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The witchcraft trials in salem sumary
Puritans/salem witch trials
Puritans/salem witch trials
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In “We Aren’t Superstitious”, by Stephen Vincent Benet, the theme of accusation supports the superstitions for the Salem Witch Trials. Throughout the entire story, accusations are thrown left and right; Arguing on who is a witch and who isn’t. When Tituba arrived from the West Indies towards the beginning of the story, nobody could predict the mayhem she would unfold. The queer and interesting stories she told Elizabeth Parris later spread into the infamous Salem Witch Trials. Now, one doesn't know if this was part of her “evil voodoo-witch plan” or aimlessly come across, but it was catastrophic. The first individual to be accused of witchery was Sarah Good, who later was followed by Sarah Osborne. They were both accused of witchery because of their low social classes. Sarah Good was known as a whore and a beggar, while Sarah Osborne was married to a lower social class and was a horrible Christian. This accusation of the lower class portrays a lot of what happens today in the real world. …show more content…
When September 11th occurred, Islamic descendants were discriminated and patronized and to this day still are. Ahmed Mohamed, a 14 year-old Muslim boy, built a clock for his school's engineering class and was accused of building a hoax bomb. This proves to show how accusation is linked to racism. Trayvon Martin, (Whose brother I knew personally), is another example of racist accusation. Just because a black male is wearing a hoodie at a gas station does not give a man the right to shoot! It's honestly disappointing how some races need to teach their kids the right things to say or do when they see a police
The Salem witchcraft trials of 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts can be considered a horrendous period in American history, yet is also viewed as the turning point in what was considered acceptable in a contemporary society. In a documentation of a trial against a woman named Sarah Good, the reader is able to see the way in which such an accusation was treated and how society as a whole reacted to such a claim. Sarah Good fell victim to the witchcraft hysteria because she was different, and that fear of her divergence from the Puritan lifestyle led to her eventual demise.
Before reading historian Marilynne K. Roach’s Six Women of Salem: The Untold Story of the Accused and Their Accusers in the Salem Witch Trials, it must be clear that I hadn’t known much about the Salem Witch Trials besides what knowing they were in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692-93. I only recognized that there were a few unfortunate women who had been accused of being witches, sentenced to their deathbeds, and brutally burned in front of the whole town. After reading Roach’s book, I’ve found out that this thought alone was false because none of the accused were meant to be burned at all but instead the whole town was called out to watch these women being hung. It created an example for the town and explained to them the consequences of being convicted of witchcraft. What I’m now recognizing is what I did ignore: how it came to be and how it all ended, who was accused, and was giving these accusations out.
Numerous individuals may be quick to accuse others of wrong doings that are not necessarily the truth. In this matter, it is evident in the Salem Witch Trails, which happened in 1692, where individuals accused their own neighbors of witchcraft because of unforeseen death or sickness. Moreover, it led to 200 innocent human-beings that were accused of worshiping the devil’s work, which led to 19 helpless individuals who were hanged because of these untruthful allegations. Furthermore, the Salem Witch Trails were a historical event that is due to lack of knowledge, selfishness, and inhumanity.
One night in the minute New England town of Salem, Massachusetts, three young girls and a slave from Barbados were caught dancing naked in the forest around an immense kettle. This wasn't something that girls normally did in the 1600s and was also socially unacceptable. These girls, Abigail Williams, Betty Parris, Mercy Lewis, and Tituba were immediately accused of being witches just because they were dancing. To get themselves off the hook, the girls pointed their fingers at other women in the town of practicing witchcraft. They indicted some women because their names popped into their heads, but one particular girl, Abigail Williams, accused a woman named Elizabeth Proctor because she had lust for her husband, John Proctor. Abigail Williams and John Proctor had already had an affair. However, unlike Abigail, John wanted to leave that horrible mistake in the past and forget about her. Abigail also did not like other women in Salem because they called her names. They knew of her lust for men, so Abigail took the initiative and they were also charged.
