You might want to use these bullet points to help you structure your blog posts and answers to essay Q’s: What were we working on? What did I contribute? Give e.g. How well did this move the piece forward? Why? How did this make the meaning/context/setting/characters clearer? How well did research/Social, Cultural, Historical aspects contribute to the success of this part of the process/rehearsal etc? What worked well/could be improved about the piece/process/your contribution?
Knee High : Knee high was our practitioner: their process was a huge nfluence on our original drama piece: We began with a stimulus which was the concept of Witchcraft. We bagan by thinking of things that were linked to witchcraft e.g. fairytales. Then we advanced on to thinking about fairytales from the withes points of view. Then we decided to Make set and start listening to music to influence us.
KNEE HIGH: Introduction Kneehigh are a UK based theatre company with a local, national and international profile. For over 30 years we have created vigorous, popular and challenging theatre and perform with the joyful anarchy that audiences have come to expect from this ground-breaking company. Kneehigh tell stories. Based in Cornwall in breath-taking barns on the south coast we create theatre of humanity on an epic and tiny scale. We work with an ever-changing ensemble of performers, artists, technicians, administrators, makers and musicians and are passionate about our multi-disciplined creative process. In 2010 Kneehigh launched The Asylum, a beautiful and flexible nomadic structure, which means we now have a venue to call home as well as being one of the leading touring theatre companies in the UK. We have now presented three seasons in The Asylum in Cornwall, and will continue to reinvent the space and explore new locations in future years. The Asylum will return to Cornwall in 2014 Alongside our national and international touring and Asylum seasons, we run the Kneehigh Rambles Programme - aiming to engage creatively with communities in Cornwall and beyond through event and adventure
From our home in Cornwall, Kneehigh have built a reputation for creating vigorous and popular theatre for audiences throughout the UK and beyond. In Cornwall, 1980, a village school teacher began to run theatre workshops in his spare time. In due course a mixture of people became involved, a farmer, the sign writer from Tesco, several students, a thrash guitarist from a local band, an electrician. No actors...nobody who had been trained. The workshops took place in the spirit of cheerful anarchy and casually slipped into performance, and finally the production of shows.
We created theatre for families in locations within their communities, village halls, marquees, harbour sides...and less conventional places. We created theatre on cliff-tops, in preaching pits and quarries, amongst gunpowder works and arsenic wastes, up trees, down holes, where the river meets the sea and where woodland footpaths end.
Proudly, we now find ourselves celebrated as one of Britain's most exciting touring theatre companies. We create vigorous, popular theatre for a broad spectrum of audiences, using a multi-talented group of performers, directors, designers, sculptors, engineers, musicians and writers. We use a wide range of art forms and media as our ‘tool kit' to make new and accessible forms of theatre. A spontaneous sense of risk and adventure produces extraordinary dramatic results. Themes are universal and local, epic and domestic.
Cornwall is our physical and spiritual home. We draw inspiration from the landscapes, history, people and culture.
Our rehearsal base is a National Trust barn on the cliffs near Mevagissey and our office is in Truro, the administrative centre of Cornwall. We take pride in our Cornish identity, and seek to inspire ‘pride of place' in our Cornish audiences. Cornwall has a long and lively history of international trade and cultural exchange. For a county so distant from the capital, it boasts remarkably cosmopolitan and global influences and culture. We are proud to be an active part of this tradition.
"I returned home to Cornwall 30 years ago to make theatre. It was a place where you could make things happen. Kneehigh started as a company making work for children and their families, but we soon found ourselves creating challenging, accessible and anarchic theatre for a diverse local and national audience.
Kneehigh builds a team for each project. The isolation of the barns, and the need to cook and keep warm provides a real and natural focus for our flights of imagination. This is not a conceit; it is a radical choice that informs all aspects of our work. Although much of our work is now co-produced with larger theatres, we always try to start the creative process at these barns, to be inspired by our environment and where we work. Both Tristan & Yseult and Cymbeline started life as outdoor shows, playing in epic but intimate spaces: Restormel Castle, The Minack, The Eden Project and Rufford Abbey. These elemental and charged spaces add a physical and vocal robustness to our performance style, which becomes further distilled when we work ‘indoors'.
Kneehigh are an ever-changing ensemble, a kind of strange family, many of whom come from, or have chosen to live in, Cornwall: the extreme South West tip of the British Isles - outsiders, left-handers - engaging with the world with a sense of community and identity. As King Mark says in Tristan & Yseult, "We don't look inland there's not much point. No, outward, outward lies the way! Inland there's little to write home about and much less to say!".
The company changes for each project, there are those who have worked together for a long time and those who have just arrived. We look to surprise each other, to take leaps in the dark but there is no given formula for making the work. If we were to have a manifesto it might include words like generosity, passion, bravery, humility, ambition, instinct and irreverence. These words have become the secret principles that guide our work.
Kneehigh is 30 years old this year. Although I could never have planned this; there has been no great plan, just dreams and aspirations - some of which I never thought would take this long to achieve! Kneehigh has survived because it has actively evolved. We have committed to our home, our craft, to each other and to change. It's a privilege to still be part of that journey."
Mike Shepherd , 2010 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is no formula to the way we make theatre. However, it always starts with the story. No, it starts before then. It starts with an itch, a need, an instinct.
Each one is raw, relevant and personal. Stories have an ability to present themselves, to emerge as if from nowhere. But they never are from nowhere. This is the seminal moment of instinct. This is when your subconscious stakes its claim and intervenes in your carefully ordered life. I sit up when a story taps me on the shoulder. I respect co-incidence. I listen to impulse. One of my most hated questions when making theatre is ‘Why?'. ‘Because', I want to answer, ‘Because...'.
For me, making theatre is an excavation of feelings long since buried, a journey of understanding. Bruno Bettelheim in ‘The Uses of Enchantment' his book about children's relationship to fiction, states that "our greatest need and most difficult achievement is to find meaning in our lives". He argues that by revealing the true content of folktales, children can use them to cope with their baffling and confusing emotions. My fascination with certain stories is fuelled by my own subconscious. The Red Shoes charts the pain of loss, obsession and addiction, The Wooden Frock, follows the slow and faltering healing process, Tristan & Yseult is a poem to love and its madness and The Bacchae a terrifying glimpse at the beast in us all. These are not children's themes but I often approach them in a childlike way. In my experience, our basic needs and desires are the same - to be communicated with, to be delighted, to be surprised, to be scared. We want to be part of something and we want to feel. We want to find meaning in our lives.
The event of live theatre is a rare chance to deliver all these needs. We can have a collective experience, unique to the group of people assembled in the theatre. I don't want the fourth wall constantly and fearfully placed between the actors and their audience, I want the actors to speak to their accomplices, look at them, to respond to them. I want a celebration, a collective gasp of amazement. I want the world to transform in front of the audiences eyes and demand that they join in with the game. Theatre is nothing without the engagement of the audience's creativity. Theatre takes us right back to Bruno Bettelheim and his belief in the therapeutic and cathartic nature of stories. We tell them because we need them.
Months before rehearsals begin, I start work with the creative team. We gaze at books and films, sketch and begin to form a concept; an environment in which the story can live, in which the actors can play. This physical world holds meaning and narrative, it is as much a story telling tool as the written word. Stu Barker (musical director and composer) and I exchange music we have heard, that inspires us or just feels right. We talk of themes and feelings. From these conversations he creates a musical palette of melodies and sound-scapes. With the writer or writers, we talk and dream. We map out the structure and the overall shape of the piece. They go away and write collections of poems or lyrics or ideas. Each writer works in a different way but what none of them do is to write a script or a scene in isolation.
It is this fertile palette of words, music and design that we bring to the rehearsal room. As I said, Kneehigh is a team. The shared imagination is greater than any individuals so we begin the rehearsal process by returning to the story. We tell it to each other, scribble thoughts on huge pieces of paper, relate it to our own experience. We create characters, always looking to serve and subvert the story. Actors like Mike Shepherd and Craig Johnson delight with their deft improvisation, breathing life and naughtiness into the bones of the story, performers like Bec Applebee and Eva Magyar use their painfully eloquent bodies to create physical poetry and story, Giles King and Tristan Sturrock tickle and disarm with their tragic clowns. Stu's music is used to help create the world, to guide and inform improvisation and release feeling. Lighting is used from day one, the design is developed with ideas coming from the devising team. The writers are in rehearsal. They watch and inspire, feeding in their poetry, their lyrics. They respond to improvisation and craft scenes and characters alongside the actors. Layer upon layer the world is created, the story released.
We lay the foundations, then we forget them. If you stay true to the fundamental relationship between yourself, your team and the subject matter, the piece will take on a life if its own. Armed with instinct, play and our building blocks of music, text and design, Kneehigh do fearless battle. One of our most used phrases in the process is ‘hold your nerve'. There is no room for neurosis or doubt, these will only undermine the process, hold your nerve, stay open and delight in the privilege of making theatre.
