During the seventeenth century Salem, Massachusetts is a seaport town populated mostly by Puritan colonists who came over from England in the seventeenth century. Beliefs of witchcraft came over with the settlers who, if caught practicing, was punishable by death. The Salem Witch Trials were a series of court cases in 1692 revolving around witchcraft where over hundred people were accused, nineteen were hanged, and one was pressed to death. England had accused people of witchcraft dating back as far as the twelfth century, and it was not until the fourteenth century that they began to arrest and try citizens. The accused were mostly women, and by the seventeenth century over 50,000 so called witches had been punished by death. Europeans seriously feared witchcraft in that time, so anyone convicted of witchery was going to be tortured, in hopes she would reveal names of others, or just killed. An accused witch was thought to have made a pact with the Devil and would be named devils themselves. (LaPlante p33) The term devil included humans and spirits, anyone who acted devilish. (Roach) English Puritans were named so because they believed their religion to be more pure than that of the English Church; they considered themselves to be God’s chosen people. (Wilson 20) To break away from religious oppression by the English monarch, these people left England and moved their families to the New England Colonies. Along with their families, they brought with them: their bibles, strict work ethics, and their misconceptions of witchcraft. Many of these Puritans settled in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. In 1692, an epidemic of accusations of witchcraft broke out in Salem. It started with the hysterical behaviors of two girls,... ... middle of paper ... ...k place in Salem in 1692. (Wilson 60) The events that took place in seventeenth century Salem are still extremely controversial. Twenty-First century historians have continued to avoid trying to make sense of the trials, due to the fact that much of the physical evidence does not exist. Rumor and legend have mixed over the years, making it difficult to know what truly happened. Twenty people lost their lives in what is commonly known as one of the most hysterical events to plague American history. The Salem Witch Trials, though they only lasted nine months, have forever impacted the use of the judicial system to determine religious crimes. Works Cited Salem Witch Judge by Eve LaPlante The Salem Witch Trials by Lori Lee Wilson The Salem Witch Trials Reader by Frances Hill 6 Women of Salem by Marilynne Roach Witch Hunt, a documentary of the History Channel
The Salem witch craft trials are the most learned about and notable of Europe's and North America's witch hunts. Its notoriety and fame comes from the horrendous amount of people that were not only involved, but killed in the witch hunt and that it took place in the late 1700's being one of the last of all witch hunts. The witch craft crises blew out of control for several reasons. Firstly, Salem town was facing hard economic times along with disease and famine making it plausible that the only explanation of the town's despoilment was because of witches and the devil. As well, with the stimulation of the idea of witch's from specific constituents of the town and adolescent boredom the idea of causing entertainment among the town was an ever intriguing way of passing time.
Throughout history it has been shown that, history has a tendency to repeat itself. In 1692, men and women were accused of witchcraft, whether they were guilty or not. The place where this was occurring was, Salem, Massachusetts, a city full of puritans who came from Europe. Witchcraft was the one of the worst crimes any individual could commit. This often times led to people being hanged or exiled from the church.
The Salem Witch trials were when hundreds of citizens of Salem, Massachusetts were put on trial for devil-worship or witchcraft and more than 20 were executed in 1692. This is an example of mass religion paranoia. The whole ordeal began in the home of Reverend Samuel Parris. People soon began to notice strange behavior from Parris’s slave, Tituba, and his daughters. Many claimed to have seen Parris’s daughters doing back magic dances in the woods, and fall to the floor screaming hysterically. Not so long after, this strange behavior began to spread across Salem.
“Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.”, Exodus 22:18. In 1692 , in Salem Massachusetts , the Puritans believed everything in the bible, they also believed in witches and that witches should not be able to live.There were at least 3 causes for the Salem witch trial hysteria. There are: age, gender, and marital status , lying girls, and a divided town.
The Salem Witch Trials began in the spring of 1692 in the small village of Salem, Massachusetts. The Salem Witch Trials began because some young girls claimed to be possessed by the devil. More than 150 people where accused to witchcraft, and twenty people died.The Salem Witch Trials were famous, many innocent people were accused of being witches, and many innocent people were killed.
During the time of the Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692, more than twenty people died in innocent death. All of those innocent people were accused of one thing, witchcraft. During 1692, in the small town of Salem, Massachusetts, many terrible events happened. A group of Puritans lived in Salem during this time. They had come from England, where they were prosecuted because of their religious beliefs.
