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During 1692, in the city of Salem, a little colony in Massachusetts, US, a horrifying
trial started against several neighbors accused of witchcraft.
What’s the real story behind the Witches of Salem?
It all started during winter that year, when two girls of 9 and 11 years old, Betty Parris
and Abigail Williams, daughter and niece of Samuel Parris, the new reverend of the village,
got sick.
The little girls suffered terrible convulsions, spasms, high fever… we’ve even heard stories
that say they would walk around the house on 4 legs, and bark like furious dogs.
Nobody knew what was going on.
The Parris cousins said they had been bewitched by some women in the village, who, at night,
made doubles of themselves.
Little after, more young girls fell ill, and they complained they felt bites on their skin.
They contorted and screamed inconsistencies.
Since nobody was able to explain those strange symptoms, nor cure them, there was only one
explanation at the time… it had to do with the devil!
There must have been witches in town!
They found the answer in the book “Memorable Providences”, written by reverend Cotton
Mather (Máder).
It tells the story of a witchcraft case in Boston, of an Irish laundry woman with the
same symptoms.
People believed it and they started an investigation that had all of Salem in an atmosphere of
collective craziness.
The first accused was Tituba, the Parris family’s slave.
She had indian origins or, perhaps, she had been born in Barbados.
Following Tituba, more possessed and accused people started appearing.
The paranoia became bigger and bigger, and different men and women from nearby towns
were accused of witchcraft, put under arrest and judged.
People in town were denouncing each other, blaming their mothers, wives and daughters.
Hundreds of people were reported for serving the Devil, with no evidence.
In court, judges got carried along by the hysterical reaction of the puritan community
of salem, turning rumors into actual facts.
Despite the common belief, these supposed witches were not burnt at the stake.
According to the English law at the time (back then, the US wasnt independent yet), those
accused of witchcraft were punished with the gallows.
The extermination of the witches took place between June and September 1962.
Out of all the accused, 20 of them were executed, and some died in prison.
14 women, 5 men and 2 dogs were found guilty of witchcraft, and hung.
One of the men, more than 80 years old, was condemned and died under piles of rocks because
he refused to plead.
Dogs were considered agents of the witches, and thought to follow their evil orders.
This process went on for another year without executions, and most of the accused were absolved.
Years after the trial, the judges who had passed sentence blamed their action on the
fear and obsession of the people back in the day.
Some researchers believe that what happened to the population of Salem was the consequence
of ergotism, an illness caused by the ergot in the rye, a fungus historically related
to witchcraft and all kinds of mysteries and legends.
The Salem Witch Trials became more famous thanks to the author Arthur Miller and his
work “The Crucible”, released in 1952 as a metaphor of the Witch Hunt promoted by
the House Un-American Activities Committee.
This committee made accusations without foundations, denunciations, interrogations, irregular processes
and black lists against suspects of being communists.
Those segments of society that were against these irregular methods denounced senator
Mc Carthy’s processes.
He based his undercover communist processes in constant suspicion, same as with the Salem
Trials.
The story of the Salem Witches has been used in many books, songs, series and movies.
One of the most recent adaptations is American Horror Story: Coven.
They devoted this third season to tell the story of the Salem Witches and their fight
for survival in today’s world.
The Salem witch trials are a dark period in history, a sign of what mass hysteria based
on rumors can do to people.
A shameful másacre that we should avoid nowadays.
There’s nothing more dangerous than confusion and ignorance mixed together.