The Pros And Cons Of The Witch Trials

In literature and in life, the opportunity of personal and corporate gain allows for easy manipulation of vulnerable circumstances, as seen primarily by the Salem Witch Trials of 1692. Based upon the accusations of multiple vindictive Salem residents, the lack of empirical evidence, the lack of division in the church and state, and the lack of proper leadership in Salem allowed for certain members of society to claim revenge, manipulate citizens, and gain unprecedented religious influence. The continuation of these incentives caused the Trials to rapidly turn into hysteria, with dozens killed, and hundreds more convicted of faulty acts. In The Crucible by Arthur Miller and “‘Homo Economicus’ and the Salem Witch Trials” by Franklin G. Mixon, Jr., the nature of Salem residents is exposed, explaining how greed and selfishness led to the conviction of multiple men and women in the fall of 1692. Although religion and the Puritan ideology played a major role in these shocking figures, without the motivation of personal and corporate profit, the Salem Witch Trials would not have had the same devastating effects.

Witchcraft is the use of sorcery or magic communication with the devil or with a familiar an irresistible influence or fascination. In the spring of 1692, the Salem witch trials began after a group of young girls in Salem Village, Massachusetts claimed that they were possessed by the devil and accused several women in their town of witchcraft. During this time more than 200 people were accused of witchcraft, all because a group of young girls thought they were possessed.

Thousands of years ago, many Christians believed that the Devil was able to give people power to harm others in order to gain their loyalty. This led society in Europe to go crazy all the way from the beginning of the 1300’s to the end of the 1600’s. The Salem Witch Trials is the most popular event of the “witchcraft craze” that took place. It was an event that led the residents of Salem in to a state of paranoia. Between the months of March and October in 1692, one hundred and fifty people were arrested on the accusations of witchcraft, leading to the death of twenty-four people. The trials destroyed hundreds of lives leading to the loss of property and lack of labor need in order to run farms and households. Relationships between neighbors, parents and children, and husbands and wives were all destroyed by the accusations of witchcraft. This tragedy all began by two young girls who began displaying “possessed” symptoms which eventually shook the Puritan society to its core and has a lasting effect on society to this day.

During the seventeenth century, many Puritans became fed up with the Church of England and its devilish ways. They wanted to break free from it, and make changes elsewhere. They got permission to set up a colony in Massachusetts Bay, and soon after that, over twenty-thousand Puritans fled from England to America. They decided to base their colony on the word of God, and believed God would protect them if they followed his commandments. This meant that if anyone were to sin, “they didn’t want God to protect them because they already worshiped the devil,” and “anyone who worshipped the devil was a witch who used witchcraft to possess others.” Because of this theory, many people were accused of being witches and using witchcraft. The most notorious series of hearings and prosecutions for those accused of witchcraft took place in Salem Village, Massachusetts, known as the Salem Witch Trials.

By reading the two primary sources we are given a clear account of the Salem Witch Trials. John Hale describes the officials involved in the trial and those being prosecuted. Hale states, “I observed in the prosecution of these affairs, that there was in the Justices, Judges and others concerned, a conscientious endeavor to do the thing that was right.” he then later states “But what chiefly carried on this matter to such an height, was the increasing of confessors til they amounted to near about fifty.” While Governor phips goes into more detail in reference to the actual court proceedings, “When the Court came to sit at Salem in the County of Essex they convicted more than twenty persons of being guilty of witchcraft, some of the convicted were such as confessed their Guilt, the Court as I understand began their proceedings with the accusations of the afflicted and then went upon other humane evidences to strengthen that.” Only together the sources are able to give the reader the information needed, showing a disadvantage to using primary sources to evaluate history. These accounts illustrate comprehensively the picture of a court concerned with doing the right thing for their people and trying the accused in the way they see fit. They explain the use of accusations to testify against the convicted and

Nineteen were hung, one was pressed and tortured to death, hundreds were imprisoned, and five had died while waiting to be trialed in prison. They were just a victim of being someone’s personal vendetta. The witch trials were revolved around a group of women that were said to of witnessed witchcraft. These young women were thirsting after their enemies to get the type of justice they thought to believe was reasonable for things certain people had done in the past that enraged them. Witch hunts like these root back far, all the way back to New England. During the 17th century europe was swarmed with accusations of

From the 1400’s to the 1800’s, around forty thousand individuals were executed for witchcraft, most of which occurred throughout central Europe. Constant religious and political upheaval caused elites to attempt to harness control over populations, which led to multiple laws being passed in regards to witchcraft. Torture was allowed and women and children were called to testify in the court room. Individuals who were seen to be outcasts on the outer edge of society were immediately targeted and easily suspected of sorcery. The Trial of Tempel Anneke: Records of Witchcraft Trial in Brunswick, Germany, 1663 gives its readers an inside perspective of the many different attitudes that existed towards witchcraft at the time. Because 17th century Brunswick townspeople were driven by deep Christian beliefs, they greatly feared all forms of magic, thinking them to come from the devil. Yet despite these fears, they did not completely reject witchcraft as they often sought out purported “witches” for magical solutions.