Randomly accusing innocent people of being devilish, atrocious witches is extremely far fetched and unusual for people to do today. However, in the 1690’s in Salem, Massachusetts, it was a daily occurrence. After seeing people do odd things happening at the time, people got scared and accused them of witches to get rid of them, send them to jail, and possibly kill them. Even worse, the accusers may have actually been sick or insane, or they could of been faking it to get revenge on their enemies.
During the time of the Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692, more than twenty people died an 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. They chose to come live in America and choose their own way to live. They were very strict people, who did not like to act different from others. They were also very simple people who devoted most of their lives to God. Men hunted for food and were ministers. Women worked at home doing chores like sewing, cooking, cleaning, and making clothes. The Puritans were also very superstitious. They believed that the devil would cause people to do bad things on earth by using the people who worshiped him. Witches sent out their specters and harmed others. Puritans believed by putting heavy chains on a witch, that it would hold down their specter. Puritans also believed that by hanging a witch, all the people the witch cast a spell on would be healed. Hysteria took over the town and caused them to believe that their neighbors were practicing witchcraft. If there was a wind storm and a fence was knocked down, people believed that their neighbors used witchcraft to do it. Everyone from ordinary people to the governor’s wife was accused of witchcraft. Even a pregnant woman and the most perfect puritan woman were accused. No one in the small town was safe. As one can see, the chaotic Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692 were caused by superstition, the strict puritan lifestyle, religious beliefs, and hysteria.
Those who were very religious resented those who were wealthy. Many accusers accused individuals who have wronged them in the past, after being accused, trials would be unfair and unjust. The accuser never had any punishment for wrongly accusing a person of witch craft. At times, even rumors were enough to have someone hung. “Old feuds (disputes within congregation, property disputes) between the accusers and the accused spurring charges of witchcraft” (The Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692) Douglas Linder stated on his list of causes of the Salem witch hunts; arguments between the accusers and the accused had been one of the factors caused the epidemic. Some accusers during these times had the intention of taking large establishments of property for themselves after the so called “witches” were hung. Many of the accused had lived near the prosperous Salem Town while the accusers were the poor farmers on the outskirts of Salem Village. Jealousy would have been enough reason to blame someone of witchcraft in 1692, whether or not they were a
A major cause of the Salem Witchcraft trials was superstition, an “irrational [belief] ... resulting from ignorance or fear of the unknown” (Saliba). A lack of scientific reasoning led many people to believe that, for instance, walking under a ladder would bring seven years of bad luck. The Puritans in Salem had even more reasons to be superstitious. Cotton Mather’s “Memorable Providences, Relating to Witchcrafts and Possessions,” with its inaccurate accounts of witchcraft, terrified. In addition, crude medical techniques, constant food poisoning, and unsanitary conditions killed many Puritans. (In the Trials, dead people and dead livestock were used as evidence of witchcraft.) More importantly, war with a nearby Indian tribe was imminent (Schlect 1); when livestock died, the Puritans thought their village was cursed, vulnerable to Indian attack. With several factions vying for control of the Village, and a series of legislative and property disputes with the nearby Salem Town which controlled Salem Village, it is easy to see how the people of Salem were so vulnerable to the notion of witches taking over their town.
In the early years of America, people were mostly unaware of certain things. Sickness, for instance, was an important issue for people didn't know how to manage or cure such complex illnesses. The Puritans, during the colonial times, didn't have much information about certain things. They came to believe that certain unexplainable events were done by a powerful source of evil thus brought about superstitions. The infamous Witch Trials done at Salem, Massachusetts, which spread across the continent, was an example of people's injustice acts in response to superstitions. One of the major cause of the Salem Witchcraft trials was superstition, an "irrational belief or practice resulting from ignorance or fear of the unknown" (www.encyclopedia.com). A lack of scientific knowledge led many people to be convinced that, witches were responsible to the death of an animal or a livestock: John Rogger "testified that upon the threatening words " of Martha Carrier " his cattle would be strangely bewitched."(Mather, p55) John Roger believed on superstitions; thus he proposed that Martha was a witch who was killing his cows. It is easy to see how the people of Salem were so vulnerable to the notion of witches taking over their town. Furthermore Tituba, Reverend Parris's slave, practiced ritual dance and "black magic" in her early years in Africa. She influenced most of the girls in town through her stories. The girls believed on superstitions which overall started the Salem Witch Trials and made it possible for the witch trials to occur for a long duration.