Each writer, Anna Maria Murphy, Carl Grose and Tom Morris bring their own beautiful and distinctive voice to the work. But remember, these texts represent just one layer of the worlds that Kneehigh creates. As you read, close your eyes from time to time. Let a tune drift back from your childhood or recall a painting that made your heart pound. Remember falling in love or losing control, leaving a loved one or laughing ‘til you cried. Now the work lives. Now there is a connection. Now there is meaning. Emma Rice - Joint Artistic Director, Kneehigh
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Witchcraft: Witchcraft (also called witchery or spellcraft) is the use of magicalfaculties, most commonly for religious, divinatory or medicinal purposes.[1] This may take many forms depending on cultural context.
The belief in and the practice of magic has been present since the earliest human cultures and continues to have an important religious and medicinal role in many cultures today.[1]
"Magic is central not only in 'primitive' societies but in 'high cultural' societies as well..."[2]
The concept of witchcraft as harmful is often treated as a cultural ideology providing a scapegoat for human misfortune.[3][4] This was particularly the case in Early Modern Europe where witchcraft came to be seen as part of a vast diabolical conspiracy of individuals in league with the Devil undermining Christianity, eventually leading to large-scale witch-hunts, especially in Protestant Europe. Witch hunts continue to this day with tragic consequences.[5]
Since the mid-20th century Witchcraft has become the designation of a branch of modern paganism. It is most notably practiced in the Wiccan traditions, some of whom claim to practice a revival of pre-Abrahamic spirituality.[6]
In anthropological terminology, a "witch" differs from a sorcerer in that they do not use physical tools or actions to curse; their maleficium is perceived as extending from some intangible inner quality, and the person may be unaware that they are a "witch", or may have been convinced of their own evil nature by the suggestion of others.[8] This definition was pioneered in a study of central African magical beliefs by E. E. Evans-Pritchard, who cautioned that it might not correspond with normal English usage.[9]
Historians of European witchcraft have found the anthropological definition difficult to apply to European and British witchcraft, where "witches" could equally use (or be accused of using) physical techniques, as well as some who really had attempted to cause harm by thought alone.[10]
As in anthropology, European witchcraft is seen by historians as an ideology for explaining misfortune; however, this ideology manifested in diverse ways. Reasons for accusations of witchcraft fall into four general categories:[11]
A person was caught in the act of positive or negative sorcery
A well-meaning sorcerer or healer lost their clients' or the authorities' trust
A person did nothing more than gain the enmity of their neighbours
A person was reputed to be a witch and surrounded with an aura of witch-beliefs or Occultism
Éva Pócs in turn identifies three varieties of witch in popular belief:
The "neighbourhood witch" or "social witch": a witch who curses a neighbour following some conflict.
The "magical" or "sorcerer" witch: either a professional healer, sorcerer, seer or midwife, or a person who has through magic increased her fortune to the perceived detriment of a neighbouring household; due to neighbourly or community rivalries and the ambiguity between positive and negative magic, such individuals can become labelled as witches.
The "supernatural" or "night" witch: portrayed in court narratives as a demon appearing in visions and dreams.[12]
"Neighbourhood witches" are the product of neighbourhood tensions, and are found only in self-sufficient serf village communities where the inhabitants largely rely on each other. Such accusations follow the breaking of some social norm, such as the failure to return a borrowed item, and any person part of the normal social exchange could potentially fall under suspicion. Claims of "sorcerer" witches and "supernatural" witches could arise out of social tensions, but not exclusively; the supernatural witch in particular often had nothing to do with communal conflict, but expressed tensions between the human and supernatural worlds; and in Eastern and Southeastern Europe such supernatural witches became an ideology explaining calamities that befell entire communities.[13]
In Christianity and Islam, sorcery came to be associated with heresy and apostasy and to be viewed as evil. Among the Catholics, Protestants, and secular leadership of the European Late Medieval/Early Modern period, fears about witchcraft rose to fever pitch, and sometimes led to large-scale witch-hunts. Throughout this time, it was increasingly believed that Christianity was engaged in an apocalyptic battle against the Devil and his secret army of witches, who had entered into a diabolical pact. In total, tens or hundreds of thousands of people were executed, and others were imprisoned, tortured, banished, and had lands and possessions confiscated. The majority of those accused were women, though in some regions the majority were men.[14][15][16] Accusations of witchcraft were often combined with other charges of heresy against such groups as the Cathars and Waldensians.
The Malleus Maleficarum, (Latin for "Hammer of The Witches) was an infamous witch-hunting manual written in 1486 by two German monks, Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger. It was used by both Catholics and Protestants[17] for several hundred years, outlining how to identify a witch, what makes a woman more likely than a man to be a witch, how to put a witch on trial, and how to punish a witch. The book defines a witch as evil and typically female. This book was not given the official Imprimatur of the Catholic Church, which would have made it approved by church authorities, but was used by the Inquisition nevertheless.
In the modern Western world, witchcraft accusations have often accompanied the satanic ritual abusemoral panic. Such accusations are a counterpart to blood libel of various kinds, which may be found throughout history across the globe.
Throughout the early modern period, the English term "witch" was not exclusively negative in meaning, and could also indicate cunning folk. "There were a number of interchangeable terms for these practitioners, 'white', 'good', or 'unbinding' witches, blessers, wizards, sorcerers, however 'cunning-man' and 'wise-man' were the most frequent."[18] The contemporary Reginald Scot noted, "At this day it is indifferent to say in the English tongue, 'she is a witch' or 'she is a wise woman'".[19] Folk magicians throughout Europe were often viewed ambivalently by communities, and were considered as capable of harming as of healing,[20] which could lead to their being accused as "witches" in the negative sense. Many English "witches" convicted of consorting with demons seem to have been cunning folk whose fairyfamiliars had been demonised;[21] many French devins-guerisseurs ("diviner-healers") were accused of witchcraft,[22] and over one half the accused witches in Hungary seem to have been healers.[23]
Some of the healers and diviners historically accused of witchcraft have considered themselves mediators between the mundane and spiritual worlds, roughly equivalent to shamans.[24] Such people described their contacts with fairies, spirits often involving out-of-body experiences and travelling through the realms of an "other-world".[25] Beliefs of this nature are implied in the folklore of much of Europe, and were explicitly described by accused witches in central and southern Europe. Repeated themes include participation in processions of the dead or large feasts, often presided over by a horned male deity or a female divinity who teaches magic and gives prophecies; and participation in battles against evil spirits, "vampires", or "witches" to win fertility and prosperity for the community.
Historically the witchcraft label has been applied to practices people believe influence the mind, body, or property of others against their will—or practices that the person doing the labeling believes undermine social or religious order. Some modern commentators[who?] believe the malefic nature of witchcraft is a Christian projection. The concept of a magic-worker influencing another person's body or property against their will was clearly present in many cultures, as traditions in both folk magic and religious magic have the purpose of countering malicious magic or identifying malicious magic users. Many examples appear in ancient texts, such as those from Egypt and Babylonia. Malicious magic users can become a credible cause for disease, sickness in animals, bad luck, sudden death, impotence and other such misfortunes. Witchcraft of a more benign and socially acceptable sort may then be employed to turn the malevolence aside, or identify the supposed evil-doer so that punishment may be carried out. The folk magic used to identify or protect against malicious magic users is often indistinguishable from that used by the witches themselves.
There has also existed in popular belief the concept of white witches and white witchcraft, which is strictly benevolent. Many neopagan witches strongly identify with this concept, and profess ethical codes that prevent them from performing magic on a person without their request.
Where belief in malicious magic practices exists, such practitioners are typically forbidden by law as well as hated and feared by the general populace, while beneficial magic is tolerated or even accepted wholesale by the people – even if the orthodox establishment opposes it.
Probably the most obvious characteristic of a witch was the ability to cast a spell, "spell" being the word used to signify the means employed to carry out a magical action. A spell could consist of a set of words, a formula or verse, or a ritual action, or any combination of these.[26] Spells traditionally were cast by many methods, such as by the inscription of runes or sigils on an object to give it magical powers; by the immolation or binding of a wax or clay image (poppet) of a person to affect him or her magically; by the recitation of incantations; by the performance of physical rituals; by the employment of magical herbs as amulets or potions; by gazing at mirrors, swords or other specula (scrying) for purposes of divination; and by many other means.[27]
Strictly speaking, "necromancy" is the practice of conjuring the spirits of the dead for divination or prophecy – although the term has also been applied to raising the dead for other purposes. The Biblical Witch of Endor is supposed to have performed it (1 Sam. 28), and it is among the witchcraft practices condemned by Ælfric of Eynsham:[28][29][30]
Witches still go to cross-roads and to heathen burials with their delusive magic and call to the devil; and he comes to them in the likeness of the man that is buried there, as if he arise from death.[31]
Albrecht Dürer circa 1500: Witch Riding Backwards On A Goat
During the Christianisation of Norway, King Olaf Trygvasson had male völvas (shamans) tied up and left on a skerry at ebb.
