Brita Pipare

Brita, "the wife of Jöran Pipare" (floruit 1595) was an alleged Swedish witch, one of the first in Sweden to be accused and tried for witchcraft.

In September 1593, two women were accused of witchcraft in the city of Stockholm in Sweden; the first one was a woman known as "Margareta from Norrsunda", and the second was Brita.

This was one of the first witch trials held in Sweden, and it is clear that the judges were unsure how to handle the matter, as there had been few similar cases in the country before this and there were no rules about how to conduct such a trial.

Margareta from Norrsunda was known as a "wise woman", who supported herself by practicing medicine; she claimed she could cure sickness, expose thieves, prevent witches from stealing milk from cattle and give rest to the ghosts of deceased by magical words, but denied she had used her powers to hurt people. The court could not take her seriously, and as there was as yet no tradition of torturing accused witches in Sweden, she was acquitted from the charges and let free with the warning to never again use this "superstition".

Brita, however, in the protocol only identified simply as "Brita, wife of Jöran Pipare", was put to trial, accused of having magically caused sickness and damage to a couple of merchants in the city, and although she denied being a witch, she admitted having used "Signeri" and "Lövjeri" (spells and potion-making). These were simply old superstitious habits from folklore that were widely practised and were not normally considered serious, but in this case, it put the judges in a dilemma.

At this point, the judges, under the influence of the witch trials in Denmark and other countries, did discuss examining her and using torture. But in the end, the court decided "not to do more than the law of Sweden allows, which demands six witnesses or a full confession, before any is put to death." No one in the court wanted to be the one responsible for condemning her to death, but neither did they want her to be allowed free. Therefore they compromised: because of her admission of partial guilt, she was simply kept in jail, without sentence, for two years.

In September 1595, Brita was set free from jail and banished from the city of Stockholm, a judgment enthusiastically applauded by her husband Jöran Pipare, who believed her to be a witch; it was he who had insisted on this, as he "believed her as much of evil as the others." It is not known what happened to her after this.

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