Ill-Wished: Witchcraft and Magic in 19th Century Cornwall

In the last century and before, many Cornish people believed in witchcraft and in the possibility of being cursed or ‘ill-wished’. This book, which centres on multiple newly discovered newspaper articles, demonstrates how deeply the belief in ill-wishing was held, and the levels of desperation and fear it could engender.

It shows the existence of a large number of magical practitioners, known variously as cunning folk, conjurors, white witches, pellars and fortune-tellers, many of whom are named again for the first time. Their powers were various, but they nearly all claimed to be able to prevent, or reverse, the effects of witchcraft.

'this study paints a picture of a people living precariously between two worlds; the world of magic and the rational world in a not too distant, fast-changing past....the accounts are sometimes moving, sometimes absurd, and sometimes unsettling...all of them open a window on an aspect of our culture we have erased through a miasma of collective amnesia...' Steve Patterson (from the foreword).

Dr. Rupert White is editor of The Enquiring Eye: Journal of the Museum of Witchcraft & Magic