...Without question, every October 31st, the town of Salem Massachusetts comes alive with would be revelers decked in all manner of costumes from the most grotesque to the truly bizarre. These masquerades are often highlighted by an over indulgence of persons assuming the persona of witches. Intriguingly, they may even assume the personas of victims of the Salem Witch Trials such as Giles Corry or Sarah Good. Some will undoubtedly plaster their faces with green makeup while others will bring a broom or perhaps even a black cat to serve as a witches’ familiar. While witnessing this morbid revelry, one cannot help but ponder, where does this fascination with witches come from, and why does Salem Massachusetts seem to serve as the epicenter for this...
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...The Witch of Blackbird Pond, written by Elizabeth George Speare, was set in a Puritan settlement, in Connecticut, during the 17th century. In this book, a young woman named Katherine Tyler, “Kit”, sailed to Connecticut on a ship, “the Dolphin”, from Barbados to her aunt’s house soon after her grandfather had passed away. During the 17th century, the belief in witchcraft was common and considered a serious crime which often resulted in a number of females being executed. Throughout the book, Kit faces various challenges in order to fit in this new community and is also accused to be practicing witchcraft. As Kit moved into Connecticut, she had to say goodbye to her lavish life back in Barbados. Now, she had to start working for the family, cook, make her own clothes and...
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...Is the horrifying myth about witches really true? If they actually roam the earth, when exactly did they first exist and where do they live? In the 17th century, Abigail Williams insisted there were witches living in Salem, Massachusetts. Williams evoked the Salem Witch Trials after numerous suspects were convicted for Satanism; however, many were faulty accused and Abigail was blamed. Is there a catastrophe worse than the Devil’s spawn? McCarthyism was established after Senator Joseph McCarthy convinced the colonists of communism in the United States; as a result, innocent people were imprisoned and McCarthy was appointed to the court for witch trials. Although the Salem Witch Trials and McCarthyism occurred at different centuries in time,...
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...Hemphill, C. Dallett. "Women in Court: Sex-Role Differentiation in Salem, Massachusetts, 1636 to 1683." The William and Mary Quarterly 39, no. 1 (1982): 164-75. This source pints out the fact that men held power and authority over women since the beginning of Salem and throughout its development. The law was enforced by patriarchal figures and women were subjects who were expected to follow it. While Salem was a patriarchal society, it surprisingly also allowed women to testify in court and were active in their duties outside of the household. Women were aware of the social issues that surrounded them. This source shows the shift that occurred in Salem and caused women to eventually feel “economically helpless”. The experience of abuse between...
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...In 1953, American playwright Arthur Miller produced a play titled, The Crucible. It takes place in 17th century Salem, a small town in colonial Massachusetts. The play focuses on the actual events known as the Salem Witch Trials, in which dozens of people in and around the town of Salem were wrongfully and chaotically accused of witchcraft, Satanism, and devil worship by a group of teenage girls. It is firmly established that the play is an allegory of the hysteria and chaos that took place throughout the events of the Red Scare in the United States during the Cold War; a period in which politicians and ring leaders also wrongfully accused numerous amounts of people for supporting communism. It makes perfect sense as to why Miller wrote The Crucible allegorically to these events, 1953 was a time in which American fear and madness concerning communism was frankly getting out of control, just as the experiences in Salem were in the 1690s. The Crucible is a historically fictitious adaption of the Salem Witch Trials which as previously stated, was an episode of unjust accusations of witchcraft/devil worship carried out by a group of female teens. In the play, the group of accusing teens is led by girl named Abigail Williams. In order to refocus the “heat” on another source in order to save herself from trouble, her and her peers wrongfully stage a phenomenon of witchcraft in Salem, producing mass panic in the community for months on end. It got so bad in fact, that at one point...
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...Basically, a witch can curse someone without having to use a wand or crystal, while a sorcerer must use something.” Witchcraft scared a lot of people into confessing to false sins (Witchcraft - A Guide). This was viewed with apprehension mixed with fear that was in cultures (10 Amazing Facts…). A specific religion was Wicca (Witchcraft...