Upon arriving 1692, Salem faced trial after trial that had destroyed their community. From having no governor, to not enough resources, to having to follow strict guidelines set by people with higher authority, it was a given something in Salem was bound to go wrong. The Salem Witch Trials began in 1692 and lasted for over six months. A total of two hundred people were accused for witchcraft and 19 people actually got convicted and executed, five of which were men. One man, Giles Corey, even got pressed to death because he refused to cooperate with the court. There’s no exact answer on why people started accusing other people of false accusations,
Witchcraft has been present in many other religions, not only the Puritan religion. Witchcraft was also found in Catholic and Protestant parts of Europe. The Salem Witch Trials were smaller in comparison to those in Scotland, France, or Germany (Hall 3). Though the trials in Salem were smaller, people recognize the Salem Witch Trials as one of the worst times in American history (“Witch Madness” 4). The Puritans believed that the Devil was alive in their community (“Witch Madness” 2). The accusations started in February 1692 in Salem Village, Massachusetts when young Puritan girls were found using magic. The Salem Witch Trials began when Betty Paris, Abigail Williams, and some of their friends began to act strange with odd fits (Hall 1). Because many mental and emotional disorders were not understood, the people of Salem believed it was the work of witchcraft. When sickness or even misfortune came, the most
During the early winter of 1692 two young girls became inexplicably ill and started having fits of convulsion, screaming, and hallucinations. Unable to find any medical reason for their condition the village doctor declared that there must be supernatural forces of witchcraft at work. This began an outbreak of hysteria that would result in the arrest of over one hundred-fifty people and execution of twenty women and men. The madness continued for over four months.
The Salem Witch Trials of 1692 and 1693 was a tragic set of events that took place in Salem, Massachusetts (Salem is now Danvers, Massachusetts.) It began with a “witchcraft craze” from 1300-1600 in Europe, when thousands of people were murdered, accused of performing witchcraft, the devil’s magic.
In 1692, the occurrence of “witchcraft” began after the Massachusetts Bay Charter revolution and the outbreak of small pox. The rebellion caused hysteria and a sad injustice. Friends were pinned against friends; upstanding citizens were forced to flee for their lives and men and women were put to death (Jurist Legal News and Research Services 2008).The fear of the devil influenced the cruelty that took place. Most of the settlers that established their homes in the colony were puritans, a member of a group of English Protestants who revolted against the Church of England. The belief that God punished sinful behavior with misfortune did not help circumstances. The puritans targeted outcasts, people who never really fit it in; they wanted to rid the towns of these suspected sinners.
The practices in which became known as The Salem Witch Trial, where the trials were held in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1692 and 1693. “Magical practices were not altogether divorced from Christianity in the minds of many “natural philosophers”, who sometimes thought of them as experiments that could unlock the secrets of Scripture”(Patricia U. Bonomi). Also, some people of practices with Christianity “had a strong belief that the Devil could give certain people known as witches the power to harm others in return for their loyalty. A "witchcraft craze" rippled through Europe from the 1300s to the end of the 1600s. Tens of thousands of supposed witches—mostly women—were executed. Though the Salem trials came on just as the European craze was winding down, local circumstances explain their onset.”(Jess
Accusations of witchcraft ran rampant in the 17th century colonial settlements in the United States. The individuals accused, mostly women, were put on trial and punished, if found guilty. The most well-known of such cases on public record are the Salem Witch Trials. Between February, 1692 and May, 1693, hearings and prosecutions were set up to deal with those accused of dabbling in the dark arts in the cities of Andover, Salem, and Ipswich, all in Massachusetts Bay. These trials came to commonly be referred to as the Salem Witch Trials because some of the most notorious cases were heard in the Oyer and Terminer courts in Salem. At the time, practicing witchcraft was considered a serious crime, and was often punished with serious consequences.
A series of events occurred leading up to, and during the Salem Witch Trials making the situation far detrimental than it should have been. Salem, Massachusetts became the main focus in 1692 when over one hundred people were falsely accused of practicing witchcraft. Twenty were executed by being hanged, one by being pressed, and one-hundred and fifty-six jailed. Women played a big role in the trials. Most of them were the accusers, and the unlucky ones were the accused. The Puritans of this town had just recently moved from their old homes, so living in a new environment may have had an effect on the outrageous hysteria. People were not good with change. With that being said, Individualism began to conquer the principles of Puritanism while trying to protect oneself. Humanity was in a panic from trying to deal with new economic expansion. “The Puritan inhabitants were always alert to the “signs” that
The Salem witch trials in Massachusetts Colony lasted from 1692 to early 1693. Even before the witchcraft trials, Salem Village was not exactly known as a bastion of tranquillity in New England. (Sutter par.2) There was a population of over six hundred that was divided into two main parts; those that wanted to separate from Salem Town and those that did not. They divided themselves into the eastern and western parts of the town. With this tension and an unfortunate combination of economic conditions, congregational strife, teenage boredom, and personal jealousies, (Oliver par. 2) Salem became unstable. When Elizabeth Parris and Abigail Williams, Reverend Samuel Parris's daughter and niece, started to exhibit strange behavior including convulsive seizures, screaming, and trances, (Oliver par. 2) and the doctor declared that the girls were under the influence of the devil, the townspeople believed him. This could be because there was an Indian War ranging less than seventy miles away, and with many refugees from the war were in tha...