A Victim of Slander: Margrette Jonsdatter

On the 8th October in 1662 an autumn session was held at Vardøhus court on the island of Vardø.

The island of Vardø 

Margrette Jonsdatter, the wife of Styrck Oelsen, alleged that she had been the subject of malevolent gossip and slandered a witch. Although the people present at court attested that they knew nothing about her 'except what was good and honest in every way', Margrette Jonsdatter had made a grave mistake bringing her name to the attention of the Governor of Vardø. Although she left the court officially cleared of any witchcraft, it had been noted in the trial records that indeed slander had been heard about her. She was now a marked woman.

Already Margrette had a reputation for witchcraft

Just over two weeks later Margrette was back in court, this time accusing two women in particular of calling her a witch. The case gives an insight into the paranoia and stress of the women of Vardø. And of the powerful consequences of gossip. During the court proceedings Margrette was unable to prove that the women accused her of witchcraft although she described in detail an argument that took place when she was shovelling snow off the doorstep of one of the women. Here a petty fight with neighbours began to take on more sinister implications. Since Margrette was unable to prove the slander against her, she was fined 4 marks of silver by the court, an amount she was unlikely to be able to come up with since she worked as a servant herself. More disturbing was the notation in the court records of 'her alleged reputation for being versed in witchcraft.'

Indeed the unfortunate Margrette became one of the central figures of the witch panic of 1662 / 1663. Her name was uttered again and again by other accused women. Not only was she named a witch, but she was singled out as their ringleader, and given the name Liren Sand, a reference to the seabird, a petrel, that she apparently transformed into when doing the Devil's work.

Margrette was accused of transforming into a seabird, known as a Liren

But Margrette did not confess. Not at first. Maybe she was not initially tortured, like the other accused women, because she was pregnant. Since confession meant certain death, one can only imagine that it was the extreme pain and duress of the horrific methods of torture that would make a woman admit to witchcraft.
One of the first to be thrown into the wretched Witches Hole, a tiny windowless prison in Vardøhus fortress, yet Margrette Jonsdatter was one of the last to be condemned to the stake. She must have lived that whole desperate winter, half starved in the freezing cold, and watching her neighbours, maybe friends, or other family members, being tortured and sent to the stake. All the while she knew as the baby grew inside her that it was her child alone that kept her alive. They would not condemn a pregnant woman to the stake, but as soon as she gave birth, Margrette's fate would have been sealed. It is hard to comprehend her absolute terror at her knowledge of her impending trial. Moreover the belief was that the accused women who were with child, were carrying Devil's spawn. She was one of those marked as particularly depraved, to have fornicated with the Devil, although she was married.

It was believed that Margrette's baby, was the Devil's child

Margrette desperately tried to defend herself as more and more accusations stacked up against her after each trial. After what must have been about four long dark months in the Witches' Hole, on 9th March she was finally brought before the court. Clearly she had now given birth. What happened to her baby? Was she even allowed to nurse the child? It is likely that Margrette's baby would have been fostered within the community, but if a girl, she would be marked by her mother's reputation. Maybe one day herself be accused of witchcraft, and the desperate cycle would go on and on.

When asked by the Governor to make a full confession before the court, Margrette still refused to do so. Like so many of the other accused women, she 'requested' to be tried by the water ordeal. Imagine those arctic waters in early March, still with heavy snowfall, and ice, in the near dark. As Margrette Jonsdatter was trussed, tied hand to feet, and thrown into the water, her undergarments would have billowed like sails, and the intense cold would have made her inhale sharply. Nature would have made her float. And so to float was to fail the test, for water was sacred and if it did not receive you, than surely you were from the Devil, too evil to be bathed in its purity.

The Water Ordeal

And thus once it had been 'ascertained that she floated on the water like a fishing bob' Margrette stood before the court again, and after 'diligent questioning' (more like aggressive interrogation of a shivering half drowned woman, fragile from recent childbirth,) Margrette finally broke.

And so Margrette got to have her say. Her tale of her descent into life as a consort of the Devil was long and detailed. She described how she learnt the craft from an old milkmaid, who gave it to her in a piece of cheese dipped in milk. She talked about going to the Devil's mountain, Domen, and dancing with the other accused women, drinking beer and wine, and playing board games. Indeed she danced so wildly with the Devil one night that she lost her shoe.  In the guise of a seabird, she described plotting to cast a spell on the previous Governor's sleigh so that it lost control. She took part in beating the fish away from the shore with stalks of seaweed the previous Easter. Along with some of the other women, who had already been executed as witches, Margrette took on the shape of a seal and cast a spell on Captain Jens Ottensen's ship, raising a tremendous storm the previous Autumn. Most serious of all, she was part of a large convention of witches that congregated outside the castle with the purpose of destroying the Governor within.

