NAME: Robert Southworth

AGE: 25

DESCRIPTION: Robert is a tall lean man with russet coloured hair and brown eyes.  He has a round face, but with an angular nose and thin lips his features are stark.  He has a clear complexion and seems almost boyish when clean shaven.  Occasionally he chooses to grow a beard which is reddish in colour.  His facial hair tends to equate as to how he wishes to be perceived, a man of distinguished gravitas or a playful youth.

PERSONALITY:

Robert can be most described as curious.  It is curiosity that sends him down the rabbit holes of his ancestors.  A heady mix of inquisitiveness to learn more of the secrets of the Hermetic sciences mixed with guilt and shame of the extended family's parochial Catholicism.  He is a man of contrast and complexity.  He is a gentleman of the country, rigid in town, never to be seen carousing like a dipsomaniac.  And yet he has a thirst for knowledge and learning, a desire to know more and more about who he is and the secrets of his grandmother and her mother before her.

Robert can be considered kind and generous, yet formal to outsiders, including those of his own family but he is also deeply passionate, considered in his opinions and behind his eyes lies a critical mind.  He is polite to the tenant farmers and traders he deals with.  He is equally comfortable with the merchants from further afield.

Where he changes is by the light of the moon when fires are lit by the river as the faeries and the sprites dance, for then Robert is not the manager of farmers and the trading of crops.  He is of the Coven.

BACKGROUND:

Robert is the eldest son of Edmunde and Corrine Southworth born on the 21st December 1629.  His birth carrying auspicious significance coming on a Full Moon at the longest night commencing the ancient celebration of Yule.  He has two younger sisters named Jane and Elizabet, both of still yet in their teens whom are nevertheless studious in the craft.

Edmunde Southworth is the third son of John and Jane Southworth, the disowned son of Sir John Southworth and the accused witch of 1612 respectively.  Edmunde dismisses the accusations of his mother as being a witch as vile calumny whilst rigorously defending his deceased father's reputation as one not fit to bear the Southworth name.  Edmunde has retained his father's Anglican faith, much to the umbrage of the wider Southworth family.  Indeed Edmunde has cast his own path amongst the gentry of Preston as relations with the Protestant de Hoghton's are equally strained.

The trouble in the family all started almost a hundred years ago.  During the Reformation the Southworth's like most of the surrounding area remained staunchly Catholic.  In the purges that followed priests were hidden at the Southworth home, Samlesbury Hall and Mass conducted clandestinely.  However it was a tumultuous time and when the King's men came Father Cribden was brutally beheaded in the Priest's hiding room.

A young John Southworth, (later to be Sir) was impassioned at such cruelty and was possessed with a zeal to defend the faith.  Indeed as the new century turned he committed murder most foul of Thomas de Hoghton and two of his friends for having the temerity of seeing his sister Dorothy unaccompanied.  The idea of a Protestant having a secretive dalliance with his sister was abominable!  The vile Protestant bones were buried in secret at Samlesbury Hall, escalating a neighbourly dispute to a familial blood feud with the de Hoghton family

However worse was to come in later years when his son John renounced Catholicism and embraced Anglicism.  His change in faith was a bitter insult not just to his father, but to all Catholics who had suffered under the oppression of the Monarchy over the decades.  The son was disowned and was expected to stay quiet but his shrew of a wife wouldn't hold her tongue and continued demand acceptance of their faith and admittance back into the family.

Following the death of the younger John, the father chose to seek his revenge.  It was Father Christopher, brother of Sir John, a Jesuit priest hiding at Samlesbury Hall and practising clandestine Mass who concocted the plot.  There had been words and whispers about Jane Southworth for some time.  Although she was from a relatively wealthy background she was nevertheless considered a 'low' match for the younger John.  Of course, there were rumours.  She consorted with the local women when she passed by their homes.  She had strange notions of curing illness through remedies other than clearing humours with leeches.

With the furore of the exposing of witches across the County on the lips of all Father Christopher engaged with an impressionable young child, Grace Sowerbutts and convinced her that her aunt, grandmother and the abominable Jane Southworth were guilty of maleficium, child murder and cannibalism!

However the judge, Sir Edward Bromley questioned the primary witness, the  afore child Grace Sowerbutts which led to a collapse of the trial and acquittal of all three women of all charges.  The trial evidenced as a 'Papist plot' to root out heresy in the area.

The acquittal saved Jane Southworth's life, but the enmity within the family increased.  Jane never forgave her father and uncle-in-law, Sir John and Father Christopher and in turn although the older Southworth soon died he went to his grave despising his daughter-in-law for raising her children as heretic Anglicans.

And that was how the story went amongst polite society....but the truth was, whilst Jane Southworth had never practised cannibalism or committed murder she was known as a 'wise woman' amongst the poor.  It was true that she could aid or curse depending on one's needs.  She healed wounds and illnesses and blessed the locals crops and livestock.  To be in public as a witch would be a death sentence but even so when the night fell the fires burnt as they danced around the totem that promised good health and life.  Although she continued to attend services in church she instructed her children and grandchildren in the ways of the Horned God and the Mother Goddess.

And so to little Robert, one of her favourite grandchildren.  He was born on Yule, a symbol of the masculine.  Her precious boy was inquisitive, yet serious.  When it was just them though his smile came to the fore.  He truly was special.  The Father, The Youth, The Sage.

Robert saw the way his grandmother spoke in riddles, recognised the forces of nature and seemingly had an enormous influence where ever she walked.  She let slip when he was eleven about her trial, and Robert seized on it to learn more.  Of course his grandmother was teasing information out bit by bit.  The boy would (and did) work it out for himself.  And little by little he learnt more and more.  He read forbidden texts, written in hands unknown.  He listened and learned from his grandmother and the other wise women in the area.  He travelled into the woods and hills to convene with others of a similar persuasion - low in number but vital nonetheless.

Old Nanna Jane passed away.  Her funeral was simple but a separate blessing was held by the river.  Clad in white robes they walked into the river.  Water the giver of life and bringer of destruction.  Jennet Brierley, the elder of their coven walked to him as he stood in the shallows and removed her shift.  A crown made of Ash was placed upon his head.

"You are our Leader now.  You are her chosen.  You must build the Coven to the power of thirteen,"

It was something he was always born to be.  He is the Horned God.  Night and Day.  Light and Shade.

...........

Of course when it is not the Sabbat Robert is a small landowner with tenant farmers who work by the river side and also a trader of livestock and crops, trading in the town.  Eyebrows have been raised that despite the estrangement he is still an eligible bachelor and he has not taken a wife.

Thankfully, although the town suffered greatly during the Civil War, especially in 1648 (a battle that destroyed much of the workable land, if not the men) it also begun to heal some older wounds.  The de Hoghton's despite being Protestant supported the monarchy and the Roundhead's attacked their home.  The Southworth's too were on the 'wrong' side being both Catholic and Royalist.  There is still little trust between the de Hoghton's and the Southworth's and relationships are strained but at least cordial with the estranged Southworth's.  After all, one cannot continue the feuds of their grandparents, can they....

In 1654, Robert's relative Father John Southworth, having been previously been deported to France is arrested and executed in England for practising his faith which begins to heal some wounds and open others.

It is in this climate of religious persecution, witchcraft and neighbourly feuding that our story begins....