Suffolk Archives have received a £22,000 grant to support an upcoming exhibition exploring Suffolk’s brutal witch trials of the mid 1600s, featuring prestigious loans rarely seen outside of London.
Suffolk archives are delighted to have received £22,000 from the Art Fund’s Weston Loan Programme. The grant will support their upcoming exhibition Witches: Suffolk’s Dark Legacy at The Hold Ipswich from 16 October 2026 to 21 February 2027. It explores the brutal Suffolk witch trials of the mid 1600s, which saw nearly 200 people accused of witchcraft.
The exhibition will also look at how the image of the witch has evolved through time, from the old hag in a pointed hat to the self-sufficient witch of TV and film today. Beautifully illustrated through books, prints, and works of art including John Waterhouse’s Magic Circle, on loan from the Tate.
There are prestigious loans from the V&A, Tate Britain, The Wellcome Collection (which is loaning Suffolk Archives the pictured 1720 woodcut of Witches giving babies to the devil), Bodleian Libraries, the National Archives and the British Library including the Malleus Maleficarum, King James I’s Daemonologie, and Witchfinder General Mathew Hopkins’ A Discovery of Witches. There will also be an accompanying trail map.