Burning of witches. Current scholarly estimates of the number of people executed for witchcraft vary between about 40,000 and 100,000.[32] The total number of witch trials in Europe known for certain to have ended in executions is around 12,000.[33]
In Early Modern European tradition, witches were stereotypically, though not exclusively, women.[14][34] European pagan belief in witchcraft was associated with the goddess Diana and dismissed as "diabolical fantasies" by medieval Christian authors.[35]Witch-hunts first appeared in large numbers in southern France and Switzerland during the 14th and 15th centuries. The peak years of witch-hunts in southwest Germany were from 1561 to 1670.[36]
The familiar witch of folklore and popular superstition is a combination of numerous influences. The characterization of the witch as an evil magic user developed over time.
Early converts to Christianity looked to Christian clergy to work magic more effectively than the old methods under Roman paganism, and Christianity provided a methodology involving saints and relics, similar to the gods and amulets of the Pagan world. As Christianity became the dominant religion in Europe, its concern with magic lessened.[37]
The Protestant Christian explanation for witchcraft, such as those typified in the confessions of the Pendle witches, commonly involves a diabolical pact or at least an appeal to the intervention of the spirits of evil. The witches or wizards engaged in such practices were alleged to reject Jesus and the sacraments; observe "the witches' sabbath" (performing infernal rites that often parodied the Mass or other sacraments of the Church); pay Divine honour to the Prince of Darkness; and, in return, receive from him preternatural powers. It was a folkloric belief that a Devil's Mark, like the brand on cattle, was placed upon a witch's skin by the devil to signify that this pact had been made.[38] Witches were most often characterized as women. Witches disrupted the societal institutions, and more specifically, marriage. It was believed that a witch often joined a pact with the devil to gain powers to deal with infertility, immense fear for her children's well-being, or revenge against a lover.
The Church and European society were not always so zealous in hunting witches or blaming them for bad occurrences. Saint Boniface declared in the 8th century that belief in the existence of witches was un-Christian. The emperor Charlemagne decreed that the burning of supposed witches was a pagan custom that would be punished by the death penalty. In 820 the Bishop of Lyon and others repudiated the belief that witches could make bad weather, fly in the night, and change their shape. This denial was accepted into Canon law until it was reversed in later centuries as the witch-hunt gained force. Other rulers such as King Coloman of Hungary declared that witch-hunts should cease because witches (more specifically, strigas) do not exist.
Burning witches, with others held in Stocks, 14th century
The Church did not invent the idea of witchcraft as a potentially harmful force whose practitioners should be put to death. This idea is commonplace in pre-Christian religions. According to the scholar Max Dashu, the concept of medieval witchcraft contained many of its elements even before the emergence of Christianity. These can be found in Bacchanalias, especially in the time when they were led by priestess Paculla Annia (188BC–186BC).
However, even at a later date, not all witches were assumed to be harmful practicers of the craft. In England, the provision of this curative magic was the job of a witch doctor, also known as a cunning man, white witch, or wise man. The term "witch doctor" was in use in England before it came to be associated with Africa. Toad doctors were also credited with the ability to undo evil witchcraft. (Other folk magicians had their own purviews. Girdle-measurers specialised in diagnosing ailments caused by fairies, while magical cures for more mundane ailments, such as burns or toothache, could be had from charmers.)
In the north of England, the superstition lingers to an almost inconceivable extent. Lancashire abounds with witch-doctors, a set of quacks, who pretend to cure diseases inflicted by the devil ... The witch-doctor alluded to is better known by the name of the cunning man, and has a large practice in the counties of Lincoln and Nottingham.[39]
Such "cunning-folk" did not refer to themselves as witches and objected to the accusation that they were such.[citation needed]
Powers typically attributed to European witches include turning food poisonous or inedible, flying on broomsticks or pitchforks, casting spells, cursing people, making livestock ill and crops fail, and creating fear and local chaos.
Pagan practices formed a part of Russian and Eastern Slavic culture; the Russian people were deeply superstitious. The witchcraft practiced consisted mostly of earth magic and herbology; it was not so significant which herbs were used in practices, but how these herbs were gathered. Ritual centered on harvest of the crops and the location of the sun was very important.[41] One source, pagan author Judika Illes, tells that herbs picked on Midsummer's Eve were believed to be most powerful, especially if gathered on Bald Mountain near Kiev during the witches' annual revels celebration.[42] Botanicals should be gathered, "During the seventeenth minute of the fourteenth hour, under a dark moon, in the thirteenth field, wearing a red dress, pick the twelfth flower on the right."[43]
Spells also served for midwifery, shape-shifting, keeping lovers faithful, and bridal customs. Spells dealing with midwifery and childbirth focused on the spiritual wellbeing of the baby.[43] Shape-shifting spells involved invocation of the wolf as a spirit animal.[44] To keep men faithful, lovers would cut a ribbon the length of his erect penis and soak it in his seminal emissions after sex while he was sleeping, then tie seven knots in it; keeping this talisman of knot magic ensured loyalty.[45] Part of an ancient pagan marriage tradition involved the bride taking a ritual bath at a bathhouse before the ceremony. Her sweat would be wiped from her body using raw fish, and the fish would be cooked and fed to the groom.[46]
Demonism, or black magic, was not prevalent. Persecution for witchcraft, mostly involved the practice of simple earth magic, founded on herbology, by solitary practitioners with a Christian influence. In one case investigators found a locked box containing something bundled in a kerchief and three paper packets, wrapped and tied, containing crushed grasses.[47] Most rituals of witchcraft were very simple—one spell of divination consists of sitting alone outside meditating, asking the earth to show your fate.[48]
While these customs were unique to Russian culture, they were not exclusive to this region. Russian pagan practices were often akin to paganism in other parts of the world. The Chinese concept of chi, a form of energy that often manipulated in witchcraft, is known as bioplasma in Russian practices.[49] The western concept of an "evil eye" or a "hex" was translated to Russia as a "spoiler".[50] A spoiler was rooted in envy, jealousy and malice. Spoilers could be made by gathering bone from a cemetery, a knot of the target's hair, burned wooden splinters and several herb Paris berries (which are very poisonous). Placing these items in sachet in the victim's pillow completes a spoiler. The Sumerians, Babylonians, Assyrians, and the ancient Egyptians recognized the evil eye from as early as 3,000 BCE; in Russian practices it is seen as a sixteenth-century concept.[51]
The most well-known aspect of Russian witchcraft is arguably the folklore of Baba Yaga. Sixteenth-century legend portrays Baba Yaga as all-knowing and connected to death and contemplation. It was also said that she devoured children. Baba Yaga is often depicted as a guardian of the fountain of water and life, in triple form with two sisters. The concept of the triple Goddess also occurs in Egyptian, Celtic, and Greek witchcraft.[52]
While altars to deities are usually constructed to invoke or evoke the subject, altars to Baba Yaga are only for contemplation. Legend does not recommend contacting Baba Yaga because she is unforgiving and does not have time to waste. An altar to Baba would consist of birch wood and leaves, animal imagery, mortar, pestle, broom, and food and drink. Because Baba Yaga is always hungry, food and drink are especially recommended. Her favorites are Russian coulibiac, samovar with blocks of fine Russian tea, and water pipes.[53]
The dominant societal concern re those practicing witchcraft was not whether paganism was effective, but whether it could cause harm.[54] Peasants in Russian and Ukrainian societies often shunned witchcraft, unless they needed help against supernatural forces. Impotence, stomach pains, barrenness, hernias, abscesses, epileptic seizures, and convulsions were all attributed to evil (or witchcraft). This is reflected in linguistics; there are numerous words for a variety of practitioners of paganism-based healers. Russian peasants referred to a witch as a chernoknizhnik (a person who plied his trade with the aid of a black book), sheptun/sheptun'ia (a "whisperer" male or female), lekar/lekarka or znakhar/znakharka (a male or female healer), or zagovornik (an incanter).[55]
Ironically enough, there was universal reliance on folk healers – but clients often turned them in if something went wrong. According to Russian historian Valerie A. Kivelson, witchcraft accusations were normally thrown at lower-class peasants, townspeople and Cossacks. People turned to witchcraft as a means to support themselves. The ratio of male to female accusations was 75% to 25%. Males were targeted more, because witchcraft was associated with societal deviation. Because single people with no settled home could not be taxed, males typically had more power than women in their dissent.[56]
Witchcraft trials occurred frequently in seventeenth-century Russia, although the "great witch-hunt" is believed[by whom?] to be a predominately Western European phenomenon. However, as the witchcraft-trial craze swept across West European countries during this time, Orthodox Christian Eastern Europe indeed partook in this so-called "witch hysteria." This involved the persecution of both males and females who were believed to be practicing paganism, herbology, the black art, or a form of sorcery within and/or outside their community. Very early on witchcraft legally fell under the jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical body, the church, in Kievan Rus' and Muscovite Russia.[57] Sources of ecclesiastical witchcraft jurisdiction date back as early as the second half of the eleventh century, one being Vladimir the Great's first edition of his State Statute or Ustav, another being multiple references in the Primary Chronicle beginning in 1024.[58]
