Triora’s Witch Trials: A History of Accusation

Triora · Liguria

The tradition and its place

In 1587–88, people in Triora were investigated and accused of witchcraft. The local ethnographic museum recounts the trials. This is history about legal proceedings, hunger, fear and vulnerable people, not evidence of a real witches’ coven. Calling Triora a “witch village” can attract curiosity; it can also conceal what happened to the accused.

Reading the evidence

An archive can reveal who made an accusation and how power operated; it cannot turn testimony obtained in coercive conditions into an account of supernatural events. The respectful way to tell the story is to hold onto names, dates and uncertainty, while allowing local contemporary artists to reinterpret the figure separately.

Another angle

A trial narrative involves real people, even when their stories have been turned into tourist folklore. Comparing museum accounts with the surviving legal record can show how the word “witch” was applied from outside. That distinction matters especially where an accusation shaped a person’s fate.