of the earliest accusation of witchcraft can be dated back to 1484 in Germany. Many men and women were persecuted‚ tortured‚ burnt and even killed because they were believed to be witches under the devil’s control. In this essay I will talk about what witchcraft was‚ who was accused of practicing it‚ the social response in Salem and what social and religious factors are given to account for the harsh response to witchcraft. The direct definition of witchcraft is the use of supernatural or
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Puritans and the Salem Witch Trials During the time period of 1691 to 1692 the town of Salem‚ a small thriving community within the Puritan Massachusetts Bay colony‚ was struck by widespread hysteria in the form of witch trials. The way these trials and accusations played out are historically unlike any other witch trials found in European and American history. Historians have pointed to a number of economic‚ political‚ and social changes of the then existing institutions throughout the Massachusetts
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The Salem Witch Trials Salem The Salem witch trials and hysteria first began‚ during the spring of 1692‚ when two young girls‚ Elizabeth Parris and Abigail Williams‚ started having uncontrollable fits that consisted of screaming and contortions. Several other girls‚ such as Mercy Lewis‚ Elizabeth Hubbard‚ and Ann Putnam Jr.‚ from Salem were also diagnosed with similar symptoms. After seeing the local doctor‚ William Griggs‚ he decided on the diagnosis of bewitchment. This lead the people to wonder
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In the late 1600’s Salem‚ Massachusetts‚ the Salem Witch Trials was conceivably thought of as terrifying or even unjustified. Left and right‚ convictions of witchcraft were put on other villagers in Salem. Abigail and other girls‚ Tituba‚ Proctor‚ and others are to be blamed for the deaths and events in Salem‚ but Reverend Parris seems to have the bigger faults. Parris’s childish and avaricious characteristics caused the deaths of many innocent people. Reverend Parris enacted an essential role in
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Brennyn Mackey 2 May 2011 The Secret War of Salem Exposing the Culprit behind the Mass Hysteria The Salem Witch Trials were a series of infamous events that demand an explanation for their occurrence. The trials that took place in 1692 caused neighbors in the community of Salem Village in the colony of Massachusetts to turn on one another out of paranoia‚ accusing one another of witchcraft. According to Carol Karlsen‚ a longtime author of the subject‚ nineteen people were hanged
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The changing historiography of the Salem Witch Persecutions of 1692. How current/contemporary and historical interpretations of this event reflect the changing nature of historiography. The number of different interpretations of the Salem Witch Trials illustrates that historiography is ever changing. The historians‚ Hale‚ Starkey‚ Upham‚ Boyer and Nissenbaum‚ Caporal‚ Norton and Mattosian have all been fascinated by the trials in one way or another because they have all attempted to prove or
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though there are many theories as to why the girls of the Salem witch trials made accusations‚ the two most believable are that there was fungus growing on the rye and the girls suffered from an outbreak of encephalitis because the girls showed signs of sickness and questionable actions. In February 1692‚ the people of Salem were all caught up in a case of mass hysteria: (Saxon). Eight girls ruled the town by accusing their neighbors of witchcraft (Saxon). It all began with two young girls who had
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Fictions of The Salem Witch Trials The idea of witchcraft has been a controversial topic since the begging of time however‚ witchcraft became better known in 1692‚ with the begging of the Salem witch trials. Many stories have been written about the Salem witch trials. Some are found in journals‚ other stories are exaggerated from those journals. The comparison of historical facts and the play the Crucible are the perfect example of an exaggerated actual event. During the Salem witch trials‚ Tituba
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The Salem Witch Trials are known as a series of people being accused and prosecuted of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts beginning in February 1692 until May 1693. The trials began after a group of girls claimed that they were possessed by the devil. Several local women were accused of witchcraft and this began the wave of hysteria that would forever haunt Salem and leave a painful legacy for a long time to come. Nearly every major school of historians has attempted to explain the answer to the
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The Salem Witch trials caused a lot of hysteria in history‚ during 1692. The town of Salem is located in Massachusetts. The hysteria was drawn from the beliefs of witches‚ witchcraft and black magic. The topics of witches‚ witchcraft and black magic have been questioned for many centuries. These questions have been dated all the way back to B.C. times. There have been writings in The Bible about people saying that others have been seen performing witchcraft and are in need of being saved by God.
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