The first person to be accused of witchcraft was Tituba, the slave of reverend Samuel Parris ("Witchcraft in Salem"). She was accused when the children in the household began to act strangely. She first decided to make a special cake, “a cake made from rye meal and the afflicted girl’s urine, and fed it to a dog hoping it would reveal the name of whoever bewitched the girls” (Brooks). When that did not work, they called a doctor. When the doctor came to check in on them, he could not find anything wrong. Instead of searching for a diagnosis, he labeled them as witches. “They screamed, threw things, uttered peculiar sounds and contorted themselves into strange positions, and a local doctor blamed the supernatural” (Blumberg). Historians now
Suddenly people seemed very paranoid and soon residents were placing blame on one another and accusing each other of witchcraft. In a fifteen month period between 1691 and 1692 nearly twelve dozen people were accused of witchcraft in or near Salem (Norton, p8).
The Salem Witch Trials occurred from 1692 to 1693. When two girls, aged 9 and 11, started having strange and peculiar fits, the Puritans believed that the cause of these actions was the work of the devil. The children accused three women of afflicting them: Tituba, Sarah Good, and Sarah Osborne. Tituba was a Caribbean slave owned by the Parris family. Sarah Good was a homeless woman. Sarah Osborne was a poor elderly woman. Sarah Osborne and Sarah Good pleaded innocent. Tituba admitted, “The Devil came to me and bid me serve him.” She described seeing red cats, yellow birds, black dogs, and a black man who asked her to sign his “book”. She confessed to signing the book. All three wo...
The Salem Witch Trials occurred because “three women were out in jail, because of witchcraft, and then paranoia spread throughout Salem” (Blumberg). In the Salem Village, “Betty Paris became sick, on February of 1692, and she contorted in pain and complained of fever” (Linder). The conspiracy of “witchcraft increased when play mates of Betty, Ann Putnam, Mercy, and Mary began to exhibit the same unusual behavior” (Linder). “The first to be accused were Tituba, a Barbados slave who was thought to have cursed the girls, Sarah Good, a beggar and social misfit, and Sarah Osborn, an old lady that hadn’t attended church in a year” (Linder). According to Linder, Tituba was the first to admit to being a witch, saying that she signed Satan’s book to work for him. The judges, Jonathan Corwin and John Hathorne, “executed Giles Corey because he refused to stand trial and afterwards eight more people were executed and that ended the Witch Trials in Salem”
The Salem, Massachusetts Witch Trials have generated extensive evaluation and interpretation. To explain the events in Salem, psychological, political, environmental, physical, and sociological analysis have all been examined. The authors Linnda Caporael, Elaine Breslaw, Anne Zeller, and Richard Latner all present differing perspectives to speculate about the events of the Salem Witch Trials. This changing interpretation and perspective has resulted in an extensive historiography to explain the
Women started to accuse other women and they also accused a few men. Murrin details that this caused a challenge in the local judical system: “…a number of judicial irregularities, including an unusual heavy dependence by the courts on spectral evidence ( when an accused witch’s spirit or specter, supposedly tormented the victim) and the use of open confessions by the accused to escape punishment” (339). New England had a organized way of doing things when it came it witches, but once accusations arose in Salem they started a new system which led their town into hysteria. “The Salem witch panic stands out, in part, because the judicial execution of twenty people within three months became an event of enormous drama in a region that hanged comparatively few offenders and in a colony that hanged only five people for witchcraft before 1692 and only one before 1656”