The sentence for an individual found guilty of witchcraft or sorcery during this time, and in previous centuries, typically included either burning at the stake or being tested with the "ordeal of cold water" or judicium aquae frigidae.[59] The cold-water test was primarily a Western European phenomenon, but was used as a method of truth in Russia prior to, and post, seventeenth-century witchcraft trials in Muscovy. Accused persons who drowned were considered innocent, and ecclesiastical authorities would proclaim them "brought back," but those who floated were considered guilty of practicing witchcraft, and burned at the stake or executed in an unholy fashion. The thirteenth-century bishop of Vladimir, Serapion Vladimirskii, preached sermons throughout the Muscovite countryside, and in one particular sermon revealed that burning was the usual punishment for witchcraft, but more often the cold water test was used as a precursor to execution.[59]
Although these two methods of torture were used in the west and the east, Russia implemented a system of fines payable for the crime of witchcraft during the seventeenth century. Thus, even though torture methods in Muscovy were on a similar level of harshness as Western European methods used, a more civil method was present. In the introduction of a collection of trial records pieced together by Russian scholar Nikolai Novombergsk, he argues that Muscovite authorities used the same degree of cruelty and harshness as Western European Catholic and Protestant countries in persecuting witches.[60] By the mid-sixteenth century the manifestations of paganism, including witchcraft, and the black arts—astrology, fortune telling, and divination—became a serious concern to the Muscovite church and state.[61]
Tsar Ivan IV (reigned 1547-1584) took this matter to the ecclesiastical court and was immediately advised that individuals practicing these forms of witchcraft should be excommunicated and given the death penalty.[61] Ivan IV, as a true believer in witchcraft, was deeply convinced[citation needed] that sorcery accounted for the death of his wife, Anastasiia in 1560, which completely devastated and depressed him, leaving him heartbroken.[62] Stemming from this belief, Ivan IV became majorly concerned with the threat of witchcraft harming his family, and feared he was in danger. So, during the Oprechnina (1565-1572), Ivan IV succeeded in accusing and charging a good number of boyars with witchcraft whom he did not wish to remain as nobles. Rulers after Ivan IV, specifically during the Time of Troubles (1598-1613), increased the fear of witchcraft among themselves and entire royal families, which then led to further preoccupation with the fear of prominent Muscovite witchcraft circles.[63]
After the Time of Troubles, seventeenth-century Muscovite rulers held frequent investigations of witchcraft within their households, laying the ground, along with previous tsarist reforms, for widespread witchcraft trials throughout the Muscovite state.[64] Between 1622 and 1700 ninety-one people were brought to trial in Muscovite courts for witchcraft.[65] Although Russia did partake in the witch craze that swept across Western Europe, the Muscovite state did not persecute nearly as many people for witchcraft, let alone execute a number of individuals anywhere close to the number executed in the west during the witch hysteria.
Franciscan friars from New Spain introduced Diabolism, belief in the devil, to the indigenous people after their arrival in 1524.[66] Bartolomé de las Casas believed that human sacrifice was not diabolic, in fact far off from it, and was a natural result of religious expression.[66] Mexican Indians gladly took in the belief of Diabolism and still managed to keep their belief in creator-destroyer deities.[67]
In 1645, Springfield, Massachusetts, experienced America's first accusations of witchcraft when husband and wife Hugh and Mary Parsons accused each other of witchcraft. At America's first witch trial, Hugh was found innocent, while Mary was acquitted of witchcraft but sentenced to be hanged for the death of her child. She died in prison.[68] From 1645–1663, about eighty people throughout England's Massachusetts Bay Colony were accused of practicing witchcraft. Thirteen women and two men were executed in a witch-hunt that lasted throughout New England from 1645–1663.[69]
The Salem witch trials followed in 1692–93. These witch trials were the most famous in British North America and took place in the coastal settlements near Salem, Massachusetts. Prior to the witch trials, nearly 300 men and women (mostly women) had been suspected of partaking in witchcraft and over 30 of these people were hanged.[70] The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings before local magistrates followed by county court trials to prosecute people accused of witchcraft in Essex, Suffolk and Middlesex Counties of colonial Massachusetts, between February 1692 and May 1693. Over 150 people were arrested and imprisoned, with even more accused who were not formally pursued by the authorities. The two courts convicted 29 people of the capital felony of witchcraft. Nineteen of the accused, 14 women and 5 men, were hanged. One man who refused to enter a plea was crushed to death under heavy stones in an attempt to force him to do so. At least five more of the accused died in prison.
Despite being generally known as the "Salem" witch trials, the preliminary hearings in 1692 were conducted in a variety of towns across the province: Salem Village, Ipswich, Andover, as well as Salem Town, Massachusetts. The best-known trials were conducted by the Court of Oyer and Terminer in 1692 in Salem Town. All 26 who went to trial before this court were convicted. The four sessions of the Superior Court of Judicature in 1693, held in Salem Town, but also in Ipswich, Boston, and Charlestown, produced only 3 convictions in the 31 witchcraft trials it conducted. Likewise, alleged witchcraft was not isolated to New England. In 1706 Grace Sherwood the "Witch of Pungo" was imprisoned for the crime in Princess Anne County, Virginia.
Accusations of witchcraft and wizardry led to the prosecution of a man in Tennessee as recently as 1833.[71][72][73]
Author C. J. Stevens wrote The Supernatural Side of Maine, a 2002 book about witches and people from Maine who faced the supernatural.
Ordeal by water was associated with the witch-hunts of the 16th and 17th centuries: an accused who sank was considered innocent, while floating indicated witchcraft.
Witchcraft was also an important part of the social and cultural history of late-Colonial Mexico. Spanish Inquisitors viewed witchcraft as a problem that could be cured simply through confession. Yet, as anthropologist Ruth Behar writes, witchcraft, not only in Mexico but in Latin America in general, was a "conjecture of sexuality, witchcraft, and religion, in which Spanish, indigenous, and African cultures converged."[74] Furthermore, witchcraft in Mexico generally required an interethnic and interclass network of witches.[75] Yet, according to anthropology professor Laura Lewis, witchcraft in colonial Mexico ultimately represented an "affirmation of hegemony" for women, Indians, and especially Indian women over their white male counterparts as a result of the casta system.[76]
The belief in sorcery and its practice seem to have been widespread in the past. It played a conspicuous role in the cultures of ancient Egypt and in Babylonia, with the latter composing an Akkadian anti-witchcraft ritual, the Maqlû. A section from the Code of Hammurabi (about 2000 B.C.) prescribes:
If a man has put a spell upon another man and it is not justified, he upon whom the spell is laid shall go to the holy river; into the holy river shall he plunge. If the holy river overcome him and he is drowned, the man who put the spell upon him shall take possession of his house. If the holy river declares him innocent and he remains unharmed the man who laid the spell shall be put to death. He that plunged into the river shall take possession of the house of him who laid the spell upon him.[78]
According to the New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia:
In the Holy Scripture references to sorcery are frequent, and the strong condemnations of such practices found there do not seem to be based so much upon the supposition of fraud as upon the abomination of the magic in itself.[79]
Execution of alleged witches, 1587
The King James Bible uses the words "witch", "witchcraft", and "witchcrafts" to translate the Masoretic כשף (kashaph or kesheph) and קסם (qesem);[80] these same English terms are used to translate φαρμακεια (pharmakeia) in the GreekNew Testament text. Verses such as Deuteronomy 18:11–12 and Exodus 22:18 ("Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live") thus provided scriptural justification for Christian witch hunters in the early Modern Age (see Christian views on magic).
The precise meaning of the Hebrew kashaph, usually translated as "witch" or "sorceress", is uncertain. In the Septuagint, it was translated as pharmakeia or pharmakous. In the 16th century, Reginald Scot, a prominent critic of the witch-trials, translated kashaph, pharmakeia, and their Latin Vulgate equivalent veneficos as all meaning "poisoner", and on this basis, claimed that "witch" was an incorrect translation and poisoners were intended.[81] His theory still holds some currency, but is not widely accepted, and in Daniel 2:2kashaph is listed alongside other magic practitioners who could interpret dreams: magicians, astrologers, and Chaldeans. Suggested derivations of Kashaph include mutterer (from a single root) or herb user (as a compound word formed from the roots kash, meaning "herb", and hapaleh, meaning "using"). The Greek pharmakeia literally means "herbalist" or one who uses or administers drugs, but it was used virtually synonymously with mageia and goeteia as a term for a sorcerer.[82]
The Bible provides some evidence that these commandments against sorcery were enforced under the Hebrew kings:
And Saul disguised himself, and put on other raiment, and he went, and two men with him, and they came to the woman by night: and he said, I pray thee, divine unto me by the familiar spirit, and bring me him up, whom I shall name unto thee. And the woman said unto him, Behold, thou knowest what Saul hath done, how he hath cut off those that have familiar spirits, and the wizards, out of the land: wherefore then layest thou a snare for my life, to cause me to die?[83]
Note that the Hebrew word ob, translated as familiar spirit in the above quotation, has a different meaning than the usual English sense of the phrase; namely, it refers to a spirit that the woman is familiar with, rather than to a spirit that physically manifests itself in the shape of an animal.