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...During the 1940’s through the 1950’s America was overwhelmed with concerns about the threat of communism growing in Easter Europe and China (Goss 20). The anti-Communist McCarthy hearings of the 1950’s and the witchcraft trails of 1692 both were known for accusing and imprisoning people with little proof. This is shown in Arthur Miller’s play The Crucible. He was able to capture the panic and simple madness of many Americans in a symbolic way. McCarthyism is very similar in the way that Joe McCarthy accused Americans of being communist and in The Crucible the people were being accused of being witches. Joe McCarthy, born on a farm to Irish-American Roman Catholic parents, was a relatively unknown U.S. senator from Wisconsin. He was the youngest member of the new senate and his voting record was conservative, even though he didn’t follow the Republican Party line (Appleton Public Library, pars 2). He later became a chairman of the committee on government operations. With that he became the leading spokesman of the post war anti-Communist Crusade in 1950 to 1954 (Klingaman 253). McCarthyism was a search, or “witch hunt”, led by Senator Joe McCarthy, for Communists in the 1950’s United States Government. McCarthy continued to make accusations of communist infiltration of the U.S. government, though he had failed to provide evidence. On December 2, 1954 the full senate, by vote of 67-22 passed a resolution, condemning McCarthy for abusing his power as senator. He remained as...
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...of the minister of salem village randomly started having screaming and violent outbursts. The doctor diagnosed them with being controlled by witches. After they have been diagnosed other females started mimicking the same symptoms that the two girls had. The young girls accused a caribbean slave, Tituba, and other women of using witch spells on them. Years latter it was revealed they were lying, and Abigail Williams were the mastermind behind the lies of the young girls being bewitched. The people Abigail Williams accused of being witches were brought to the magistrates Jonathan Corwin and John Hathorne and being questioned while the teens who lied about them being...
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...People have a natural tendency to create mass hysteria around small events. In the 17th century, Puritans living in Salem accused one-another of witchcraft. In a society like Salem, many activities, such as music and dance were not allowed, as they were believed to be satanical practices. Some people convicted each other because of personal agendas and without evidence. Because of this, honor and respect were considered the value of each citizen. In The Crucible, Reverend Hale, John Proctor, and the people of Salem show that the value of life, and conscience are factors affected by the Salem witch trials. This kind of restates the prompt be more specific. Reverend Hale, a minister sent from a nearby village to Salem in order to find evidence...
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...Although some argue that the Salem witch trials were a result of hysteria, the accusations were primarily caused by gender and class tensions, Puritan world views, and the Indian Wars. These causes are explored in the texts “The Historiography of Salem Witch Trials”, “Witchcraft”, “Puritan Beliefs and the Salem Witchcraft Trials”, but most importantly in Arthur Miller’s play, “The Crucible”. “The Crucible” deals with women and young girls in 17th Century Salem, MA. These women were being accused of practicing witchcraft and dealing with the devil. The gender and class tensions along with Puritan world views combined to create this hysteria that led to these women going to trial, found guilty, and sentenced to public hanging. The Indian Wars were not the main focus in “The Crucible” because it was also meant to be a commentary on the McCarthy trials in the 1950s during the Cold War. Gender tensions contributed to to the accusations of the 1692 Salem Witch Trials, as demonstrated in the film “The Crucible”. One example of this was the scene in (“The Crucible”) where the girls ask Tituba to help them get a husband with casting spells. There were many fears among the adolescent girls and that...
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...Salem Revisited In 1692, the town of Salem Massachusetts turned on each other. They accused their own neighbors of witchcraft. Between June and September of 1692, nineteen people were unjustly executed by hanging, one crushed to death by stones, and many more incarcerated after trials had found them guilty of acts of sorcery. The trials have been researched and looked at many different ways for years. Scholars and students alike continue to be intrigued by the trials and continue to seek answers for how a small town could do this to itself. Every scholarly discipline contributes to what could be the possible answer from ergot poisoning to the psycho-social factor among Africans and American Indians. The road that leads to Salem comes from Europe where witch-hunts rose and fell. The reasons behind the trials themselves are complex. While economics, socioeconomic class issues, tainted food supply, property disputes, and congregational feuds are all listed as causes, the clergy and its congregation are what fueled the accusations and thereby deaths of many town citizens. Witchcraft and sorcery have long attracted the attention of historians and other scholars with the spotlight aimed at 14th-17th century Europe. During the 14th-17th centuries, thousands were executed but to try to be a number to it would be futile. There have been those who have been able to calculate those executed for witchcraft in small towns but the sheer number of countries a part of the craze makes it...
