Salem Witch Trials

In the months of June to September 1692, nineteen men and women were hung near Salem Village, Massachusetts, for the crime of witchcraft. One man, Giles Corey, close to eighty years of age at the time of the accusations, was crushed to death under heavy stones for refusing to be tried. Hundreds of other people also faced accusations of witchcraft, and a large proportion of the accused spent many months in jail without the benefit of trial.

They hysteria that led to the Salem witchcraft trials has its roots in the strict Puritan religion of the colony of Massachusetts. However, economic conditions, personal jealousies, discontent within a congregation, and teenage boredom all played an important role in the events that swept Salem that summer.

Salem's hysteria over witchcraft sparked with the strange illness of Betty Parris, the daughter of the Salem minister. She exhibited a strange variety...
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