Alice Kyteler

Irish witch

  • Born: 1280
  • Birthplace: Kilkenny, Ireland
  • Died: After 1324
  • Place of death: England

Cause of notoriety: First suspected of poisoning some or all of her husbands, Kyteler was accused of sorcery in the first major witch trial in the British Isles.

Active: 1299-1323

Locale: Kilkenny, Ireland

Early Life

Alice Kyteler (KIT-luh) came from a Norman family that had settled in Ireland following the conquest of 1169. Her father died in 1298. Alice, as his only child, inherited his property and business.

Career

In 1299, Alice married one of her father’s former associates, William Utlagh (outlaw), a banker twenty years her senior; they had one son, also named William. She extended her house for use as an inn and became a successful hostess. Following Utlagh’s death, Alice married Adam Le Blond, another banker; after Le Blond’s death in 1310 she married Richard De Valle, a wealthy landlord, and then—in 1320—John Le Poer. Her troubles began when Le Poer sought help at a Franciscan abbey after falling ill in 1323.

Following Le Poer’s death, charges were made against Alice by her stepchildren that she had murdered some or all of her husbands by means of poison. These charges occasioned an enquiry by the Franciscan bishop of Ossory, Richard Ledrede. The only contemporary record of the affair is an account of that enquiry’s findings, presumably commissioned by Ledrede. Ledrede was an Englishman, but he had spent considerable time in France, where the Franciscans were very active in the persecution of heretics. Ledrede had been there during the years following the suppression of the Knights Templars by Philippe le Bel, who had used accusations of sorcery as a justification for seizing their wealth. Ledrede was, therefore, well versed in the politics of slander and pursued Lady Alice’s case determinedly. He had several of Lady Alice’s alleged accomplices flogged, including one of her barmaids, Petronilla of Meath—who proved quite inventive when suitably encouraged.

Ledrede concluded that ten people were implicated in the homicides, which had been accomplished by sorcery. Various apparatuses supposedly used in sorcery were procured as evidence, and testimony was amassed—mostly that of Petronilla—regarding the concoction of poisonous potions whose ingredients included worms, the fingernails of corpses, and the swaddling-cloths of unbaptized children. The skull of a decapitated robber was said to have been used as a mixing bowl, and the sorcerous proceedings were alleged to have been illuminated by candles made of human fat. Lady Alice, it was said, had a familiar demon named Robin Artisson who could appear in the form of a cat, a black dog, or a “negro,” and who copulated with her.

Ledrede presented an account of his findings to the lord chancellor of Ireland, Roger Utlagh—Lady Alice’s brother-in-law—who declined to take any action. The bishop attempted to institute proceedings on his own authority but was prevented by the seneschal of Kilkenny, who was related to John Le Poer. The seneschal imprisoned Ledrede, who then excommunicated Lady Alice. Sued for defamation, Ledrede appeared before the parliament in Dublin—but persuaded them that he was in the right. With the support of parliament he was able to take formal legal action against the ten accused, but the court refused to convict them. By this time, however, the rumors of sorcery had created a panic, and Petronilla of Meath was burned on November 3, 1324, in order that the mob might have satisfaction. Lady Alice allegedly fled to England, vanishing from the historical record. Ledrede excommunicated the seneschal but then had to flee prosecution himself; he spent nine years in Avignon before returning to lodge charges of heresy against the archbishop of Dublin.

Impact

The Lady Alice Kyteler affair became famous during the years of the great European witch hunt of the sixteenth century as the first significant sorcery trial in the British Isles. It became a significant local legend; there is still a Kyteler Inn in Kilkenny. The peasantry undoubtedly took great delight in the scandal among the ranks of their Norman overlords, and scholarly fantasists fascinated by the history of witch trials have taken equal delight in Petronilla’s inventions. Whether Alice actually poisoned her husbands remains a matter for conjecture.

Bibliography

Cohn, Norman. Europe’s Inner Demons: An Inquiry Inspired by the Great Witch-Hunt. New York: Basic Books, 1975. A general account of the historical, sociological, and psychological origins of the witch hunt, which pays heed to the peculiar circumstances of the Kyteler trial and the significant precedents it set.

Davidson, L. Sharon, and John O. Ward. The Sorcery Trial of Alice Kyteler: A Contemporary Account. Binghamton, N.Y.: Center for Medieval and Early Renaissance Studies, 1993. An annotated reprint of the document from which all modern accounts of the trial are taken; the commentary is more conscientious than Wright’s, as befits a modern academic study.

Wright, Thomas, ed. Alice Kyteler. A Contemporary Narrative of the Proceedings Against Dame Alice Kyteler, Prosecuted for Sorcery by Richard de Ledrede, Bishop of Ossory, 1324. London: Camden Society, 1843. A different and looser translation of the source document, whose tone lends support to a commentary that is far more credulous than the one provided by Davidson and Ward; the source of many subsequent sensational accounts.