Of course to our modern minds, these misdeeds appear ludicrous but to the 17th century court in Vardø Margrette Jonsdatter was a dangerous terrorist. She could wield the power of the Devil to kill, and destroy. She was part of a conspiracy to tear down the very Government, threaten the King himself. The court saw no other option but to condemn her to the flames. In their minds, she had made that choice herself, when she agreed to follow the Devil. How could they pity her?

But we must remember she was a poor woman, a wife, a maid, and a mother, her breasts sore and swollen, her heart broken from the loss of her baby, her mind in terror at her fate. All she could hope for was a life free of the Devil, at least the pain of the fire would give her that. The flames would purge her evil, the prayers of those same accusing neighbours would speed her towards redemption, and freedom at last. Flying and swooping over the wild sea, with all the other lost women of Varanger.

Aurora's Light

I discovered the music of Aurora not long after I began writing Where The Ice Burns. I fell in love with her lyrics, and her essence as an artist immediately. At times when I doubted my own creative vision I would play her music, and almost immediately I was able to feel the heartbeat of my characters inside my head, and their words and actions began to flow.

Aurora's album is called 'All My Demons Greeting me as a Friend', the title of which strangely resonates with my investigations into the witch trials in Finnmark. Some of the tracks in particular trigger moments in the book for me. I know of course that Aurora's meaning with her music could be something else entirely, but I think art is as much as about the creator, as the viewer, listener, or reader, and their personal interpretations and journeys. So with the track, Runaway, I saw my main character, Ingeborg, running away from the past, and the stigma of being branded a witch, trying to find a place called home, 'a soft place to fall.'

I have read that Aurora's song, 'Running with the Wolves' is very much about the environmental devastation of our modern age, but for me this song also brings images into my head of the young girls and women accused of witchcraft, imprisoned in the witches' hole and craving to be free, 'to run with the wolves.' These captives were often accused of turning into birds, and cats, and other creatures, escaping to dance with the Devil, and in the line 'I'm running with the wolves tonight' I imagine them wishing that they really could escape their reality by turning into a wild one.

The track 'Under The Water' immediately calls to mind the cruel water ordeal that many of the accused women were forced to undergo. The theory behind this test was that water was sacred so that if the water received the woman and she sank she was not a witch, but if she floated she was. Stripped to their underclothes, the accused were trussed hands to ankles and thrown in the Arctic water in the middle of the winter. It is surprising they did not freeze to death. But, not one of the accused drowned. All floated 'like a bob' upon the water. As I listen to Aurora's song I imagine the women wishing that they could drown, willing themselves to drop to the bottom of the fjord, an escape from the fiery stake and peace at last.

 The song that resonates with me the most powerfully is Winter Bird. Every single line seems to speak of the pain and suffering of the persecuted.
'My tears are always frozen / I can see the air I breathe/ Got my fingers painting pictures on the glass in front of me / Lay me by the frozen river where the boats have passed me by / All I need to remember is how it was to feel alive.'
All the captive women were like winter birds, trapped and in torment.

Aurora is around the same age as my main narrative voice, Ingeborg, and the other girls accused of witchcraft in the novel. To see Aurora singing brings these young women alive again for me, with their shared power and purity of spirit. The fact that she is Norwegian herself, and from Bergen, makes her words and music even more special to me. I feel that listening to her music has added more depth to the mood and atmosphere of the novel. A few months ago I saw Aurora singing live. It was an unforgettable experience and I had the pleasure of talking to her for a few minutes afterwards. It was important to me to let her know just how much her music has inspired my work as a writer. Aurora is a northern star, her light and inspiration enduring.

Sami words, and Sami Spirit

Mari Boine 

I have been listening to the music of Mari Boine since I came to live in Norway. She has always transported me to a place of intense creativity. Her music meant even more to me as I wrote Where The Ice Burns because of its setting in Finnmark, and the importance of the Sami experience in the novel. The first victims of the witch hunts in seventeenth century Finnmark were Sami.

Mari Boine Singing Elle

I love the sounds of Sami words, although I do not know their meaning. Once I read the English translations I know that the spirit of them have infused me. The deep connection between nature, the landscape of the north, and the human heart is a constant inspiration in my writing. 

The song Elle from the album It Ain't Necessarily Evil was one I played time again. Elle is on the soundtrack to the film, The Kautokeino Rebellion, the true story of a revolt in the town of Kautokeino in northern Norway in 1852 by a group of Sami because of injustices against their people by the Norwegian authorities. I found the film very moving. 