The Salem Witch Trails started in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692 and went on till 1693. There were 200 individuals and more accused of practicing witchcraft. Witchcraft was known for practicing the devils magic. These people who were accused were arrested and then imprisoned. Unfortunately, there were 20 people who were executed, including two animals which were dogs. Those 20 people were hung at the Gallows Hills near the Salem Village. One man was stoned to death and other individuals died in jail. Living in the colonial Massachusetts, children were known to help their parents as much as possible. Boys were known to “work as apprentices outside of the house, but also go hunting and fishing” (Jason C., Wilson K. and Shaunak P, n.d.). The girls were known to “help their mothers clean, cook, wash, and stew” (Jason C., Wilson K. and Shaunak P, n.d.). There was not much time for children to play or have fun. To show that someone didn’t pursue any witchcraft, there was a series of steps that needed to be done. This mass hysteria brought one village to be divided into two clashing groups. The nation has been facing similar problems for its entire existence and this is evidenced by the persecution of innocent people during the Salem Witch Trials.

The notion of witchcraft has been around long before the witch trials in Early Modern Europe. Different cultures have different images and stereotypes on what a witch is and what “magical” abilities he or she may possess. Many people however, did not look at these “magical” men and women as bad until the Holy Roman Empire began to look negatively on those people who were different, and opposed the norm set by the elites. Driven by fear, those living under the control of the Holy Roman Empire would began to blame other people for diabolical actions, or malicious activities. Women and some men, were tortured and tested in cruel ways in attempt of finding evidence or gaining a confession that the accused was a witch. Laws about how which were persecuted

Two hundred people were accused and twenty were executed between the years of 1692-1693 in Salem, Massachusetts due to suspicion of witchcraft. Although most, if not all of these people were falsely accused this act by the court could’ve ended up a good thing in Salem in the future. The Salem witch trials affected Salem positively and negatively. The unfortunate event helped positively towards the government because it separated law and church, but had a negative effect on the church making them lose credibility, and a clear negative effect on the people of Salem that died and were accused.

One of the most interesting aspects of the European witch trials between 1450 and 1750 is the frequency with which accused witches confessed to the crime of witchcraft throughout the legal proceedings. While some confessions were offered voluntarily, most were not, and extreme measures were often employed by prosecutors to force confessions from the accused. Among the questions this raises, a prominent one is why obtaining confessions to witchcraft was so crucial. This paper argues that confessions were so important in continental Europe because of the critical developments they facilitated: namely, confessions allowed prosecutors to secure convictions of witchcraft within a judicial system that required high standards of proof; they produced information that was invaluable to the creation and spread of the concept of witchcraft; and they validated the guilt of the accused, the reality of

Neighbors accused neighbors of witchcraft, and the fright was mounting. (Sutter par. 4) The accused were mostly women, and to make them confess, different methods of torture were used. The confessions and trials of the accused witches were nonsense. Often, torture would continue until the victim had no choice but to confess of being a witch, and most of the confessions were forced. Trials and hangings continued and by the early autumn of 1692, doubts were developing as to how so many respectable people could be guilty. The educated elite of the colony began efforts to end the witch-hunting hysteria that had enveloped Salem. Increase Mather then published a work entitled Cases of Conscience, which argues that it were better that ten suspected witches should escape than one innocent person should be condemned. This urged the court to exclude spectral evidence. With spectral evidence not permitted, the remaining trials ended in acquittals and all the convicted and accused witches were let out of jail in May of 1693. By the time the whole witchcraft incident ended, nineteen convicted witches were hanged, at least four accused witches had died in prison, and one man, Giles Corey, had been pressed to death under rocks. About one to two hundred other people were arrested and imprisoned on witchcraft charges. The witchcraft accusations in Salem had taken the lives of at least twenty-four people.

The Salem Witch Trials was a harsh time in Spring 1692. A time when young girls were accused of witchcraft. The Salem Witch Trials included harsh torturing methods for those accused of witchcraft. Torturing methods included swimming test, prayer test, touch test, witch cakes, witch marks, pricking and scratching test, incantations. These were some harsh punishments. Practicing witchcraft was considered a horrible crime on a scale with rape and murder. The 18th century Code of Hammurabi contained punishment against sorcery, and many medieval legal systems listed specific reasons for identifying, trying and even executing suspected witches and warlocks. Since finding proof of evil was no easy task, witch-hunters often went to some particular experiments in their journey to kill accused witches. From awful tortures and terrible dessert dishes to unwinnable trials by ordeal, find out more about unusual tests once used against evil misconduct.

According to the website Frontier Culture Museum, much of the cultures and traditions were brought over into the first North American Colonies from the English. The very first colony was Virginia. The colonies were established along the east coast. In the early colonial period of what would one day become the United States of America, most of the settlers were farm workers. Although men and women were typically divided by the types of jobs they would perform, both men and women were equal contributors. Men were believed to be more suited for heavy labor, the women were tasked with maintaining the overall household. Men would do the farming, growing crops, and yard work while the women made meals and took care of the children. In Lecture three,

The idea of torture being an important and commonly used way to question accused witches is also supported by source thirty-four in Witchcraft in Europe, which is The Malleus Maleficarum written by Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger in 1487. The Malleus Maleficarum is a handbook filled with many different sections covering a variety of witch beliefs, and its ninth action covers the method of sentencing that is to be used on the accused witch during questioning (Kors, 211). “And while she is being questioned about each several point, let her be often and frequently exposed to torture…” (Kors, 213). This source was the first encyclopedia covering witch beliefs that was available during the fifteenth century and was used quite often because of the beliefs it contained, which were held by Catholics and Protestants alike (Kors, 180). With The Malleus Maleficarum being cited often during that time, it is easy to assess that the wide use and acceptance of this handbook points to a time when the torture of accused witches was virtually accepted and pretty much commonplace practice.