The Role Of Witchcraft In New England

New England in the seventeenth century was a difficult place to live. The raging winds of winter, the ravaging Indian tribes and the many diseases that killed both livestock and family members often had inhabitants believing that they were being punished by God for their sins, or that their afflictions were caused by something much more sinister. Anyone who threatened traditional gender and societal roles was seen as a potential threat to both themselves and the rest of the community. The outbreaks of witch accusations that occurred throughout New England during this time reflected how unsettled the settlers really felt about their lives. This is reflected in both the Salem, Massachusetts witch trials and the Stamford, Connecticut witch trials even if these trials had different results.

The Salem Witch Trials brought havoc among the citizens of Salem, Massachusetts starting in 1692. Many of the people within the town continued to have strong loyalties to their new Puritan religion and their old king back home. The church of England had moved away from the Catholic religion with the help of King Henry VIII and the Puritans were a new group of people who accepted the split from Catholicism but still believed that the church of England had a lot of aspects that remained with the Catholic religion. Despite this, loyalty to the king remained strong because the Puritans were not looking to break off from the Church of England instead they wanted to reform the religion and make it their own. These loyalties stretched to such an extent that any sin committed was also considered an act of treason and thus punished. The Salem community was constantly searching for evil within their town to prove their righteousness to God which lead to high rates of fear and paranoia in their daily lives. The strict Puritan religion soon became the root cause of the monstrous imagination that started to form within the community of Salem. Many people still feared the presence of Catholic ideas within their communities and in response were willing to go to any extent to irradiate these views. Some historians also account the beginning of the trials to divisions within the two towns of Salem that lead to tensions and turmoil between the townsmen. But without the increased belief in their new religion, women around town wouldn’t have been persecuted. The strict belief in the Puritan religion and culture was the root cause of fear and paranoia that led to the mass execution of many women and townspeople during the Salem Witch Trials.

In 17th-century Colonial America, contact with the supernatural was considered part of everyday life; many people believed that evil spirits were present and active on Earth. This superstition emerged 15th century Europe and spread with the colonization of North American puritan colonies. Women were believed to be the most susceptible to demonic behavior; females were considered simple targets for Satan due to being viewed as the weaker sex physically, spiritually, and morally. Women who did not conform to the Puritan ideals at the time were usually ostracized, institutionalized, or brutally murdered. In 1692, thirteen women were famously put on trail for accusations of witchcraft; famously known as the Salem Witch Trails. Most of these women were put on trial and later burned to death for erratic and un-Godly behaviors, 78% of the people charged were women who were accused of doing devilish things such as; speaking out against church officials, being a financially wealthy widow, having pre marital sex, or just being too beautiful. According to Michael Coren’s Why Catholics are Right “five million women were killed by the Church as witches… witch hunts began in the sixteenth century in Europe and that between 30,000 and 50,000 men and women were burned to death for

The Puritans that comprised the colony of Salem, Massachusetts, were extremely religious, attributing biblical meaning to all aspects of their lives and being accustomed to personify the devil (Kocić, 2010). Specifically, church elders strongly believed that their congregation was superlatively righteous and for this reason the devil would try to target it with attacks in all forms, hence it was impressed upon the community to be vigilant against any signs of his presence. Such signs were subject to interpretation, yet they were generally concentrated on negative events which occurred unexplainably in the colony, for instance in the eventuality of a crop failure, stillborn children, or serious disease of an unknown nature. Common perception identified a witch as someone who bonded their body and

From the time of the 1690’s the entirety of Salem, Massachusetts were Puritans. “The Puritan lifestyle was restrained and rigid: People were expected to work hard and repress their emotions or opinions. Individual differences were frowned upon.” (Salem Witch Trials, The World Behind the Hysteria). These people believed that doing anything sinful would result in punishment from God. Just as much as they believed in God, they also believed in the Devil. Keeping up with the Puritan code, it led to the first women being accused of witchcraft. They were viewed as pariahs, and seen differently. Had the Puritan government let the afflicted defend themselves, not be so dependent on religion, not investigating the facts or scrutinize the trials the killing of many could have been prevented. The hangings from the trials would ultimately be the last in America.

In the article by Kamensky, once again the role of the woman in Puritan society is put under scrutiny, this time not for disrupting the order of land transfer, but for the patterns of speech, which by virtue of being spoken by a female could indicate a demonic presence. The tone, content, order and style of speech was important in determining a witch from a devout follower of God. Certain verbal traits were ascribed to Satan's followers. Kamensky gives examples of women who spoke as if they knew too much about the Bible. The gender biases of the time led people to assume that they had to be witches since only men could have attained that level of verbal prowess. This meant that women could never defy the all male authority of the church. Another common indicator of witchcraft was speaking out against authority. To defend one's self against the charges of consorting with the devil was seen as a challenge; men were allowed to speak aggressively, women

The largest outbreak of witchcraft in America took place in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. A group of girls, including the Parris’s Indian slave Tituba, gathered in the Salem village and were attempting to see the future by decoding “messages”. Shortly after this gathering the girls started showing signs of the possessed (pg. 73). To this day people all over America are still amazed with the events that took place in this time. But why is that? The fear of the village fell heavily onto the judicial system, which later made people focus on the proper separation of government and religious beliefs. Mass hysteria broke out amongst the village and many people were being accused, therefore leading to many innocent deaths. Although there could be many theories as to the reason the witch trials in Salem began, there are two points of view that are very commonly shared amongst people. Some believe that the Salem witch trials were women unconsciously searching for power, whereas others believe it was an encephalitis epidemic.

