acobean era. The reigning king of the moment, James I, was highly engaged surrounding ideas of the supernatural and witchcraft ideas as shown by the king writing and publishing a book in 1605 called ‘Daemonologie’ which was an efficacious text in which he stated that witchcraft was a reality and that its practitioners should be penalised. We can infer that James’ obsession may have inspired Shakespeare to write “Macbeth” and to have the theme of the supernatural so prominent throughout the play. The first comment Macbeth makes is “So foul and fair”. This is alarming as the first words Macbeth utters is similar to the witches. This suggests that he has been influenced by the witches to say such comments. This could then indicate that Macbeth’s subsequent murders and visions were of a similar effect of the witches we see in Act 1 Scene 3, suggesting supernatural forces supposedly had control over the acts of Macbeth. The deceit in ‘fair is foul’ foreshadows that Macbeth deceives Duncan and commits the ultimate crime of assassinating him in order to be king. Act 1 Scene 3, in terms of the supernatural, is a critical and crucial scene. The scene opens with the witches contending about their secret intentions. The witches have gathered on a moor, where a horrific storm is adding to the ominous, eerie mood of the scene. Macbeth and Banquo then stumble upon the witches, after their victory at the battle. Banquo describes the witches as “so withered and so wild in attire, which looks not like the inhabitants of the earth,” If Banquo can see the witches then we know that they are not a product of Macbeth’s imagination, driven by his ambition. Banquo believes the witches derive from the devil, after his confrontation with the witches ‘can the devil speak true’. This shows that Banquo sees the witches as a source of evil from hell and has some doubt surrounding the ‘weird sisters’ and their prophecies as he refers to them as ‘instruments of darkness’ and it’s Macbeth who needs the witches to tell him what is already in his own mind, but is too afraid to acknowledge. Macbeth only believes what he wants to hear, which later leads Macbeth to his own downfall by the manipulating witches.>