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Salem Witch Trials Essay

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The Salem witch trials were a very dark time in the history of the United States. The tragic deaths of the 20 people who died will forever be carved into United States history. There are three main theories about what caused the mass hysteria in Salem. Ergot poisoning, strict rules towards women, and strict religion. In theory 1, Ergot is a disease that grows on rye and fits perfectly with the area of Salem for it to grow. This disease causes many symptoms, including burning sensations, infections, seizures, convulsions, and hallucinations. These symptoms very closely follow the ones the girls claimed to have. In source #1 it states “If ergot did exist, it is almost certain they would have been contaminated.” Since rye was their main crop and thrived in the conditions they lived in, they most certainly contracted it. Once contracted the girls started having symptoms of the ergot which eventually led to accusing people of doing the devil's bidding. Since one of the girls was the daughter of the minister, the fire quickly spread and everyone …show more content…

Pressure on the kids was extreme; they were expected to work and be adults. The kids got very little attention during this time and were only educated on one book alone, which was the bible. The kids' minds were on the sole purpose of the church, and girls especially had no insightful imagination as they had no form of freedom, only work inside the house. Source 3 states, “Whereas boys had at least some way to excite their imagination, girls were faced with an almost unbearable level of responsibility, boredom, and misery.’’ The feelings towards women as a whole at this time were extreme prejudice and cruelty, as their job at this time was to have children and tend the house. In this modern era women have rights and can do anything they want to, but still face oppression but nowhere near the acts of the Salem witch

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There were at least three causes of the Salem witch trial hysteria. They were anti-female bias, strong beliefs and lying/acting girls, and jealousy of poor versus rich. One cause of the witch trial hysteria was anti-female bias. Out of the twenty people hung, thirteen were women and seven were men. (Doc.

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N) also brings up the possibility of a fungus called ergot triggering the hysteria of 1692. Ergot grows on cereal grains and can be poisonous which was a “common condition resulting from eating contaminated rye bread” back in the seventeen hundred´s. Ergot is believed to have affected the accusers by causing symptoms such as “crawling sensations, tingling in the fingers, vertigo and hallucinations”. To better understand how ergot played a role in the Salem witch hysteria, an additional document listing how much rye and other cereal grains were consumed during the year 1692 would help determine a

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What Caused the Witch Trial Hysteria of 1692? Nineteen people hung and one was pressed to death but what for? Boredom and hatred filled people’s empty lives in 1692, especially in Salem. The biblical quote, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” was taken seriously, and a feud between the east and west side of the town caused controversy.

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They said they were pinched or that ghosts that had been killed by the witches, came to them. It is thought that these girls experienced these fits and visits because it was their father and uncle that was the minister and spoke of the witches. The whole situation could have possibly been avoided if Parris had not made such a big deal about the witches in

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The tight-knit community of Salem was rife with suspicion and anxiety. The settlers faced many challenges, including harsh living conditions, disease, and conflicts with Native American tribes. In this environment, any deviation from the norm is met with fear and apprehension. The sudden and unexplained afflictions experienced by Betty Parris and Abigail Williams, the two young girls who started the accusations, fueled panic. Their strange behavior, characterized by fits, convulsions, and hallucinations, baffled the community.

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The Hysteria Behind the Salem Witch Trials The Salem witch trials, dating back to February 1692, was a series of hearings against a group of young girls and those claimed to be witches. The girls had professed that their bodies had been dominated by the devil and blamed innocent citizens of using the “witchcraft” behind it. Anyone who seemed slightly out of the ordinary were accused by the girls to have dealt with “the devil’s magic.” The court put these accusations to the test by performing various executions and distinguishing whether the supposed witches could escape or not.

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There were all kinds of different theories going around which made the people of Salem think those girls were witches. One big theory that small town had was the bread that the girls ate they were all thinking that that bread had some type of poisoning, which that was a theory that bread had caused the girls to become witches. In the article the New Yorker Stacy Schiff a newsletter writer states that “Salem witch trials followed an outbreak of rye ergot. Ergot is a fungus blight that forms hallucinogenic drugs in bread.” That ergot poisoning was a serious thing when that drug was in the bread the girls that had ate it would be crazy, they didn’t act the same that’s why they would accuse them of being witches.

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Ergot poisoning mostly affected women and children with effects of skin crawling, tingling in the fingers, and mania to name a few. But very similar to what the “witches” were going through. The town of Salem was bored at this time in history. They didn't have any TVs, no government, they read all the books, and there was not much to do in Salem.

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Salem, Massachusetts, USA and occurred between February 1692 and May 1693. Over 150 people were arrested and imprisoned and even more accused; but not pursued by the authorities. 29 were convicted of witchcraft but only 19 were hanged. The best known trials were in the Court of Oyer and Terminer.

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The Salem Witch Trials occured on February 1692 - May 1693 and caused many of issues and effected a lot of people. It caused a lot of people to be killed for no reason. People abused it in so many ways and just had people killed because they didn't like them or wanted their land, and it could even because they wanted to be with that person's husband or just be cause of jealousy. It made them fear people because if you make anyone mad they could just turn on you and try to say your a witch to have you killed or sent to jail. But it also didn't take much to convince people and get people to act like someone casted a spell on them to have them executed so that they could get attention.

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This illness was like no other. It made the girls scream and try to climb under chairs, tables, and even up walls. The girls would hallucinate and feel weird sensations of tingling and things crawling under their skin. After they both were examined witchcraft was determined to be the cause. This was because the doctors in the 1600-1800s were extremely uneducated and when symptoms didn't make sense they would blame it on witchcraft.

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Even though the Salem Witch Trials began in Massachusetts in the 1600s, the fear of witches and witchcraft existed long before then. There was a witchcraft craze in Europe, lasting approximately from the 1300s to the end of the 1600s and resulting in the deaths of thousands (Blumberg, 2007). The Salem Witch Trials began in January 1692 when Reverend Samuel Parris’ daughter, Elizabeth, and niece, Abigail, began exhibiting strange behavior. Another girl by the name of Ann Putnam Jr. started exhibiting similar behaviors around the same time. The girls would scream, throw things, utter strange noises, and contort themselves into unnatural positions, and the local doctor blamed the girls’ behavior on the supernatural.

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