Set in the 17th century against the backdrop of political and religious conflict, the second of Watt's John MacKenzie series is as historically rich and gripping as the last. MacKenzie investigates the murder of a woman accused of witchcraft and he must act quickly when the same accusations are made against the woman's daughter. Superstition clashes with reason as Scotland moves towards the Enlightenment. The 1600s are expertly recreated with a strong sense of history and place.

The Price of Scotland covers a well-known episode in Scottish history, the ill-fated Darien Scheme. It recounts for the first time in almost forty years, the history of the Company of Scotland, looking at previously unexamined evidence and considering the failure in light of the Company's financial records. Douglas Watt offers the reader a new way of looking at this key moment in history, from the attempt to raise capital in London in 1695 through to the shareholder bail-out as part of the Treaty of Union in 1707. With the tercentenary of the Union in May 2007, The Price of Scotland provides a timely reassessment of this national disaster.

Set in Edinburgh in 1690. The body of a wealthy merchant is discovered in his home in the city centre. Was his killing the result of a robbery gone wrong? The vicious mode of his death seems to suggest otherwise. Scotland is in upheaval as political and religious tensions boil, and there is mystery concealed behind the walls of Van Diemen's Land. MacKenzie and Scougall investigate.

Mystery surrounds the murder of Sir Lachlan MacLean, an impoverished Highland laird. With bad debts, family quarrels, and shady associates, Sir Lachlan had many enemies. But while motives are not hard to find, evidence is another thing entirely. Lawyer John MacKenzie and scribe Davie Scougall turn investigator to try to track down the murderer.

I confess that I am a witch. I have sold myself body and soul unto Satan. My mother took me to the Blinkbonny Woods where we met other witches. I put a hand on the crown of my head and the other on the sole of my foot. I gave everything between unto him. Scotland, late seventeeth century. A young woman is accused of witchcraft. Tortured with pins and sleep deprivation, she is using all of her the Scottish witch-hunt began. Probably more than a thousand men and women were exectued for witchcraft before the frenzy died down. When Edinburgh-based Advocate John MacKenzie and his assistant Davie Scougall investigate the suspicious death of a woman denounced as a witch, they find themselves in a village overwhelmed by superstition, resentment and puritanical religion. In a time of spiritual, political and social upheaval, will reason allow MacKenzie to reveal the true evil lurking in the town, before the witch-hunt claims yet another victim?

Scotland in 1688 – a nation bitterly divided by religion and politics where the King’s pro-Catholic policies have unleashed the sectarian hatred of extreme Protestants. Edinburgh is a powder-keg, packed with plotters planning revolution. The mob is on the High Street each night burning effigies of the Pope and causing mayhem. When a nobleman is assassinated by a Catholic fanatic, Protestant anger reaches fever pitch. Lawyers John MacKenzie and Davie Scougall must investigate the killing, but their relationship is tested as never before when they find themselves on opposing sides of the political divide. To make matters worse, a killer is stalking the stinking streets; a disciple of revolution; a butcher in the name of God; a pilgrim of slaughter.

The seventeenth century was one of the most dramatic periods in Scotland's history, with two political revolutions, intense religious strife culminating in the beginnings of toleration, and the modernisation of the state and its infrastructure. This book focuses on the history that the Scots themselves made. The seventeenth century was one of the most dramatic periods in Scotland's history, with two political revolutions, intense religious strife culminating in the beginnings of toleration, and the modernisation of the state and its infrastructure. This book focuses on the history that the Scots themselves made. Previous conceptualisations of Scotland's "seventeenth century" have tended to define it as falling between 1603 and 1707 - the union of crowns and the union of parliaments. In contrast, this book asks how seventeenth-century Scotland would look if we focused on things that the Scots themselves wanted and chose to do. Here the key organising dates are not 1603 and 1707 but 1638and 1689: the covenanting revolution and the Glorious Revolution. Within that framework, the book develops several core themes. One is regional and local: the book looks at the Highlands and the Anglo-Scottish Borders. The increasing importance of money in politics and the growing commercialisation of Scottish society is a further theme addressed. Chapters on this theme, like those on the nature of the Scottish Revolution, also discuss central governmentand illustrate the growth of the state. A third theme is political thought and the world of ideas. The intellectual landscape of seventeenth-century Scotland has often been perceived as less important and less innovative, and suchperceptions are explored and in some cases challenged in this volume. Two stories have tended to dominate the historiography of seventeenth-century Scotland: Anglo-Scottish relations and religious politics. One of the recentleitmotifs of early modern British history has been the stress on the "Britishness" of that history and the interaction between the three kingdoms which constituted the "Atlantic archipelago". The two revolutions at the heart ofthe book were definitely Scottish, even though they were affected by events elsewhere. This is Scottish history, but Scottish history which recognises and is informed by a British context where appropriate. The interconnected nature of religion and politics is reflected in almost every contribution to this volume. SHARON ADAMS is Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Freiburg. JULIAN GOODARE is Reader in History at the University of Edinburgh. Contributors: Sharon Adams, Caroline Erskine, Julian Goodare, Anna Groundwater, Maurice Lee Jnr, Danielle McCormack, Alasdair Raffe, Laura Rayner, Sherrilynn Theiss, Sally Tuckett, Douglas Watt

I confess that I am a witch. I have sold myself body and soul unto Satan. My mother took me to the Blinkbonny Woods where we met other witches. I put a hand on the crown of my head and the other on the sole of my foot. I gave everything between unto him. Scotland, late seventeeth century. A young woman is accused of witchcraft. Tortured with pins and sleep deprivation, she is using all of her the Scottish witch-hunt began. Probably more than a thousand men and women were exectued for witchcraft before the frenzy died down. When Edinburgh-based Advocate John MacKenzie and his assistant Davie Scougall investigate the suspicious death of a woman denounced as a witch, they find themselves in a village overwhelmed by superstition, resentment and puritanical religion. In a time of spiritual, political and social upheaval, will reason allow MacKenzie to reveal the true evil lurking in the town, before the witch-hunt claims yet another victim?

It’s 1689 and the body of a young lawyer has been discovered near Craigleith Quarry, Edinburgh. Meanwhile, in the Highlands, an army is trying to crush the government in the hope of restoring James Stewart to the throne. Bonnie Dundee is at the head of an army in the Highlands looking to crush the government forces and help restore James Stewart. Was the discovered body anything to do with the rise of the Jacobites? Or was it simple the result of an office rivalry? Did the young man perhaps have connections to criminals in the city? Investigative lawyer John MacKenzie and his assistant Scougall search for the truth in this gripping new instalment of Douglas Watt’s John MacKenzie series.

A documentary history of the Alewife (Alosa pseudoharengus) in Maine and Massachusetts from 5,000 B.C. to present. With jokes.