Saturday, August 10, 2019

Alice Kyteler: The Kilkenny 'witch' condemned for sorcery

From The Journal

Her KindThe search for witches wasn’t confined to Salem – here in Ireland we had our own witch trial, when Kilkenny’s Dame Alice Kyteler was accused of sorcery. Now a book by Irish author Niamh Boyce takes a fictionalised look at Kyteler’s trial, through the experiences of the woman who died instead of her.

In 1324, Petronella de Meath, Kyteler’s maid, was flogged and burned at the stake. It was Dame Alice Kyteler who was the person who had been condemned for witchcraft (the first person in Ireland to be condemned for this), but Petronella died in her stead.

The story of Alice Kyteler and Petronella has been turned into a novel, written by Boyce, author of the novel The Herbalist. Called Her Kind, it took four years to write, and was a real labour of love for Boyce, as she told The Journal.

read more here @ The Journal

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