The belief in witches existed for centuries before the trials at Salem. Over time, a considerable body of folklore developed about how to identify witches. A contemporary writer explains the most popular methods. Perhaps the reason witch-hunting has gotten a bad name is that some practitioners used rather crude methods to separate the guilty from the innocent. The notorious judges of the Holy Roman Empire, for example, simply applied thumbscrews until the unfortunate suspects confessed.
Yarely Covarrubias Pd. 3 What Caused the Salem Witch Trial Hysteria of 1692? The Salem Witch Trials of 1692 are a turning point in history, and is an event that continues to mystify our nation, as well as others. Between the months of june and September of 1692, 19 women and men were accused of witchcraft and hanged because of it. Local magistrates took the initiative when young girls claimed that women in the village were inflicting pain on them, which resulted in all the hangings and overall hype of the Salem Witch Trials.
Excessive Pride Overtaken by rumors, the small town of Salem takes a turn for the worst when children make accusations that many of the townspeople partake in witchcraft. John Proctor, a well known farmer in the area, becomes one of the accused. Stuck in a paradox, he holds to his honorable name by defending himself and others. John Proctor fit the description of a tragic hero because of his tragic flaw of committing adultery and his predictable downfall of death. While working in Proctor’s home the previous year, Abigail engaged in an affair with Proctor.
The Salem Witch Trials Brittany Johnson Marc Romanelli Monday April 8, 2013 The Salem Witch Trials (Rough Draft) Fear of Devil-worshipping and witchcraft swept through Salem, Massachusetts, like a plague. During the years of 1692 and 1693, more than 200 people—men, women, and even children—were accused of witchcraft (Blumberg). Words of friends, neighbors, and even complete strangers put many people's lives in danger. Nineteen people were hanged, one person pressed to death, and four known deaths occurred in prison. The accusations, the trials, the executions, and the events leading up to and after the deaths, kept Salem, Massachusetts on its toes in
After Betty Parris was sent away, Ann and Abigail became the most active--as well as the youngest--of the accusers. Ann claimed to have been afflicted by sixty-two people. She testified against several in court and offered many affidavits. Her father, Thomas Putnam, was the chief filer of complaints in the village, and maintained complete control over the actions of the two afflicted girls living in his house. Most of the afflicted and the accusers were in some way related to the Putnam family.
As colonial Massachusetts began to recuperate from the recent King Philip's War, which ravaged though the majority of New England, another event was just around the corner. In the year of 1692 village minister Samuel Parris's daughter Betty and niece Abigail had contracted some sort of odd illness that numerous doctors could not categorize as a specific illness or disease. As many doctors came through the town of Salem to take a look at the girls, one doctor boldly made the assumption the some type of witchcraft was responsible for these girls' current state. It was due to this assumption that the witch hunt had begun, and 178 Massachusetts citizens were accused of using witchcraft or being a witch (Davidson & Lytle 42). Of these over 178 citizens three out of four were female, which made this witch hunt a gender issue (Davidson & Lytle 42).
Witches were described as “outspoken” and were said to be widows who received land and money from their dead husbands. Old women were usually accused of witchcraft by adolescent girls. People believe these young girls who were under strict restrictions would rebel by
When the trials began, many accused others of witchcraft and this lead to them accusing even more. The new news of the entire witchcraft epidemic in Salem left many disturbed and trying to eliminate the bad of the town. The novel allows the reader to reflect on the life of the Salem people and understand the happenings. One example is the reflection of the lives of teenage girls in the puritan society, sent by God to marry and have a family, lacking the happiness of teen hood. Thus, explaining a
From the late 1400’s to the 1700’s, a witch craze spread throughout Europe, resulting in the deaths of over 100,000 ‘witches’. Though witches were persecuted all throughout Europe, trials were most popular in Western Europe; torture was a common practice during these trials. These persecutions were mostly popular in Europe but, they spread to America and later to parts of Africa. Through the evidence provided by testimonies of witnesses and statistics, the three major reasons for the persecution of witches were social prejudices, economic greed and religious beliefs. Though the accused witches were not strictly female, the accused were predominantly women and more specifically older women, older women were seen as more fragile and impressionable so the devil could convince them to do his dirty work quiet easily.POV Two Dominican monks, Kramer and Sprenger, wrote a handbook used to identify witches by the Inquisition.
At the start of 1692, two adolescent girls from Salem village started to ail from mysterious fits. Seventeen months afterwards, after lawful action was taken on 144 individuals, with 20 of them being sentenced to death, the humiliating Salem witchcraft court proceedings ended at long last. (Norton, 2003 pg. 3 -4) During those times, the magistrates who headed court cases paid no attention to women as well as girls who were aged below twenty five years old but in that witch case, things took a different turn as women were the prevalent accusers and the magistrate gave them opportunity to air their views (Norton, 2003 p.7). Norton's supposition regarding the 1692 hunt for witches at Salem village support a clash of traditions thesis and some