"Hatcht up in Villanie and Witchcraft": Historical, Fictional, and Fantastical "Recuperations" of the Witch Child

The witch child manifests at the intersection of history and fiction, revealing as uncanny the desire to capture a "real" child. This article considers the BBC Four documentary The Pendle Witch Child, and Joseph Delaney's fantasy series The Wardstone Chronicles, to explore how cultural constructions of the child inform representations of witch children in the wake of the four-hundred-year anniversary of the Pendle witches. Historical narratives that attempt to "recuperate" as real an innocent child victim are destabilized by an uncanny witch child who resists this recuperation. The witch child is uncanny because it reveals what ought to have remained hidden: there is no real child. Fantasy narratives have been viewed with some scorn in recent commentary on the Pendle witches. However, this article argues that fantasy's disregard for historical veracity allows space for the uncanny witch child to become something more than simply horrifying. Without a need to capture a real child, fantasy can allow the witch child to inhabit multiple possibilities.