day before she died. She had begged him not to say anything because the witches would harm her.
Good Omens is a fantasy comedy television series created by Neil Gaiman based on his and Terry Pratchett's 1990 novel of the same name. A co-production between Amazon MGM Studios and BBC Studios, the series was directed by Douglas Mackinnon, with Gaiman also serving as showrunner. Michael Sheen and David Tennant lead a large ensemble cast that also includes Jon Hamm, Miranda Richardson, Michael McKean, Derek Jacobi, Brian Cox, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Frances McDormand as the voice of God, who narrates the series.
Thomas Potts was an English law clerk, and the author of the Discoverie of Witches.