The European Witch Hunts was a time that lasted between 1450-1750, these hunts incorporated a series of trials for the crime of “witchcraft” which primarily resulted in the accused’s execution. This time period has several names accommodated with it such as The European Witch Craze, The European Witch Trials, and several more. This period of time as well embarks many characteristics of Europe in a pre-enlightenment manner such as ignorance, belief in hearsay, and many others. Today, the european witch hunts are a controversial topic among scholars whilst their is only but few sources on this topic. Among these factors the witch hunts have been brought up with correlating issues in this day and age, prominently gender issues. Roughly, around …show more content…
The Devil would have people whom were called witches that made a vow to worship and serve him(Lambert). This derogatory term of witch soon spread around Europe among this time. The calumniation of fear was building up amongst local neighbors in fact. With these fearful terms and news about witches it was when the trials were soon to occur. Many books were created during the time period of the witch hunts, one book in particular which was created around 1486 named “Malleus Maleficarum” which translates to Hammer of Witches(University of Pennsylvania). This fifteenth century book was essentially a handbook for identifying witches. These witch trials would commonly occur in Central Europe, Germany, France, and Switzerland(Lambert). These frequencies of the trials varied overtime(Lambert). For example, “The Burning times” which had occurred during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and was the peak of the witch trial executions during the time compared to, the beginnings of the trials that occurred in France and Germany. Statistically, “The Burning Times” were a highly probable to be the peak of the european witch hunt death toll. According to a data chart found on “Estimates of Executions” the results come too 12,545 in the category of Death Toll and 35,184 - 63,850 for estimated death toll (Hutton). Compared to the …show more content…
The society in this time period was disoriented and in complete hysteria. The society around this time would usually base their accusations on hearsay, the act of basing information on word of mouth. In general, people would take advantage of this accusation of “witchcraft” for resources such as ones land. Commonly, these witch trials would be a popular event among a town. Usually, when one thinks of a “witch” they picture most of the time an old wretched women brewing potions, spells, etc. Comparatively, there is not that much of a difference from our depiction to the european society back then. Approximately, 75%-80% of accused “witches” were woman however, it varied dependent on the country i.e. Scandinavia whom had both men and women accused around an equal percentage(Gibbins). In reference to woman, the “Malleus Maleficarum” plays a role into this. The book gives insight on finding witches, what do to do, and several more. In particular, the article “ 'Where there are many women there are many witches ': The Social and Intellectual Understanding of Femininity in the Malleus Maleficarum (1486)” explains the definitive concept of femininity in the “Malleus Maleficarum”(O’Leary). In the textual analysis section of this article it mentions question one of the book and explains how women were considered an inferiority regarding their male counterparts which in turn with their cruelty gave
The recent origin of this book is constricting because it has not been widely accredited by historians who study seventeenth century witch trials. Furthermore, Boynton is not an expert in this topic: her field of study in school was medicine and science, not history. In her introduction, Boynton stated her biased viewpoint that the Connecticut witch trials were much more deadly than those of Salem. This bias may have caused her to exaggerate some of the details of the witch trials and thus inaccurately portray the content she analyzes.
The Renaissance, Religious Reformations, religious wars, and oversea expansions lead to changing attitudes in Europe during the 15th and 16th centuries. The Protestant Reformation raised the status of women, but at the same time reformers like Martin Luther believed women should be domestic figures and stay out of the public area. As a result of the strong religious feelings from the Reformations, people became insecure with certain women, like widows and midwives, and developed the idea that they were witches and conferring with the devil. This insecurity and confusion launched the Great European witch-hunt. A witch-hunt is the searching for witches, which often resulted in the trial and persecution of women allegedly practicing witchcraft.
1692 was a bad time for women in Salem. Most lower class women were accused of witchcraft and killed. A lot of bad things were done to these innocent women, a lot of the time they were tortured to get a confession or to prove she was a witch. Some of these torture methods were inhumane and didn’t really prove anything. They were burned, stretched,crushed, swam; many methods were used and a lot of the time the odds weren’t in the accused’s favor.
Social: 1600s During the 1600s, there were plenty of witch trials and wars regarding religion. In the 1600s, there was a new thing going on. In Europe, people were hunting witches, whether they were men or women. Usually, the ones that were victims, falsely accused were women, for doing witchcraft.
