Torsåker witch trials

The witch trial reached Torsåker as a result and a consequence of the great wave of witch hysteria known as stora oväsendet, which had begun to flourish over Sweden after the trial caused by Gertrud Svensdotter against Märet Jonsdotter in Dalarna in 1668.

Sweden did not have separation of church and state, causing state-employed Lutheran priests to abide by government instructions.

Hornæus was zealous in his work — by the time his task was complete, 71 people had been beheaded and burned.

The priest had two boys stand at the door of the church to identify the witches by an invisible mark on their forehead as they went in.

People gasped, but she, as she told her grandson who wrote down the story, then slapped the boy, and he quickly apologized when he saw who he had pointed at, and said he had been blinded by the sun.

After the last sermon in the church of Torsåker, the prisoners, 71 people (65 women and 6 men) were led to the place of execution.

Many fainted on the way out of weakness and death wish, and those were carried by their families up until the place of execution, which was in the middle in the parish, half a mile from all the three churches, and called "The Mountain of the Stake."

The families of the executed then went home, according to Britta Rufina, without showing any emotions, as if they were completely numbed.

[8] [9] The witch-hunt in the country continued; after the Torsåker witch trial, it reached the capital, where it lasted until 1676 and ended with the execution of Malin Matsdotter during the Katarina witch trials in Stockholm, after which the authorities proved that the child witnesses were lying and it had been a mistake.