The New Testament condemns the practice as an abomination, just as the Old Testament had (Galatians 5:20, compared with Revelation 21:8; 22:15; and Acts 8:9; 13:6), though the overall topic of Biblical law in Christianity is still disputed. The word in most New Testament translations is "sorcerer"/"sorcery" rather than "witch"/"witchcraft".
Jewish law views the practice of witchcraft as being laden with idolatry and/or necromancy; both being serious theological and practical offenses in Judaism. Although Maimonides vigorously denied the efficacy of all methods of witchcraft, and claimed that the Biblical prohibitions regarding it were precisely to wean the Israelites from practices related to idolatry, according to Traditional Judaism, it is acknowledged that while magic exists, it is forbidden to practice it on the basis that it usually involves the worship of other gods. Rabbis of the Talmud also condemned magic when it produced something other than illusion, giving the example of two men who use magic to pick cucumbers (Sanhedrin 67a). The one who creates the illusion of picking cucumbers should not be condemned, only the one who actually picks the cucumbers through magic. However, some of the Rabbis practiced "magic" themselves or taught the subject. For instance, Rabbah created a person and sent him to Rabbi Zera, and Rabbi Hanina and Rabbi Oshaya studied every Friday together and created a small calf to eat on Shabbat (Sanhedrin 67b). In these cases, the "magic" was seen more as divine miracles (i.e., coming from God rather than "unclean" forces) than as witchcraft.
Judaism does make it clear that Jews shall not try to learn about the ways of witches (Deuteronomy/Devarim 18: 9–10) and that witches are to be put to death. (Exodus/Shemot 22:17)
Judaism's most famous reference to a medium is undoubtedly the Witch of Endor whom Saul consults, as recounted in the First Book of Samuel, chapter 28.
Divination and magic in Islam encompass a wide range of practices, including black magic, warding off the evil eye, the production of amulets and other magical equipment, conjuring, casting lots,and astrology. Muslims do commonly believe in magic (Sihr) and explicitly forbid its practice. Sihr translates from Arabic as sorcery or black magic. The best known reference to magic in Islam is the SurahAl-Falaq (meaning dawn or daybreak), which is known as a prayer to Allah to ward off black magic.
Say: I seek refuge with the Lord of the Dawn From the mischief of created things; From the mischief of Darkness as it overspreads; From the mischief of those who practise secret arts; And from the mischief of the envious one as he practises envy. (Quran 113:1–5)
Also according to the Quran:
And they follow that which the devils falsely related against the kingdom of Solomon. Solomon disbelieved not; but the devils disbelieved, teaching mankind sorcery and that which was revealed to the two angels in Babel, Harut and Marut ... And surely they do know that he who trafficketh therein will have no (happy) portion in the Hereafter; and surely evil is the price for which they sell their souls, if they but knew. (al-Qur'an 2:102)
However, whereas performing miracles in Islamic thought and belief is reserved for only Messengers and Prophets, supernatural acts are also believed to be performed by Awliyaa – the spiritually accomplished. Disbelief in the miracles of the Prophets is considered an act of disbelief; belief in the miracles of any given pious individual is not. Neither are regarded as magic, but as signs of Allah at the hands of those close to Him that occur by His will and His alone.
Some Muslim practitioners believe that they may seek the help of the Jinn (singular—jinni) in magic. It is a common belief that jinn can possess a human, thus requiring Exorcism. Still, the practice of seeking help to the Jinn is prohibited and regarded the same as seeking help to a devil.
The belief in jinn is part of the Muslim faith. Imam Muslim narrated the Prophet said: "Allah created the angels from light, created the jinn from the pure flame of fire, and Adam from that which was described to you (i.e., the clay.)". Also in the Quran, chapter of Jinn:
And persons from among men used to seek refuge with persons from among the jinn, so they increased them in evil doing.
—(The Qur'an) (72:6)
To cast off the jinn from the body of the possessed, the "ruqya," which is from the Prophet's sunnah is used. The ruqya contains verses of the Qur'an as well as prayers specifically targeted against demons. The knowledge of which verses of the Qur'an to use in what way is what is considered "magic knowledge."
A Hadeeth recorded by Al-Bukhari narrates that one who has eaten seven dates in the morning will not be adversely affected by magic in the course of that day.
Students of the history of religion have linked several magical practises in Islam with pre-Islamic Turkish and East African customs. Most notable of these customs is the Zar Ceremony.[84][85]
Saudi Arabia continues to use the death penalty for sorcery. In 2006 Fawza Falih Muhammad Ali was condemned to death for practicing witchcraft.[86] There is no legal definition of sorcery in Saudi, but in 2007 an Egyptian pharmacist working there was accused, convicted, and executed. Saudi authorities also pronounced the death penalty on a Lebanese television presenter, Ali Sabat, while he was performing the hajj (Islamic pilgrimage) in the country.[87]
In April 2009, a Saudi woman Amina Bint Abdulhalim Nassar was arrested and later sentenced to death for practicing witchcraft and sorcery. In December 2011, she was beheaded.[88]
A Saudi man has been beheaded on charges of sorcery and witchcraft in June 2012.[89]
Belief in the supernatural is strong in all parts of India, and lynchings for witchcraft are reported in the press from time to time.[90] It is estimated that 750 people have been killed in witch-hunts in the states of Assam and West Bengal since 2003.[91] More than 100 women are tortured, paraded naked, or harassed in the state of Chhattisgarh annually, officials said.[92] A social activist in the region said the reported cases were only the tip of the iceberg.[93]
In Japanese folklore, the most common types of witch can be separated into two categories: those who employ snakes as familiars, and those who employ foxes.[94]
The fox witch is, by far, the most commonly seen witch figure in Japan. Differing regional beliefs set those who use foxes into two separate types: the kitsune-mochi, and the tsukimono-suji. The first of these, the kitsune-mochi, is a solitary figure who gains his fox familiar by bribing it with its favourite foods. The kitsune-mochi then strikes up a deal with the fox, typically promising food and daily care in return for the fox's magical services. The fox of Japanese folklore is a powerful trickster in and of itself, imbued with powers of shape changing, possession, and illusion. These creatures can be either nefarious; disguising themselves as women in order to trap men, or they can be benign forces as in the story of "The Grateful foxes".[95] However, once a fox enters the employ of a human it almost exclusively becomes a force of evil to be feared. A fox under the employ of a human can provide many services. The fox can turn invisible and find secrets its master desires. It can apply its many powers of illusion to trick and deceive its master's enemies. The most feared power of the kitsune-mochi is the ability to command his fox to possess other humans. This process of possession is called Kitsunetsuki.
By far, the most commonly reported cases of fox witchcraft in modern Japan are enacted by tsukimono-suji families, or "hereditary witches".[96] The Tsukimono-suji is traditionally a family who is reported to have foxes under their employ. These foxes serve the family and are passed down through the generations, typically through the female line. Tsukimono-suji foxes are able to supply much in the way of the same mystical aid that the foxes under the employ of a kitsune-mochi can provide its more solitary master with. In addition to these powers, if the foxes are kept happy and well taken care of, they bring great fortune and prosperity to the Tsukimono-suji house. However, the aid in which these foxes give is often overshadowed by the social and mystical implications of being a member of such a family. In many villages, the status of local families as tsukimono-suji is often common, everyday knowledge. Such families are respected and feared, but are also openly shunned. Due to its hereditary nature, the status of being Tsukimono-suji is considered contagious. Because of this, it is often impossible for members of such a family to sell land or other properties, due to fear that the possession of such items will cause foxes to inundate one's own home. In addition to this, because the foxes are believed to be passed down through the female line, it is often nearly impossible for women of such families to find a husband whose family will agree to have him married to a tsukimono-suji family. In such a union the woman's status as a Tsukimono-suji would transfer to any man who married her.
Witchcraft in the Philippines is often classified as malevolent, with practitioners of black magic called Mangkukulam in Tagalog and Mambabarang in Cebuano; there are also practitioners of benevolent, white magic, with some practising both. Mambabarang in particular are noted for their ability to command insects and other invertebrates to accomplish a task, such as delivering a curse to a target.
Magic and witchcraft in the Philippines varies considerably across the different ethnic groups, and is commonly a modern manifestation of pre-Colonial spirituality interwoven with Catholic religious elements such as the invocation of saints and the use of pseudo-Latin prayers (oración) in spells, and anting-anting (amulets).
Practitioners of traditional herbal-based medicine and divination called albularyo are not considered witches. They are perceived to be either quack doctors or a quasi-magical option when western medicine fails to identify or cure an ailment that is thus suspected to be of malevolent, supernatural origin (often the work of black magic). Feng shui, an influence from Filipino Chinese culture, is also not classified as witchcraft, and it is seen as a separate realm of belief altogether.
