Rosalyn Schanzer's Witches: The Salem Witch Trials

In Rosalyn Schanzer’s Witches! The Absolutely True Disaster in Salem, the author discusses how the Salem Witch trials started and how the Puritans believed the witches should be tortured or killed for being a witch. Many people were accused of being witches. Many people thought the accused should die but some were somewhat nice and didn’t think they should die just in prison. Every puritan believed them because the dad was a reverend and everyone believed him so they all accused people. The causes of the Salem Witch Trials were disease, revenge, and attention.

In the book, one of the causes of the Salem Witch Trials was disease. In Sam Dean’s paper on Bon appetit it says “Cases of ergot poisoning (known as ergotism) were well-documented in medieval Europe, and often caused victims to experience the same symptoms as the “bewitched” Salem girls.” This is showing how crop poisoning caused disease which led to the Parris girls getting sick and having the weird symptoms. On pg 22 it says “He consulted with doctors and tried dosing the girls with every elixir.” This is showing how desperate Parris was to getting his children well again because of the disease. On pg 19 it says “Betty and Abigail began to twitch and choke and contort their bodies into strange abnormal shapes, crouch beneath

furniture, and speak in words that made no sense.” This shows how the girls were doing weird stuff like convulsions, and contortions like it was a disease. That is how disease affected the Salem Witch Trials.

Another cause of the Salem Witch trials was revenge. Here is a quote from pg 50 that shows revenge is “But was this accusation really a way to take revenge against the Nurse family?” This is showing how they were kind of malicious, and wanted revenge. In Anastasia Karson’s paper it says “Personal assault and revenge played a role in the accusations, often the result of harsh feuds and bitter memories.” This shows how revenge wanted them to accuse the people more and it sometimes caused feuds. Also on pg 50 “In all, 10 of 18 depositions against Rebecca Nurse were signed by the Putnams” This is showing how they were trying to deluge them with accusations so that they would know she would be hanged and it’s like they condemned them to do all the accusations. These are the ways they got revenge on them.

The last reason was that they wanted attention. On pg 92 it says “More people than ever flocked to the hangings on Friday, August 19.” This is showing how they wanted to abolish them but wanted them to die and attention for them dieing. On pg 90 “A woman named Goodie Bibber testified that the specter of Rebecca Nurse pricked her with pins.” This shows that they wanted attention to be heard in court so that the people would be hung on the gallows for them to die. Also on pg 90 “she cried that the prisoner had stabbed her in the breast with a knife.” It says in the book that a man had broken it then she found it than faked it all this part of the trials should had been unheeded. Those are the reasons why they attention was a reason for the Salem Witch Trials.

In conclusion I think it should have been lack of observation for the cause of the Salem Witch Trials but, the causes of the Salem Witch Trials were disease, revenge, and attention.

So the cause of disease was because of some bad rye grain and it made them think it was witchcraft. Then the feud with the Parris’s and the Nurse family cause the revenge part of the Salem Witch Trials. Then for attention more people went to the hangings and they faked being hurt in the court when a witch walked in all for attention. The significance of the trials were don’t make some stuff up it will kill people and make innocent people die. That is how the Salem Witch Trials were

caused.