In the late 17th Century, the Wurzburg witch trials stood as the largest mass trials in German history, prosecuting 900 men, women, and children. Rooted in a complex interplay of socioeconomical, cultural, psychological, and political factors, the trials left a profound cause on vulnerable communities, and stigmatized psychologically scarred individuals, already ensnared in fear and mass hysteria amid the ongoing Thirty Years’ War. The presence of the Wurzburg witch trials had significant psychological impacts on both communities and individuals, leading to heightened paranoia surrounding malevolent Satanic witches and widespread fear of prosecution. According to a review of “Witchcraft in Europe 400–1700: A Documentary History, 2nd ed”,
In his book, “A Modest Inquiry into the Nature of Witchcraft (1702),” clergyman John Hale comes forth to confront the recent events going on at the time. Initially, Hale alludes to the questionable actions and activities of the townspeople being accused of witchcrafts, and being imprisoned as punishment. In addition, he discloses how everyone suspicious will be accused, not even young children are safe from the hands of this fate. Hale’s purpose of publishing this book was to describe the incident of the Witch Trials, and to reveal his experience of the trials, since his own wife was accused. By employing a didactic tone, Hale relays the actions of the past that targeted the Puritans and those wrongly accused of witchcrafts, so this occurrence
"The story of witchcraft is primarily the story of women . . . ." Karlsen argues for the relevance and importance of women’s roles in the panic of witchcraft fear in 17th Century American society. She subtly contests that specific interests were at work in the shaping of witchcraft accusations; book elaborates that a specific type of woman risked accusation based on her demographic representation in society. Karlsen further elaborates on her theme with,
During this time period, over 200 people were accused of being a witch or performing some type of witchcraft and some even paid the ultimate price for a crime they never even committed. This event in history occurred through widespread hysteria created by lies from those who lived in the village. These lies that were spread around were about how the devil was there and took control of others so they could perform witchcraft
The massive witch hunt of the early modern period came to be due to the concept of witchcraft becoming more and more present with reality. Religious Reformations officially started the illusion of witches and demons walking among society. This is the case when the concept of the devil gets molded with the gods of norse mythology, which are Pagan gods. This caused society to fear Pagans and view them as devil’s servants walking the earth alongside them. This illusion was vivified when the concept of Sabbath, a ceremonial gathering of witches to worship the devil, was introduced and non-Christian religious groups got targeted for practicing their religion secretly.
Over the past year 100-200 people in the Salem region were thrown in prison for witchcraft. Twenty four people died and fifty five people falsely admitted to being witches. The trials were not over when the accused witches were released from prison. The aftermath of the trials plays a role in today 's society by showing us there is more to learn to prevent things like this from happening in the future. The aftermath of the trials also brought closure to
The Salem Witch Trials were a series of trials that occurred during Colonial America where many people, mostly women, were falsely accused of and wrongly punished for performing witchcraft. There is a well documented history of these accounts, including the causes, the results, and similar cases throughout history. During the end of 1692 and the beginning of 1693 there were a series of court cases where over 100 members of the town of Salem, Massachusetts were accused of being witches. Witches are defined as people with special powers
The Salem witch trials were the prosecution of people accused of witchcraft in Massachusetts from June to September 1692 by the Court of Oyer and Terminer. Though the trials were held in Salem, the accused were brought in from the neighboring towns of Amesbury, Andover, Topsfield, Ipswich, and Gloucester as well. To this day the trials are considered the epitome of injustice, paranoia, scapegoating, mass hysteria, and mob justice. The results were almost 200 arrests, 19 executed “witches”, one man pressed to death, one man stoned to death, and two dogs killed because they were suspected to be familiars of their owners who were accused of being witches. (Familiars are evil spirits in the form of animals used by witches to cast spells and perform
During the hysteria of 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts, many people were accused of practicing witchcraft. Therefore, their reputation, was ruined. Other people committed many sins in order to keep their reputation clean in town. For instance, some characters had to lie, fight, and accuse other people of witchcraft which could get the individual out of trouble and keep their hands clean. when a person got accused of being a witch, the person’s reputation would get ruined and the person would go to jail or be hanged.
The witch hunts nowadays may not be the same as they used to be in the 15th century, but they still exist. During the 1950’s witch-hunts, people who were
As Whitney mentioned, the witch hunts occurred in the 17th century were due to the fears of women becoming “economically and psychological” independent, and threatening the male control of property and social order. Those women were viewed as “discontent” meaning the refusal of accepting their predetermined social status (Whitney 85). In contrast, men who had high authority and social status like the Putmans and Parris could purposely manipulate women and instigated the public resentment to falsely accuse, and cruelly eliminate their enemies such as Rebecca and other accused witches. Certainly, the girls and women in the Putman and Parris’s families who made the false accusations of witches and witchcraft were wielded by