The Lancashire Witches - Crossley
Potts’s
Discovery of Witches in the County of Lancaster (Old Series, 6, 1845), proved to be one of the most
important and influential publications of the Chetham Society, transcending
purely local interest to become source material for many subsequent works (both
fiction and non-fiction) on the subject of witchcraft.
Thomas Potts was a London court
clerk, who was sent to Lancaster, charged with the task of making a record of
the witchcraft trials, to serve as a guide to others who might prosecute such
cases. The resulting report, originally published in 1613, was chosen by
Crossley as his first editorial project for the Chetham Society. When
introducing the book to the members, Crossley modestly added: ‘such notes and
preliminary observations as seemed to be required, without overstepping the
bounds of just and necessary illustration have been appended by the editor.’ In fact, the editorial work comprises an introductory essay of seventy-six pages,
plus fifty-one pages of notes at the end of the volume. The scrupulous and
painstaking scholarship not only reveals the extent of Crossley's knowledge of
the subject, but gives a glimpse of the magnitude of his personal collection of
manuscripts and early editions of relevant material. The footnotes to the
introduction demonstrate the editor's extraordinarily wide reading in the
fields of witchcraft and demonology, and at the same time make it clear that
the sources referred to are rare editions and manuscripts in his possession. In
one instance, Crossley even provides the name of the previous owner, and the
lot number in the sale at which he bought the item, which is described as
'perhaps the rarest of the English tracts relating to witchcraft.' This may seem strange to the present-day reader, but it must be remembered that
Crossley was addressing the nineteenth-century antiquarian community, many of
whom would be extremely interested in the provenance of his source material. In an age when many valuable manuscripts were in private
hands, one of the functions of the publishing society was to provide
information on the whereabouts of interesting and unusual works.
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