June 1, 1563: Witchcraft Laws Go Into Effect In England
England’s Witchcraft Laws were put into effect.
These laws were put into effect on June 1, 1563, and made the practice of witchcraft illegal and outlawed all witchcraft-related activities.
It was called An Act Against Conjurations, Enchantments and Witchcrafts.
The law was not the first in English history against the practice of witchcraft. In 1401, witchcraft was legally recognized as heresy against the church and government, but it was not technically punishable by death, although killing witches did happen.
Henry VIII passed an act in 1542 that defined witchcraft as a felony punishable by death for the first time.
The felon’s property, goods, etc., were also forfeited to the crown upon conviction for witchcraft and you can see how ulterior motives would arise from the nature of the law. Edward VI repealed the law in 1547.
If you were living in England on June 1, 1563, the Act Against Conjurations, Enchantments and Witchcrafts would officially be in effect.
If you were convicted of practicing witchcraft, you served time in prison.
If the conviction had the death or destruction of another person attached to it, you were put to death without clergy to take confession, give absolution, or administer last rites.
James I added to the Act Against Conjurations, Enchantments and Witchcrafts in 1604 to make invocation or communication with spirits a felony punishable by death as well.
Being burned at the stake was actually not very common in Elizabeth I’s and James I’s reigns. Only those who committed heresy or treason were burned, and because witchcraft was turned into a felony, the cases moved to common courts and convicted individuals were hanged.
George II changed the law again in 1736 to say that anyone who “pretended” to conjure spirits, tell the future, etc., was a con artist.
Punishments for con artists were fines and prison time.
It’s important to note the language of these changes because it shifts the perception of witchcraft in the judicial system from something very real and dangerous to something not so real and less dangerous.
A witch under the law was no longer making deals with the devil but in fact knowingly conning people around them.
It shows a shift in society around the Enlightenment.
Despite witchcraft technically being illegal in England until 1951 (yes, the 20th century), people were no longer routinely put to death by the mid-1700s. Helen Duncan was the last person to do time in prison under George II’s 1736 witchcraft laws. She spent nine months in prison for being a clairvoyant, and then she was arrested again in 1956 after the 1951 Fraudulent Mediums Act, which was later repealed in 2008.
