A Scottish town is to mark Halloween by granting official legal pardons to 81 supposed witches executed during a frenzy of religious fervour about 400 years ago, officials said.
Descendants of some of the women put to death in Prestonpans, just east of Edinburgh, will join a ceremony on Sunday to mark the witch hunts in the town during the late 16th and 17th centuries.
More than 3500 Scots were executed amid a resurgence in Catholic feeling during the Reformation period that reached a peak under King James VI, later crowned King James I of England.
Many were condemned on evidence such as owning a black cat or cursing a neighbour who subsequently fell ill.
Among those executed was one woman who confessed under torture to leading a coven responsible for a storm intended to sink the king's ship as he returned from Denmark with his fiancee.
The 81 pardons were obtained in the Prestoungrange Baronial Court, an ancient body which will be abolished next month under a law removing the last vestiges of feudal authority in Scotland.
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At the ceremony, the pardons will be publicly declared, and a wreath laid at a specially commissioned plaque.
Local historian Roy Pugh, who presented evidence about the witches' evidence to the court, said it would be a "simple and solemn" ceremony.
"It will recognise the crimes that were perpetrated against these people," he said.
"It's too late to apologise, but it's a sort of symbolic recognition that these people were put to death by hysterical ignorance and paranoia."
A spokeswoman for the court, Adele Conn, said the pardons would be for convictions under the Witchcraft Act 1735.
"There were some concerns that we've got the ceremony on Halloween, but we couldn't have a witches remembrance in the middle of March," she said.
"It has a serious purpose; we're respecting these unfortunate individuals.