active 1612-1618 Thomas Potts

Raised under the care of Sir Thomas Knyvet, Thomas Potts trained in the law and was living at Clifford's Inn by 1609. In 1612 he served as clerk on circuit with judges Sir James Altham and Sir Edward Bromley, which placed him at the center of the Lancashire witch trials.

At the judges' request, he wrote up the proceedings in The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster, published in 1613. The book became the main contemporary narrative of the Pendle trials and remains one of the best-known documents of English witchcraft history.

Only a few details of Potts's life are clearly recorded after that. He appears to have received royal favor in the years that followed, but today he is remembered above all for preserving a dramatic and deeply influential account of one of England's most notorious witch trials.