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sticking a red-hot poker into the cream would be quickly felt by the witch. More elaborately, when a farmer living near Skipton in the eighteenth century believed his cattle to be bewitched, a local wise-man instructed him that on a specified day he was to kindle a fire behind his house and gather his family round. They were then to take the heart from one of the diseased cows and boil it in a pan suspended over the fire; when the organ was removed, each member of the family was to stick a pin into it. The next stage of the procedure varied: sometimes the heart was burnt on the fire; sometimes it was placed in the chimney; and sometimes it was buried in consecrated ground.
    When an individual was suffering from an illness believed to be the result of maleficium, a witch-bottle was used. Typically, the hair, fingernails and urine of the target was placed with a great quantity of pins or nails in an earthenware jar which was then heated over a fire. Again, it was believed that the link an enchantment established between a witch and her victim was such that this tactic would cause great pain to her. It was imagined she would feel the heat from the fire and the symbolic stabbing of the pins, and she would be forced to reverse the initial spell to spare herself this agony. Her only other hope of release was for the jar to shatter during the heating process or if she could get to it herself and destroy it.
    Often this would also have the effect of identifying the malefactor. One story relates that when the child of a Halifax family fell ill, the above procedure was followed and the witch-bottle was left to heat on the fire overnight. During the early hours of the morning, there was a rap at the door and outside stood the notorious Auld Betty in an evident state of distress. She asked if they needed their fire ‘riddling’ (to sieve out the ash) but unfortunately such a transparent attempt to access the house and destroy the witch-bottle was immediately recognised. She was chased from the door and shortly thereafter, the child began to recover, suggesting Auld Betty had been forced to lift her spell.
    A typical witch-bottle was unearthed around 1960 at Halton East, near Skipton, buried upside down in a field, apparently far from the nearest habitation. It was found to hold several lumps of clay, each one pierced through; altogether there were thirty-five pins, twenty-two nails and sixteen needles. This location was unusual, however. More often witch-bottles were placed in the fabric of the building or beneath the threshold to preserve the household from further mischief and they have frequently been discovered in such contexts many years later. A particularly unique example was discovered in the 1970s, buried beneath the doorstep of an outbuilding attached to a seventeenth-century farmhouse at Ogden, near Halifax. The jar contained some form of liquid, which could well have been urine, and two fragile clay figurines, doubtless intended to represent the bewitched individuals.
    It is quite common for other magically protective artefacts to be found in the fabric of old buildings, especially near threshold locations such as doorways, windows, chimneys and eaves. Such items are described as ‘apotropaic’ meaning ‘to ward off evil’. Amongst the most common discoveries were old shoes, which have been turned up in such large quantities and in such unusual locations that accidental deposition can be ruled out. Nobody has yet produced a convincing explanation as to why old shoes were regarded as an appropriate defence against evil. In a study of apotropaic practices, archaeologist Ralph Merrifield suggested that they were ‘considered an effective trap for an evil spirit’, based on a fourteenth-century legend concerning a Buckinghamshire priest who cast the Devil into an old boot.

    A witch-bottle discovered at Ogden near Halifax. (Kai Roberts)
    Not quite as ubiquitous but rather more memorable is the desiccated cat. These are