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...Arthur Miller, depicts the overall history of the Salem Witch Trials, it does have historical inaccuracies within the characters and their relationships that change the way we perceive history. Witchcraft has been present since the Paleolithic period but it began to show up in colonial America in the middle of the 17th century. It became a capital offense as far back as 1642. Shortly after becoming a law, the first execution was made in Connecticut. This case was disturbing because it influenced everyone, in puritan societies, to believe that Satan was close at hand and physically able to act in the real world.. At the time, Salem was a Puritan community in which was built upon those who fled religious execution therefore the religious authority and the government was not separate. Those who would question local authority were blamed for questioning royal authority. Eventually the hysteria spread to Massachusetts in 1692 after two young girls had been acting in alarming and been in physical pain. The physician concluded that the girls were not victims of a physical or mental illness but victims of witchcraft.2. These two girls were Abigail Williams and Betty Parris. Abigail Williams, who was 11 years of age, had a...
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...Miller followed Death of a Salesman with his most politically significant work, The Crucible, 1953, a tale of the Salem witch trials that contains clear correlation to the McCarthy anti-Communist hearings in the mid-1950s. While Miller primarily wrote The Crucible to enlighten the motivations and circumstances behind the Salem witch trials, and he also wanted to highlight the story of the "Red Scare" of the forties and fifties which had reached its peak under the leadership of Senator Joseph McCarthy. McCarthy, who was a relatively unknown Senator from Wisconsin, gained instant fame when he stated that there were many Communists in the American government. America at that time was in the middle of the Cold War with Russia, and McCarthy's charges...
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...The Salem Witch Trials were an example of the strict Puritan religion in the 17th century. Even though there was no actual evidence of witchcraft, the religious beliefs of the Puritans caused many men, women and children to be wrongfully accused. The Puritan’s life revolved around the church. They attended sermons twice a week, dancing was not allowed, listening of non-religious music was prohibited, holidays were not celebrated and children were not allowed to play with toys or dolls and their education revolved around the Bible. Some Puritan’s believed Satan needed permission to take over a living human body while others believed Satan could afflict anyone. The Puritan values and religious beliefs during this time led to a mass hysteria which started the accusations of witchcraft. In the Seventeenth Century it was believed that witches were a product of Satan. During this time it was unheard of to speak of a good witch in colonial Massachusetts. “A witch is a person believed to have received special powers.” (1) As life became more difficult for the Puritans they began to blame witches for the problems they faced within their community. Puritan’s believed that anyone crippled, aged, poor, deformed or sickly were possible offspring of Satan. Anyone that did not follow the Puritan religion faithfully would risk the possibility of being accused of witchcraft. People being accused of witchcraft were typically women in their middle age possibly living on their own. The woman...
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...The Salem Witch Trials Witchcraft is the practice of black magic. In the late 17th century in New England, at least 344 individuals were tried and 35 were executed as witches in Salem in 1692. More than 95 percent of all formal accusations and more than 90 percent of the executions for the witchcraft in British America occurred in Puritan colonies. Many factors contributed to the hysteria that gripped Salem. Impact of King William‘s War, the Puritan belief system and gender roles all led to the Salem witch trials. The foundation of the witchcraft crisis lay in the Puritan New Englanders’ singular worldview, one they had inherited from the first settlers of Massachusetts Bay more than sixty years earlier. That worldview taught them that they were a chosen people, charged with bringing God’s message to a heathen land previously ruled by the devil. And in that adopted homeland, God spoke through his providence - that is through small and large events of daily life. New England’s Puritans even in the third generation, believed themselves to be surrounded by an invisible world of spirits as well as by a natural world of palpable objects. Both worlds communicated God’s messages, because both operated under his direction. Losses sustained in the Second Indian War, King William’s War, prompted doubts or spiritual anxiety within the Puritan community. “That their Wabanaki enemies were Catholic (or at least aligned with the French Caltholics) made matters worse, suggesting that the...
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