Since Halloween is in the air and American Horror Story's theme is The Coven, what better way to kick off the blog than with a related, seasonal tale... Enjoy!
We’ve all seen the scenes. Young, beautiful, sometimes scantily clad young ladies corrupting the morally superior Puritan men. Then when confronted, they suffer facial contortions, violent shaking, moans and writhing on the floor (Novins 128). This was usually followed by a minister claiming it was the devil’s doing and then we watched in horror as the women were burned alive. Yes, this is how many of us were introduced to events in Salem, Massachusetts. But what do we really know about what went on in Salem in 1692?
History tells us due to his inability to
create harmony among the villages after about 3 years on the job, Minister
Samuel Parris was dismissed. Coincidentally, it was at this time his daughter
Betty, niece Abigail and another child Ann Putnam began exhibiting odd behavior
such as nonsensical and foolish speech followed by strange contortions (Novins 125-26).
In addition, the minister had a Caribbean slave named Tituba, who was involved
with herbal medicine so you can see where this was headed. They were
bewitched and Tituba was believed to be just one of the witches casting this
spell on the children.
According to Eric
Foner in “Give Me Liberty”, the only way to avoid prosecution was to confess
and name other witches. Therefore in the coming months like a freight
train, hundreds of accusations rolled in and around Salem, some in order to
protect themselves and some to settle old scores within the community (106).
In a movie version
of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible,
(1996) Abigail Williams has an affair with John Proctor which leads to mass
hysteria and executions. However, in
reality, Abigail would have been 11 and John Proctor 60 years of age therefore
the likelihood of an affair can be questioned. While the movie portrays Abigail and the girls’ behavior as adolescent
sexuality, historians debate the real
reasons for the strange hysterics. Movies have been known to take liberties in
the name of entertainment. For example, Miller's response to critics regarding his
deviations of actual events in Salem was “What’s real?” (129)
Around 150 people
were charged during the trials and in all, nineteen were hanged. In addition, a
husband of a so-called witch was executed by being suffocated under a pile of
stones. While the executions were gruesome, nevertheless, it was not the images
I always saw on TV of a young woman tied to a stake being engulfed by flames.
According to Carnes
and Garraty, many of the accused witches were older women, widows of men of high
status and women who owned property. Some had mastered herbal medicine and the
healing arts (127). Based on this information one can start to draw conclusions
about the underlying reasons of the trials. They go on to explain “women who
lived apart from the daily guidance of men subverted the patriarchal
authorities of church and state” (127).
In conclusion,
there were many elements that went into the bewitching of Salem. Puritan
anxiety towards women’s attitudes was a key component. Likewise, there have
been other theories such as tension and rivalry between factions within the
community and fear of Indian attack (Novins 136). Since these theories lacked excitement and
romanticism, it was not unusual for Hollywood to take a much more adventurous
and sinister approach to this period in history, using illicit and wicked
behavior, cauldrons full of boiling animal parts, and black magic to illustrate
these events.
Works Cited
Carnes
and Garraty, “The American Nation: A History of the United States.” In Cheryl
Novins, 3rd ed. The Pearson Textbook
Reader Boston: Pearson, 2011. 125-36.Print
Carnes
and Garraty, “Re-Viewing the Past, The Crucible.” In Cheryl Novins, 3rd
ed. The
Pearson Textbook Reader Boston: Pearson, 2011. 125-29. 128-29.Print
Foner,
Eric. Give Me Liberty! An American
History, Seagul Edition 2nd ed. New York, NY: WW Norton & Co Inc. 2009.
106. Print.
Hytner,
Nicholas, Dir. The Crucible. 1996. DVD. 10/17/2013
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