Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
 Puritan
Cosmos:
 Visible and Invisible World
▪Spiritual World
▪God and Satan are part of the
invisible world

Puritans believe:
 Native American attacks are part of
God’s punishment
 They are a chosen people and material
success demonstrates the close linkage
of God
 In other words, Puritans believe God
uses Satan against them
▪ Interpret God’s will in everyday life


January 1692-Spring 1693
Salem, Massachusetts
 144 People have legal action
taken against them
 38 are male, 106 are female
 54 confessions of witchcraft
 19 people hanged/14 women/ 5 men
 1 was pressed to death for not confessing
 4 died in custody including several infants
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




MapofAccusations
Strong belief that Satan is acting in the world
 He recruits witches and wizards
 Diseases, bad fortune, and natural disasters are
attributed to the work of the devil
Time of troubles
 Frontier wars
 Smallpox
Convulsive Ergotism- bad rye
(a kind of food poisoning)
Teenage boredom
Belief of physical symptoms
Significance:

 Puritan Enlightenment
 destroys the natural assignment of gender roles
 Male dominated society
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
Historical Arguments explain the events in
1692:
Context
 Ergot Poisoning: Fungus that gets on the Rye

Theclashoftraditionalbeliefsand
valuesandtheideasofEnlightenment.

DiminishingPuritanvaluesagainst
enlightenmentthinkers.
 Fraud: the poor accused the rich
 Towns versus Farms
 Enlightenment power struggle
ScenefromTheCrucible

Conclusions
 Evidence
▪ Rested on the word of young girls and women almost
guaranteed that this crisis would be short lived.
Approximately 1 year
 Gendered Role
▪ Gendered order has been inversed-Men taking orders
from women and children
 Public Opinion changed
▪ Massachusetts government acknowledges responsibility
▪ Salem renamed Danvers 1752
▪ In 1957 Massachusetts apologizes for the events of 1692
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