An expedition sent to what is now the Xinjiang region of western China by the PBS documentary series Nova found a fully clothed female Tocharian mummy wearing a black conical hat of the type now associated with witches in Europe in the storage area of a small local museum, indicative of an Indo-European priestess.[97]
In pre-Christian times, witchcraft was a common practice in the Cook Islands. The native name for a sorcerer was tangata purepure (a man who prays). The prayers offered by the ta'unga (priests)[98] to the gods worshiped on national or tribal marae (temples) were termed karakia; those on minor occasions to the lesser gods were named pure. All these prayers were metrical, and were handed down from generation to generation with the utmost care. There were prayers for every such phase in life; for success in battle; for a change in wind (to overwhelm an adversary at sea, or that an intended voyage be propitious); that his crops may grow; to curse a thief; or wish ill-luck and death to his foes. Few men of middle age were without a number of these prayers or charms. The succession of a sorcerer was from father to son, or from uncle to nephew. So too of sorceresses: it would be from mother to daughter, or from aunt to niece. Sorcerers and sorceresses were often slain by relatives of their supposed victims.[99]
A local newspaper informed that more than 50 people were killed in two Highlands provinces of Papua New Guinea in 2008 for allegedly practicing witchcraft.[100]
The term witch doctor, a common translation for the South African Zulu word inyanga, has been misconstrued to mean "a healer who uses witchcraft" rather than its original meaning of "one who diagnoses and cures maladies caused by witches".
In Southern African traditions, there are three classifications of somebody who uses magic. The thakathi is usually improperly translated into English as "witch", and is a spiteful person who operates in secret to harm others. The sangoma is a diviner, somewhere on a par with a fortune teller, and is employed in detecting illness, predicting a person's future (or advising them on which path to take), or identifying the guilty party in a crime. She also practices some degree of medicine. The inyanga is often translated as "witch doctor" (though many Southern Africans resent this implication, as it perpetuates the mistaken belief that a "witch doctor" is in some sense a practitioner of malicious magic). The inyanga's job is to heal illness and injury and provide customers with magical items for everyday use. Of these three categories the thakatha is almost exclusively female, the sangoma is usually female, and the inyanga is almost exclusively male.
Much of what witchcraft represents in Africa has been susceptible to misunderstandings and confusion, thanks in no small part to a tendency among western scholars since the time of the now largely discredited Margaret Murray to approach the subject through a comparative lens vis-a-vis European witchcraft.[101] Okeja argues that witchcraft in Africa today plays a very different social role than in Europe of the past—or present—and should be understood through an African rather than post-colonial Western lens.
In some Central African areas, malicious magic users are believed by locals to be the source of terminal illness such as AIDS and cancer. In such cases, various methods are used to rid the person from the bewitching spirit, occasionally physical and psychological abuse. Children may be accused of being witches, for example a young niece may be blamed for the illness of a relative. Most of these cases of abuse go unreported since the members of the society that witness such abuse are too afraid of being accused of being accomplices. It is also believed that witchcraft can be transmitted to children by feeding. Parents discourage their children from interacting with people believed to be witches.
As of 2006[update], between 25,000 and 50,000 children in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, had been accused of witchcraft and thrown out of their homes.[102] These children have been subjected to often-violent abuse during exorcisms, sometimes supervised by self-styled religious pastors. Other pastors and Christian activist strongly oppose such accusations and try to rescue children from their unscrupulous colleagues.[103] The usual term for these children is enfants sorciers (child witches) or enfants dits sorciers (children accused of witchcraft). In 2002, USAID funded the production of two short films on the subject, made in Kinshasa by journalists Angela Nicoara and Mike Ormsby.[104]
In Ghana, women are often accused of witchcraft and attacked by neighbours. Because of this, there exist six witch camps in the country where women suspected of being witches can flee for safety.[105] The witch camps, which exist solely in Ghana, are thought to house a total of around 1000 women.[105] Some of the camps are thought to have been set up over 100 years ago.[105] The Ghanaian government has announced that it intends to close the camps and educate the population regarding the fact that witches do not exist.[105]
In April 2008, in Kinshasa, the police arrested 14 suspected victims (of penis snatching) and sorcerers accused of using black magic or witchcraft to steal (make disappear) or shrink men's penises to extort cash for cure, amid a wave of panic.[106] Arrests were made in an effort to avoid bloodshed seen in Ghana a decade ago, when 12 alleged penis snatchers were beaten to death by mobs.[107] While it is easy for modern people to dismiss such reports, Uchenna Okeja argues that a belief system in which such magical practices are deemed possible offer many benefits to Africans who hold them. For example, the belief that a sorcerer has "stolen" a man's penis functions as an anxiety-reduction mechanism for men suffering from impotence while simultaneously providing an explanation that is consistent with African cultural beliefs rather than appealing to Western scientific notions that are tainted by the history of colonialism (at least for many Africans).[108]
It was reported on May 21, 2008 that in Kenya, a mob had burnt to death at least 11 people accused of witchcraft.[109] In Tanzania in 2008, President Kikwete publicly condemned witchdoctors for killing albinos for their body parts, which are thought to bring good luck. 25 albinos have been murdered since March 2007.[110] In the Meatu district of Tanzania, half of all murders are "witch-killings".,[91] while particularly albinos are often murdered for their body parts on the advice of witch doctors in order to produce powerful amulets that are believed to protect against witchcraft and make the owner prosper in life.[111]
In the Nigerian states of Akwa Ibom and Cross River about 15,000 children branded as witches and most of them end up abandoned and abused on the streets. In Gambia, about 1,000 people accused of being witches were locked in detention centers in March 2009 and forced to drink a dangerous hallucinogenic potion, human rights organization Amnesty International said.[112] Every year, hundreds of people in the Central African Republic are convicted of witchcraft.[113]
Complimentary remarks about witchcraft by a native Congolese initiate: "From witchcraft ... may be developed the remedy (kimbuki) that will do most to raise up our country."[114] "Witchcraft ... deserves respect ... it can embellish or redeem (ketula evo vuukisa)."[115] "The ancestors were equipped with the protective witchcraft of the clan (kindoki kiandundila kanda). ... They could also gather the power of animals into their hands ... whenever they needed. ... If we could make use of these kinds of witchcraft, our country would rapidly progress in knowledge of every kind."[116] "You witches (zindoki) too, bring your science into the light to be written down so that ... the benefits in it ... endow our race."[117]
Among the Mende (of Sierra Leone), trial and conviction for witchcraft has a beneficial effect for those convicted. "The witchfinder had warned the whole village to ensure the relative prosperity of the accused and sentenced ... old people. ... Six months later all of the people ... accused, were secure, well-fed and arguably happier than at any [previous] time; they had hardly to beckon and people would come with food or whatever was needful. ... Instead of such old and widowed people being left helpless or (as in Western society) institutionalized in old people's homes, these were reintegrated into society and left secure in their old age ... . ... Old people are 'suitable' candidates for this kind of accusation in the sense that they are isolated and vulnerable, and they are 'suitable' candidates for 'social security' for precisely the same reasons."[118]
In Nigeria, several Pentecostal pastors have mixed their evangelical brand of Christianity with African beliefs in witchcraft to benefit from the lucrative witch finding and exorcism business—which in the past was the exclusive domain of the so-called witch doctor or traditional healers. These pastors have been involved in the torturing and even killing of children accused of witchcraft.[119] Over the past decade, around 15,000 children have been accused, and around 1,000 murdered. Churches are very numerous in Nigeria, and competition for congregations is hard. Some pastors attempt to establish a reputation for spiritual power by "detecting" child witches, usually following a death or loss of a job within a family, or an accusation of financial fraud against the pastor. In the course of "exorcisms", accused children may be starved, beaten, mutilated, set on fire, forced to consume acid or cement, or buried alive. While some church leaders and Christian activists have spoken out strongly against these abuses, many Nigerian churches are involved in the abuse, although church administrations deny knowledge of it.[120]
In Malawi it is also common practice to accuse children of witchcraft and many children have been abandoned, abused and even killed as a result. As in other African countries both African traditional healers and their Christian counterparts are trying to make a living out of exorcising children and are actively involved in pointing out children as witches.[121] Various secular and Christian organizations are combining their efforts to address this problem.[122]
Also in Malawi, according to William Kamkwamba, witches and wizards are afraid of money, which they consider a rival evil. Any contact with cash will snap their spell and leave the wizard naked and confused. So placing cash, such as kwacha around a room or bed mat will protect the resident from their malevolent spells.[123]
During the 20th century, interest in witchcraft in English-speaking and European countries began to increase, inspired particularly by Margaret Murray's theory of a pan-European witch-cult originally published in 1921, since discredited by further careful historical research.[126] Interest was intensified, however, by Gerald Gardner's claim in 1954 in Witchcraft Today that a form of witchcraft still existed in England. The truth of Gardner's claim is now disputed too, with different historians offering evidence for[127][128] or against[129][130][131] the religion's existence prior to Gardner.