Image from the Kautokeino Rebellion

I have included the Sami lyrics to Elle, as well as their English translation to show you the poetry and the beauty of Mari Boine's musical vision. But it is not just her words, but also her voice that has such power. One moment fragile, the next forceful, as if she can sing as a child, and a wise woman. 

Mari Boine

So here are the Sami lyrics to Elle, followed by the English translation that I found on the link below.

Elen Skum (Elle)

De rahpasii giđđaeatnu fas

De dulvvi miel luoittašeimmet

Jiekŋaidja gárttai viimat vuollánit

Bieggabártnažan

De girdilin biellocizažiin

De joradin guovssahasain

Vuoibmás vuoiŋŋ ahagas šogádeimme ovttas

Mu bieggabártnažan

De rahtase jienaheamit fas

De golggiihii sátnerávdnji

Gálbmon gáttiin go mii viimat gávnnadeimmet

Bieggabártnažan

Go váccašat ealloravddas de...

Go guođuhat suhkesoivviid...

Almmiravda ealaska ja sugada

Mu bieggabártnažan

Image from the film Kautokeino Rebellion

English lyrics to Elle

And to the spring river opened up again

And so we let ourselves drift with the flood

The night of ice had to give in

My dearest son of the wind

Surely I flew with the bluethroat

Surely I danced with the northern light

In the strongest breath we exhaled as one

My dearest son of the wind

The lips of the silenced people bursted out in speech

The stream of words once again were flowing

Over the frozen riverbands when we finally came together

My dearest son of the wind

When you're walking alongside the reindeer herd

When you guard the reindeer oxen with the great antlers

All of the horizon comes alive and starts to move

My dearest son of the wind

(The lyrics were found on this link:http://lyricstranslate.com/en/elen-skum-elle-elle.html)

Three Scandinavian songstresses, three muses

The Curse by Agnes Obel was one of the first songs to inspire Where The Ice Burns

From the very beginning when I began work on Where The Ice Burns, music accompanied me on my journey as a writer. Every morning, before I began writing, I would listen to certain pieces of music by three Nordic singers in particular, all of whom had a huge impact on how I wanted my novel to feel. The fact that all three of these musicians were from Scandinavia meant even more to me, as their poetry fed into my own creative muse. 

When I write, I do so in silence, but the music of the Danish singer Agnes Obel: http://www.agnesobel.com/ 

the Sami singer Mari Boine: http://www.mariboine.no/, 

and Aurora from Bergen (where I live in Norway): http://www.aurora-music.com/  

vibrated in my heart as I began to type away. The suggestion of their lyrics created images in my head, and made me want to write fiction that would be as moving as their music.

On this blog, I will feature songs that had a specific impact on the writing of Where The Ice Burns and today is the turn of the song 'The Curse' by the Danish singer, Agnes Obel. This song spoke so directly to me of the events that occurred in the winter of 1662/1663 in Finnmark.

Obel sings, 'The Curse ruled from the underground down by the shore' and to me I could see the haunting landscape of Vardø island in Finnmark, and the wretched stretch of land called Steilneset where the condemned women were burnt. In an online interview (http://amusicblogyea.com/2014/02/02/gimme-your-answers-an-interview-w-agnes-obel/) Agnes Obel talks about what inspired her song, The Curse:

The Curse was also inspired by a book I was reading at the time about how the human mind is wired to give meaning to things that might just have been chance, creating a narrative fallacy of our lives. I think the consequence of this can be both positive and negative, a curse or/and a blessing, making us create beautiful things, and see symbolic meaning in otherwise random things, but also making us blind and potentially destructive and conceited.

On a subliminal level for me the song The Curse touches upon the belief system of the seventeenth century. How dark magic was attributed to the death of a lamb, or the poor yield of fish, or a storm that wrecked a ship. Indeed, the true curse of witch hunting was the dark meaning attached to random acts of chance.

Sorcerers of the North

Young Sami man with reindeer

The Sami are people of the nomadic herding tradition in northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and the Kola peninsula of Russia. During the time of witch hunting in early Modern Europe they were known as The Lapland Witches, notorious for performing different kinds of magic. The opinion of Norwegian poet and preacher Petter Dass (1647 - 1707) in his book The Trumpet of the North that the Sami had special knowledge of witchcraft, was widespread in literature of the period. Even Shakespeare mentioned Lapland sorcerers in his Comedy of Errors.

Edition of The Trumpet of the North by Petter Dass 1647 - 1707

The State authorities wished to control the indigenous people of the North and used accusations of witchcraft as a means of keeping them suppressed. Sami men were accused of casting magic spells, known as 'gand', which could travel great distances like poisonous arrows. Petter Dass described the spells as swarms of black flies:

'The Lapp may well use his old 'gann' from afar;

The flies of Beelzebub powerful are

And bit where the witchcraft determines.'

