Brooke reports that Blackburne spoke of a “witch pap”. Askwith reports the paired insults in the shop. The pap wording belongs to Brooke’s account. The reviewed papers contain no sentence.
Scope
Partial reviewed manuscript readings
Notes on the edition
Editorial note: Four-cause editorial context
Why did accusations against Grace Rayner lead to ecclesiastical defamation proceedings in these four records, and what evidence would have given them enough social credibility to become a sustained story of bewitchment? The four defendants are men. These proceedings preserve repeated combinations of sexual insult and witchcraft accusation. In the four reviewed files, no woman is documented independently accusing Grace of witchcraft, endorsing injury by magic, or supplying an afflicted household’s account. Mary Williamson reports men’s speech. In Walker her surviving wording securely gives “whore”; her Junior evidence concerns Charlesworth saying he believed Grace was a witch. The reviewed files preserve no corroborated domestic account of bewitchment. Editorial hypothesis attributed to the project’s new interpretive review. Accounts of illness, care, household production, livestock loss and neighbourly experience are comparative avenues for asking how supernatural credibility might develop. The absence of comparable testimony here may help explain the trajectory visible in these records. The surviving files leave wider belief, women’s views outside the testimony, the men’s credibility and any unrecorded prosecution unresolved.
Editorial account: Brooke attributes the witch accusation to Blackburne and places the reported speech in the shop setting. Overwriting obscures the sequence and surrounding words.
CP.H.4987 manuscript, CP.H.4987 saved manuscript images, Borthwick Institute for Archives, University of York CP.H.4987, CP.H.4987 image 4, fourth article, 10 January 1682 as written · context
Grace Rayner … was a witch and had a witch pap [provisional excerpt]
CP.H.4987 manuscript, CP.H.4987 saved manuscript images, Borthwick Institute for Archives, University of York CP.H.4987, CP.H.4987 image 4, fourth article, 10 January 1682 as written · context
Editorial account: Askwith reports that Blackburne called Grace a whore and a witch in the shop. The continuation describes repetition and damage to her good name. The visible passage does not substantiate the previously attributed pap wording.
CP.H.4987 manuscript, CP.H.4987 saved manuscript images, Borthwick Institute for Archives, University of York CP.H.4987, CP.H.4987 images 4–5 · context
she was a whore and a witche [working excerpt, image 5 left]
CP.H.4987 manuscript, CP.H.4987 saved manuscript images, Borthwick Institute for Archives, University of York CP.H.4987, CP.H.4987 images 4–5 · context
People
- Grace Rayner: Target of attributed witchcraft accusation.
- Richard Blackburne: Shopholder identified across the Junior, Blackborn, and Walker causes. The shared identity links the local setting; it does not transfer testimony from one file into another.
- Thomas Brooke: Witness whose separate depositions preserve different relationship durations. Keep his green-side account distinct from the shop and house accounts.
- Timothy Askwith: Witness, about twenty-six. His deposition is the bridge between this cause and the separate Walker and Blackborn proceedings, not proof that their allegations were identical.
Events
- Editorial account: The opening identifies Grace Rayner and Richard Blackburne. The full libel remains unresolved.
- Editorial account: Brooke attributes the witch accusation to Blackburne and places the reported speech in the shop setting. Overwriting obscures the sequence and surrounding words.
- Editorial account: Askwith reports that Blackburne called Grace a whore and a witch in the shop. The continuation describes repetition and damage to her good name. The visible passage does not substantiate the previously attributed pap wording.
Sources
- CP.H.4987 manuscript, CP.H.4987 saved manuscript images, Borthwick Institute for Archives, University of York CP.H.4987 (court record)
- Grace Rayner and Richard Blackborn / Blackburne — reading edition, Witching reading edition; prepared 2026-10-26; edition version 1.0; reading identifier rayner_charlesworth_senior-reading-v1. (edition)