The seventeenth century was a time of great religious excitement both in Europe and America. It had been widely believed even before the Puritans left England that witchcraft was a well-practiced profession in Europe. The times for settlers in the New America proved to be quite different and so ever changing. With many new rules, laws, regulations and curfew a true government was being born. Throughout this vast change, religious beliefs became so strong to be studied and participated in. Religions that divided from Christianity and Catholic beliefs, such as Puritans, who had a clear vision of what their churches were going to be like. Witchcraft had been a crime a long time before the trials in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and prior

In 1692-1693, the Salem Witch Trial Hysteria occurred, resulting in 20 deaths out of the 200 accused of practicing the Devil’s magic, a practice that women were commonly accused of. Salem, Massachusetts, was a colony that consisted of Puritans, both Separatists and non Separatists alike. From the start, the Puritans believed that the Bible was true in all aspects: every word, every idea, every thought--was true. The Puritans also had minimal understanding of science, which led them to believe that phenomenon was an act of the Devil. Thus, when three young girls admitted to seeing demons and started behaving strangely, the Puritans grew progressively hysterical because they became more convinced that witches existed within Salem as they had little scientific knowledge. In a nutshell, the cause of the Salem Witch Trial Hysteria were Puritan fundamentalism, misogyny, and hysteria.

Gender roles were heavily put upon Puritan women, “women were seen as inferior beings that needed to be dominated by a male figure, and those who broke the mold were viewed as dangerous.” When speaking of puritan women and church, women were not allowed to pray with the congregation or lead a prayer. The fact that women were viewed as dangerous should they not conform to their gender roles should really show just how ridiculous their belief system was. One can only imagine that the paranoia of women being witches derived from the belief

The Salem witch trials were trials for people who were being accused of worshiping the devil. They believed the witches were out to harm others in supernatural ways. They were believed to be able to turn into animals, cause others to become possessed by looking at them, and were accused of being the cause of illness or miscarriages. However, there are many false theories about the Salem witch trials causing many controversies. One of the bigger controversies was if people were really being possessed by the three women. Often times, if doctors could not find a cause to an illness they will blame it on witchcraft. “Laurie Winn Carlson argues that in the spring of 1691 and winter of 1692, some of the accusers exhibited these symptoms, and that a doctor had been called in to treat the girls. He could not find an underlying physical cause, and therefore concluded that they suffered from possession by witchcraft, a common diagnosis of unseen conditions at the time”. They believed there had to be a cause to everything and if something

It was evident that the Puritan beliefs were strictly inflexible. They thought that their rules were too severe, and it motivated them to accuse others and use them as scapegoats. As a result, it formed a community conflict. Modern historians have noticed a repetitive pattern throughout New England in the early 1600s: community stress had a direct relationship to accusations of witchcraft (Saari, 23). Therefore, they were in great fear of being accused. The Puritans began to wonder who among them might be with the devil in disguise (Saari, 24). They thought deeply if a “local person was in a pact with the devil then that person was ultimately responsible for the community’s problems” (Saari, 24). Blaming others was becoming a constant and endless situation. “They were focused on cooperating simply to survive (Saari, 24). Innocent people often pleaded guilty to being witches to avoid torture and potential death. These accusations became madness because of the Puritans’ overly pious views on lifestyle.

“Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live”. In 1692, in Salem Massachusetts, puritans believed that witches existed and because of this belief twenty innocent people were sent to their death. The puritans believed every single word of the bible. There were at least three causes of the Salem Witch Trial Histeria of 1692, One reason was gender, age and marital status. Another reason is girls lying, jealousy.

In the 1680’s and 1690’s there was mass hysteria in New England over supposed witchcraft. The most famous outbreak was in Salem, Massachusetts, hence the name Salem Witch Trials. In Salem, there were young girls who started acting strangely, and they leveled accusations of witchcraft against some of the West Indian servants who were immersed in voodoo tradition. Most of the accusations were against women, and soon the accusations started to shift to the substantial and prominent women. Neighbors accused other neighbors, husbands accused their wives, etc. and it kept going on for a while. There was this nature of evil and the trials didn’t end until nineteen Salem residents were put to death in 1692, more importantly before the girls

A large proportion of society in England believed in witchcraft, but the reasons as to why a country which was developing a belief in