DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17809655
title: Dataset for "'I will say all the wicked things you want to hear': patterns of accusation, coercion and investigative direction in early witchcraft trials (Vaud, 1448–1465)"

description: This dataset supports the under-review article "'I will say all the wicked things you want to hear': patterns of accusation, coercion and investigative direction in early witchcraft trials (Vaud, 1448–1465)"

Study abstract:

This study combines close reading with perspectives offered by data representation and digital methods to analyze a series of nine witch trials in the Vaud region (then duchy of Savoy, now Switzerland) conducted between 1448 and 1465. These trials – against Jaquetus Durie, Catherine Quiqctat, Petrus Mugnier, Petrus Chavaz, Petrus Anthonius, Petrus dou Chanoz, Guillelmus Girod, Johanetta Anyo, and Perrissona Gappit – are documented in the register Archives cantonales vaudoises (ACV) Ac 29 and represent some of the earliest documented inquisition processes against diabolical witchcraft. Exploration of the circumstances of the trials and content of the testimonies is complemented by data-led analyses of how the deponents accused others. Patterns in how accusations accumulated over multiple depositions and under torture are identified, providing a comparative perspective on how different deponents reacted to pressure and the purposes for which inquisitors applied it. By capturing and mapping the ties of incrimination, the study also clarifies the points of convergence – or rather their striking absence – between accusations and spaces of accusation across the trials. Despite inquisitorial efforts to build cases through corroborated denunciations, actionable overlaps proved vanishingly rare, and the spatial associations of alleged accomplices revealed limited socio-geographic continuity in witchcraft activity. The effective failure to reconstruct a coherent “sect” at a socio-geographic level may have contributed to the crystallization of certain narrative elements – such as detailed descriptions of the witches’ sabbaths, pacts with the Devil, cannibalistic suppers – that came to define the trials for witchcraft in the Vaud region.

 

This supporting dataset contains data derived from the nine extent records of witchcraft trials that occurred in the Vaud region (in modern day Switzerland) between 1448 and 1465: those of Jaquetus Durie (1448), Catherine Quiqctat (1448), Petrus Mugnier (1448), Petrus Chavaz (1448), Petrus Anthonius (1449), Petrus dou Chanoz (1458), Guillelmus Girod (1458), Johanetta Anyo (1461) and Perrissona Gappit (1465).

The data derives from the editions of these records, found in:





Georg Modestin, Le diable chez l'évêque: chasse aux sorciers dans le diocèse de Lausanne: vers 1460 (Lausanne, 1999) – trials of Petrus dou Chanoz, Guillelmus Girod, Johanetta Anyo and Perrissona Gappit.




Martine Ostorero, Kathrin Utz Tremp and Georg Modestin, eds., Inquisition et sorcellerie en Suisse romande: le registre Ac 29 des Archives cantonales vaudoises (1438-1528) (Lausanne, 2007) – trials of Petrus Chavaz (1448), Petrus Anthonius (1449).




Martine Ostorero, Folâtrer avec les démons: sabbat et chasse aux sorciers à Vevey (1448) (Lausanne, 2008) – trials of Jaquetus Durie (1448), Catherine Quiqctat (1448), Petrus Mugnier (1448).



All records are found in the same manuscript: 





Lausanne, Archives cantonales vaudoises (ACV), Ac 29.



The dataset contains six sheets:1. A table of defendants ("defendant_deponents" sheet; n=9)





“person_id”, “person_label”, “person_sex”: specifies the defendant’s identity and sex.




“trial_location_id”, “trial_location_label”, “trial_location_modern”, “trial_location_lat”, “trial_location_long”: specifies the location of their trial and its geographic coordinates.




“person_location_id”, “person_location_label”, “person_location_modern”, “person_location_lat”, “person_location_long”, specifies the location ascribed to the defendant and its coordinates.




“person_location_localization”, “person_location_localization_note”: specifies the quality of localization (precise, approximate, or ambiguous – the latter where other possible geolocations of the toponym are plausible) and any editorial note regarding geolocation choice.



 

2. A table of non-defendant witnesses whose depositions were included in the trial documentation ("witness_deponents" sheet"; n=4). 