The Wicca that Gardner initially taught was a witchcraft religion having a lot in common with Margaret Murray's hypothetically posited cult of the 1920s.[132] Indeed Murray wrote an introduction to Gardner's Witchcraft Today, in effect putting her stamp of approval on it. Wicca is now practised as a religion of an initiatorysecret society nature with positive ethical principles, organised into autonomous covens and led by a High Priesthood. There is also a large "Eclectic Wiccan" movement of individuals and groups who share key Wiccan beliefs but have no initiatory connection or affiliation with traditional Wicca. Wiccan writings and ritual show borrowings from a number of sources including 19th and 20th-century ceremonial magic, the medieval grimoire known as the Key of Solomon, Aleister Crowley's Ordo Templi Orientis and pre-Christian religions.[133][134][135] Both men and women are equally termed "witches." They practice a form of duotheisticuniversalism.
Since Gardner's death in 1964, the Wicca that he claimed he was initiated into has attracted many initiates, becoming the largest of the various witchcraft traditions in the Western world, and has influenced other Neopagan and occult movements.
Stregheria is an Italian witchcraft religion popularised in the 1980s by Raven Grimassi, who claims that it evolved within the ancient Etruscan religion of Italian peasants who worked under the Catholic upper classes.
Modern Stregheria closely resembles Charles Leland's controversial late-19th-century account of a surviving Italian religion of witchcraft, worshipping the Goddess Diana, her brother Dianus/Lucifer, and their daughter Aradia. Leland's witches do not see Lucifer as the evil Satan of Christian myth, but a benevolent god of the Sun and Moon.
The ritual format of contemporary Stregheria is roughly similar to that of other Neopagan witchcraft religions such as Wicca. The pentagram is the most common symbol of religious identity. Most followers celebrate a series of eight festivals equivalent to the Wiccan Wheel of the Year, though others follow the ancient Roman festivals. An emphasis is placed on ancestor worship.
The Feri Tradition is a modern witchcraft practice founded by Victor Henry Anderson and his wife Cora. It is an ecstatic tradition which places strong emphasis on sensual experience and awareness, including sexual mysticism, which is not limited to heterosexual expression.
Most practitioners worship three main deities; the Star Goddess, and two divine twins, one of whom is the blue God. They believe that there are three parts to the human soul, a belief taken from the Hawaiian religion of Huna as described by Max Freedom Long.
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Witchcraft of some sort has probably existed since humans first banded
together in groups. Simple sorcery (or the use of magic accessible to ordinary
people), such as setting out offerings to helpful spirits or using charms, can
be found in almost all traditional societies. Prehistoric art depicts magical
rites to ensure successful hunting, and also seems to depict religious rituals
involving people dancing in animal costumes. Shamanism, the practice of contacting spirits
through dream work and meditative trances, is probably the oldest religion, and
early shamans collected much knowledge about magic and magical tools.
Witches of ancient Sumeria and Babylonia invented an elaborate Demonology. They had a belief that the world
was full of spirits and that most of these spirits were hostile. Each person was
supposed to have their own spirit which would protect them from demons and enemies, which could can only be
fought by the use of magic (including amulets, incantations and exorcisms).
Western beliefs about witchcraft grew largely out of the mythologies and
folklore of ancient peoples, especially the Egyptians, Hebrews, Greeks and
Romans. Witches in ancient Egypt purportedly used their wisdom and knowledge of
amulets, spells,
formulas and figures to bend the cosmic powers to their purpose or that of their
clients.
The Greeks had their own form of magic, which
was close to a religion, known as Theurgy
(the practice of rituals, often seen as magical in nature, performed with the
intention of invoking the action of the gods, especially with the goal of
uniting with the divine and perfecting oneself). Another lower form of magic was
“mageia”, which was closer to sorcery, and was practised by individuals who
claimed to have knowledge and powers to help their clients, or to harm their
clients’ enemies, by performing rites or supplying certain formulas.
Some argue, however, that the real roots of witchcraft and magic as we known
it come from the Celts, a diverse group of Iron Age tribal societies which
flourished between about 700 BC and 100 AD in northern Europe (especially the
British Isles). Believed to be descendants of Indo-Europeans, the Celts were a
brilliant and dynamic people, gifted artists, musicians, storytellers, and
metalworkers, as well as expert farmers and fierce warriors much feared by their
adversaries, the Romans.
They were also a deeply spiritual people, who worshipped both a god and
goddess. Their religion was pantheistic, meaning they worshipped many aspects of
the "One Creative Life Source" and honoured the presence of the "Divine Creator"
in all of nature. They believed in reincarnation and that after death they went
to the Summerland for rest and renewal while awaiting rebirth. By about 350 BC,
a priestly class known as the Druids had
developed, who became the priests of the Celtic religion as well as teachers,
judges, astrologers, healers, midwives and bards.
The religious beliefs and practices of the Celts, their love for the land,
and their veneration of trees (the oak in particular) grew into what later
became known as Paganism, although this
label is also used for the polytheistic beliefs of the ancient Egyptians, Greeks
and Romans. Blended over several centuries with the beliefs and rituals of other
Indo-European groups, this spawned such practices as concocting potions and ointments, casting spells and performing works of magic, all of which (along with many of the
nature-based beliefs held by the Celts and other groups) became collectively
known as witchcraft in the Medieval
Period. http://www.witchcraftandwitches.com/history_ancient.html
"Salem Witches" redirects here. For the minor league baseball team, see Salem Witches (NEL).
The central figure in this 1876 illustration of the courtroom is usually identified as Mary Walcott.
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. Despite being generally known as the Salemwitch trials, the preliminary hearings in 1692 were conducted in a variety of towns across the province: Salem Village (now Danvers), Ipswich, Andover and Salem Town.
The most infamous trials were conducted by the Court of Oyer and Terminer in 1692 in Salem Town. One contemporary writer summed the results of the trials thus:
And now Nineteen persons having been hang'd, and one prest to death, and Eight more condemned, in all Twenty and Eight, of which above a third part were Members of some of the Churches of N. England, and more than half of them of a good Conversation in general, and not one clear'd; about Fifty having confest themselves to be Witches, of which not one Executed; above an Hundred and Fifty in Prison, and Two Hundred more accused; the Special Commision of Oyer and Terminer comes to a period.
Most of the accused and the executed were women.
At least five more of the accused died in prison.
When I put an end to the Court there ware at least fifty persons in prision in great misery by reason of the extream cold and their poverty, most of them having only spectre evidence against them and their mittimusses being defective, I caused some of them to be lettout upon bayle and put the Judges upon consideration of a way to reliefe others and to prevent them from perishing in prision, upon which some of them were convinced and acknowledged that their former proceedings were too violent and not grounded upon a right foundation ... The stop put to the first method of proceedings hath dissipated the blak cloud that threatened this Province with destruccion.
The episode is one of the nation's most notorious cases of mass hysteria, and has been used in political rhetoric and popular literature as a vivid cautionary tale about the dangers of isolationism, religious extremism, false accusations and lapses in due process.[3] It was not unique, being an American example of the much larger phenomenon of witch trials in the Early Modern period. Historians have considered the lasting effects of the trials to have been highly influential in subsequent United States history.
More than once it has been said, too, that the Salem witchcraft was the rock on which the theocracy shattered.
In 17th-century colonial North America, the supernatural was considered part of everyday life; many people believed that Satan was present and active on Earth. This concept emerged in Europe around the fifteenth century and spread with colonists to North America. Peasants used a kind of witchcraft to invoke particular charms for farming and agriculture. Over time, the idea of white magic transformed into dark magic and became associated with demons and evil spirits. From 1560 to 1670, witchcraft persecutions became common as superstitions became associated with the devil.
In "Against Modern Sadducism" (1668), Joseph Glanvill claimed that he could prove the existence of witches and ghosts of the supernatural realm. Glanvill wrote about the "denial of the bodily resurrection, and the [supernatural] spirits".[5] In his treatise, he claimed that ingenious men should believe in witches and apparitions; if they doubted the reality of spirits, they not only denied demons, but also the almighty God. Glanvill wanted to prove that the supernatural could not be denied; those who did deny apparitions were considered heretics for it also disproved their beliefs in angels.[5] Works by men such as Glanvill and Cotton Mather tried to prove that "demons were alive."[6] Such works supported the fears of persons who believed that demons were active among them on Earth.
Men and women in Salem believed that all the misfortunes could be attributed to the work of the devil; when events such as infant death, crop failures, or social friction among the congregation occurred, the supernatural was blamed. Because of the unusually wide scope of witchcraft accusations in the colony, scholars have explored various aspects of the historical context of this episode to determine its specific contributing factors.