The Sami were also accused of weather magic, though many Norwegian sailors paid Sami for good sailing winds. Most of all the Sami practice of Shamanism and the use of ritualistic drums, called runebomme, were described as invoking Satan.

Image from Johan Schefferus' book 'Lapponia' published in 1673. 

This book had a big influence on European scholars' perception of the invocation of Demonic forces by the Sami Shaman

In Finnmark the first to be executed for witchcraft in the early seventeenth century were Sami men, and this  in part was due to the fact that King Christian IV was obsessed with the sorcery of the Sami men since he had travelled to the far north, and experienced such tempests and storms that he believed only Satan could be the cause of them. 

 King Christian IV of Denmark-Norway believed the Sami were Devil's sorcerers

Out of 24 men accused of witchcraft in 17th century Finnmark, 16 were Sami, and 13 of these men lost their lives as a result. 

In contrast 77 women were executed, only six of whom were Sami women. The vast majority of those accused of witchcraft in Finnmark were in fact Norwegian women, the wives, mothers, and maidservants of the fishing community. In the end it was the women living within the Norwegian communities that were considered the greater threat, the enemy from within. 

The Steilneset Memorial to the persecuted of the North

The Steilneset Memorial to the victims of the seventeenth century witch hunt in Finnmark was a unique artistic collaboration between Louise Bourgeois, American artist, born in France, and the Swiss architect Peter Zumthor, and was opened in 2011. It was Bourgeois' last major work before she died.

Situated on the execution site on the island of Vardø, the memorial is one of the most intense and humbling visual experiences I have ever encountered. I visited in mid-winter, entering Peter Zumthor's work first along a wooden gangway. Its external structure was reminiscent of the fishing racks of Finnmark, its situation precarious perched on the very edge of the island. 

 Within the structure was a long seemingly endless corridor. Dark and haunting in winter-time, a bare bulb of light represented each life taken, and the story of every single person executed as a witch in Finnmark lined the walls. Tiny squares of glass looked out upon the raging sea. As the moaning wind shook the whole structure, I felt vulnerable and powerless. 

From Zumthor's piece I walked across the execution site towards the glowing light inside Louise Bourgeois installation entitled, 'The Damned, The Possessed & The Beloved'.

What at first appeared simple, a metal chair with a flame flaring from its seat within a circle of concrete, took on an horrific aspect once I looked in the huge disproportioned circular mirrors angled around and above it. I was disturbed by the impact of seeing my distended self in the flames. To stumble outside again and find myself staring across the wild arctic waters, looking at the hill Domen, the mythic entranceway to Hell, intensified the experience as I imagined this would be the last thing the persecuted would see before being put to the flames. 

The Condemned Women of 1662 / 1663

Steilneset Memorial to the condemned in Vardø

Twenty women died as a result of witchcraft persecutions between October 1662 and April 1663. Eighteen burnt at the stake and two were tortured to death.

My desire is to let their voices be heard with the tenderness they deserve. The women were: Dorette Lauritsdatter, Maren Sigvaldsdatter, Ragnild Clemidsdatter, Maren Mogensdatter, Maren Henningsdatter, Maritte Rasmusdatter, Sigri Olsdatter, Ingeborg, Peder Krog’s wife (tortured to death), Guri,Laurit’s wife, Sølve Nilsdatter, Ellen Gundersdatter, Karen Andersdatter, Margrete Jonsdatter, Sigri Jonsdatter, Gundelle Olsdatter, Dorette Poulsdatter (tortured to death), Barbra Olsdatter, Bodel Clausdatter, Birgitte Olufsdatter, and Karen Olsdatter.

The following women were acquitted at the court of appeal on 23rd June 1663:

Gertrude Siversdatter, Ragnild Endresdatter, Magdalene Jacobsdatter, and Karen Nilsdatter.

Six girls between the ages of six and thirteen were acquitted: Maren Olufsdatter, Ingeborg Iversdatter, Karen Iversdatter,Karen Nilsdatter, Kirsten Sørensdatter and Siri Pedersdatter.

Later in 1671, a Sami woman by the name of Elli died in custody accused of witchcraft. 

During the witchcraft trials in Finnmark in Northern Norway 135 persons were tried, 91 of which were executed, most of them at the stake.

The last person to die in a witch trial in Finnmark was Anders Poulson in 1692, a Sami man of 100 years of age accused of having a runebomme, a Sami drum used in rituals, and practising shamanism.  

Reconstruction of Anders Poulson's runebomme, Tromsø Museum

The original is in the Kulturhistorisk Museum in Oslo