“person_id”, “person_label”, “person_sex”: specifies the witnesses’s identity and sex.




“at_trial_of_id”, “at_trial_of_label”: specifies the defendant whose trial they appeared at.




“person_location_id”, “person_location_label”, “person_location_modern”, “person_location_lat”, “person_location_long”, specifies the location ascribed to the witness and its coordinates.




“person_location_localization”, “person_location_localization_note”: specifies the quality of localization (precise, approximate, or ambiguous – the latter where other possible geolocations of the toponym are plausible) and any editorial note regarding geolocation choice.



 

3. A table of individuals accused by the defendants and non-defendant witnesses in their depositions ("accused_individuals" sheet, n=178). NB. This table includes the names of 4 of the defendants (Jaquetus Durie, Catherine Quicqtat, Petrus Mugnier, and Perrissona Gappit), since they were cited as accomplices or otherwise denounced by other deponents in the surviving documentation.





“person_id”, “person_label”, “person_sex”: specifies the accused person’s identity and sex.




“person_location_id”, “person_location_label”, “person_location_modern”, “person_location_lat”, “person_location_long”, specifies the location ascribed to the accused and its coordinates.




“person_location_localization”, “person_location_localization_note”: specifies the quality of localization (precise, approximate, or ambiguous – the latter where other possible geolocations of the toponym are plausible) and any editorial note regarding geolocation choice.




“condemned_/_appeared_before_court”: specifies whether we know the person to have been tried and condemned for heresy / witchcraft outside of the context of these trials (“condemned”), or otherwise to have appeared before court on the same account (“appeared”).




“deponent_accuser_ids”, “deponent_accuser_names”: specifies the defendant/s or non-defendant witness/es who accused the individual. Where there are multiple accusers, their details are separated by “ #” in each column



 

4. A table of witches’ sabbath locations mentioned in the depositions ("sabbath_locations" sheet, n=21).





“sabbath_location_id”, “sabbath_location_name”, “sabbath_location_modern”, “sabbath_location_lat”, “sabbath_location_long”: specifies the location ascribed to the sabbath and its coordinates.




“sabbath_location_localization”, “sabbath_location_localization_note”: specifies the quality of localization (precise, approximate, or ambiguous – the latter where other possible geolocations of the toponym are plausible) and any editorial note regarding geolocation choice.




“attending_defendant_ids”, “attending_defendants_names”: specifies the defendant who confessed to attending a sabbath or sabbaths in that location.



 

5. A chronological table of trial events (e.g. depositions) at which deponents offered (or were asked to offer) testimony (“testimony_events” sheet, n=53).





“event_id”, “event_date”: specifies the trial event and its date.




“event_location_id”, “event_location_label”, “event_location_modern”, “event_location_lat”,  “event_location_long”: specifies the location of the trial event and its geographic coordinates.




“deponent_id”, “”deponent_label”: specifies the identity of the defendant or non-defendant witness who was the deponent at the trial event.




“inquisitor_id”, “inquisitor_label”: specifies the identity of the inquisitor who oversaw the trial event




“torture”: specifies whether torture was applied immediately preceding or during the deposition.




“accused_id”, “accused_label”: specifies the individuals accused by the deponent at the trial event. Where there are multiple accused, their details are separated by “ #” in each column.



 

6. An edge list of individual accusations (chronologically ordered) used to make the spatial network projection featured as fig. 5 of the article (“accusation_edges” sheet, n=262). An accusation is counted as an accusatory mention by a deponent of another individual in the context of a specific trial event. If the same accused is denounced by the same accuser across multiple trial events, each represents a separate accusation.





“accusation_id”, “accusation_date”: specifies the identifier and date of the accusation




“accuser_id”, “accuser_label”, “accurser_location_id”, “accuser_location_label”, “accuser_lat”, “accuser_long”: specifies the identity of the accuser, as well as their associated location and its coordinates




“accused_id”, “accused_label”, “accused_location_id”, “accused_location_label”, “accused_lat”, “accused_long”: specifies the identity of the accused, as well as their associated location and its coordinates




“distance_kms”: specifies the distance (in kilometres) between the locations of the accuser and accused.