Witchcraft in New England
Historian Clarence F. Jewett included a list of other people executed in New England in The Memorial History of Boston: Including Suffolk County, Massachusetts 1630–1880 (Ticknor and Company, 1881). He wrote,
The following is the list of the 12 persons who were executed for witchcraft in New England before 1692, when 24 other persons were executed at Salem, whose names are well known. It is possible that the list is not complete ; but I have included all of which I have any knowledge, and with such details as to names and dates as could be ascertained : —
1647, — "Woman of Windsor," Connecticut (name unknown)[later identified as Alice Young], at Hartford. 1648, — Margaret Jones, of Charlestown, at Boston. 1648,— Mary Johnson, at Hartford. 1650? — Henry Lake's wife, of Dorchester. 1650?—Mrs. Kendall, of Cambridge. 1651, — Mary Parsons, of Springfield, at Boston. 1651, — Goodwife Bassett, at Fairfield, Conn. 1653,—Goodwife Knap, at Hartford. 1656, — Ann Hibbins, at Boston. 1662, — Goodman Greensmith, at Hartford. 1662,— Goodwife Greensmith, at Hartford.
1688,— Goody Glover, at Boston."[7]
The original 1629 Royal Charter of the Massachusetts Bay Colony was vacated in 1684,[8] after which King James II installed Sir Edmund Andros as the Governor of the Dominion of New England. Andros was ousted in 1689 after the "Glorious Revolution" in England replaced the Catholic James II with the Protestant co-rulers William and Mary. Simon Bradstreet and Thomas Danforth, the colony's last leaders under the old charter, resumed their posts as governor and deputy governor, but lacked constitutional authority to rule, because the old charter had been vacated. At the same time tensions erupted between the English colonists settling in "the Eastward" (the present-day coast of Maine) and the French-supported Wabanaki Indians in what came to be known as King William's War. This was 13 years after the devastating King Philip's War with the Wampanoag and other indigenous tribes in southern and western New England. In October 1690, Sir William Phips led an unsuccessful attack on French-held Quebec. Between 1689 and 1692, Native Americans continued to attack many English settlements along the coast, leading to the abandonment of some of the settlements, and resulting in a flood of refugees into areas like Essex County.
A new charter for the enlarged Province of Massachusetts Bay was given final approval in England on October 16, 1691.[9] News of the appointment of Phips as the new governor reached Boston in late January[10] and a copy of the new charter arrived in Boston on February 8, 1692.[11] Phips arrived in Boston on May 14,[12] and was sworn in as governor two days later, along with Lieutenant Governor William Stoughton.[13] One of the first orders of business for the new governor and council on May 27, 1692, was the formal nomination of county justices of the peace, sheriffs, and the commission of a Special Court of Oyer and Terminer to handle the large numbers of people who were "thronging" the jails.[14]
Boyer and Nissenbaum have postulated that without a valid charter, the colony had no legitimate form of government to try capital cases until Phips arrived with the new charter.[15] This has been disputed by David Konig, who points out that between charters, according to the Records of the Court of Assistants, the colony tried and condemned a group of 14 pirates on January 27, 1690, for acts of piracy and murder committed in August and October 1689.[16]
Salem Village (present-day Danvers, Massachusetts) was known for its many internal disputes, and for disputes between the village and Salem Town (present-day Salem). Arguments about property lines, grazing rights, and church privileges were rife, and neighbors considered the population as "quarrelsome." In 1672, the villagers had voted to hire a minister of their own, apart from Salem Town. Their first two ministers, James Bayley (1673–79) and George Burroughs (1680–83), stayed only a few years each, departing after the congregation failed to pay their full rate. Despite the ministers' rights being upheld by the General Court and the parish admonished, each of the ministers still chose to leave. The third minister, Deodat Lawson (1684–88), stayed for a short time, leaving after the refusal of the church in Salem to ordain him and not over issues with the congregation.
The parish disagreed about the choice of Samuel Parris as Salem Village's first ordained minister. On June 18, 1689, the villagers agreed to hire Parris for ₤66 annually, "one third part in money and the other two third parts in provisions," and use of the parsonage.[17] On October 10, 1689, however, they voted to grant him the deed to the parsonage and two acres (0.8 hectares) of land.[18] But the inhabitants had voted in 1681 for a resolution: "it shall not be lawful for the inhabitants of this village to convey the houses or lands or any other concerns belonging to the Ministry to any particular persons or person: not for any cause by vote or other ways".[19]
Though the prior ministers' fates and the level of contention in the village were valid reasons for caution in accepting the position, Reverend Parris increased the village's divisions by delaying accepting his position in Salem Village. He did not seem to have any gift for settling his new parishioners' disputes: by deliberately seeking out "iniquitous behavior" in his congregation and making church members in good standing suffer public penance for small infractions, he contributed significantly to the tension within the village. Its bickering continued to grow unabated. Historian Starkey suggests that, in this atmosphere, serious conflict may have been inevitable.[20]
Prior to the constitutional turmoil of the 1680s, Massachusetts government had been dominated by conservative Puritan secular leaders. Influenced by Calvinism, Puritans had opposed many of the traditions of the ProtestantChurch of England, including use of the Book of Common Prayer, the use of priestly vestments (cap and gown) during services, the use of the Holy Cross during baptism, and kneeling during the sacrament, all of which they believed constituted "popery". King Charles I was hostile to this point of view, and Anglican church officials tried to repress these dissenting views during the 1620s and 1630s. This resulted in some Puritans and other religious minorities going to the Netherlands for refuge, but ultimately many made a major migration to North America.
These immigrants established several colonies in New England, of which the Massachusetts Bay Colony was the largest and most economically important. Self-governance came naturally to them, since building a society based on their religious beliefs was one of their goals. Colonial leaders were elected by the freemen of the colony, who were those individuals who had had their religious experiences formally examined, and had been admitted to one of the colony's Puritan congregations. The colonial leadership were prominent members of their congregations, and regularly consulted with the local ministers on issues facing the colony.
In the early 1640s, England erupted in civil war. The Puritan-dominated Parliamentarians emerged victorious, and Charles I was executed in 1649. Parliamentary rule was supplanted by the Proctectorate of Oliver Cromwell in 1653, but the failure of his successor Richard Cromwell led to restoration of the old order under Charles II. Emigration to New England slowed significantly in these years. In Massachusetts, a successful merchant class began to develop that was less religiously motivated than the colony's early settlers.
In Salem Village, as in the colony at large, life was governed by the precepts of the Church, which was Calvinist. Instrumental music, dancing, and celebration of holidays such as Christmas and Easter, were absolutely forbidden,[21] as these were considered to have roots in Paganism. The only music allowed was the unaccompanied singing of hymns—as the folk songs of the period were thought to glorify human love and nature, they were considered to be against God. Toys and especially dolls were forbidden as play was considered a frivolous waste of time.[22] Children received an education that emphasized religion and the need for strict piety to prevent their eternal damnation.[23] Villagers were expected to go to the meeting house for three-hour sermons every Wednesday and Sunday. Village life revolved around the meeting house, and those celebrations permitted, such as celebration of the harvest, were centered there.[24]
Prior to 1692, there had been rumors of witchcraft in villages neighboring Salem Village and other towns. Cotton Mather, a minister of Boston's North Church (not to be confused with the later Anglican North Church of Paul Revere fame) was a prolific publisher of pamphlets and a firm believer in witchcraft. In his book Memorable Providences Relating to Witchcrafts and Possessions (1689), Mather describes his "oracular observations" and how "stupendous witchcraft"[25] had affected the children of Boston mason John Goodwin. Mather illustrates how the Goodwins' eldest child had been tempted by the devil and stole linen from the washerwoman Mary Glover. Glover was a disagreeable old woman described by her husband as a witch; this may have been why Mary Glover was accused of casting spells on the Goodwin children. After the event, four out of six Goodwin children began to have strange fits, or what some people referred to as "the disease of astonishment".[25] The manifestations attributed to the disease quickly became associated with witchcraft. Symptoms included neck and back pains, tongues being drawn from their throats, and loud random outcries; other symptoms included having no control over their bodies such as becoming limber, flapping their arms like birds, or trying to harm others as well as themselves. These symptoms would fuel the craze of 1692.
Most accounts begin with the afflictions of the girls in the Parris household in January/February 1692 and end with the last trials in May 1693. Some historians begin with earlier events to place the trials in the wider context of other witch-hunts, and some end later, to include information about restitution to victims and their families.
Present-day archaeological site of the Salem Village parsonage
In Salem Village in the winter months of 1692, Betty Parris, age 9, and her cousin Abigail Williams, age 11, the daughter and niece, respectively, of Reverend Parris, began to have fits described as "beyond the power of Epileptic Fits or natural disease to effect" by John Hale, minister in nearby Beverly.[26] The girls screamed, threw things about the room, uttered strange sounds, crawled under furniture, and contorted themselves into peculiar positions, according to the eyewitness account of Rev. Deodat Lawson, a former minister in the town. The girls complained of being pinched and pricked with pins. A doctor, historically assumed to be William Griggs, could find no physical evidence of any ailment. Other young women in the village began to exhibit similar behaviors. When Lawson preached in the Salem Village meetinghouse, he was interrupted several times by outbursts of the afflicted.[27]
The first three people accused and arrested for allegedly afflicting Betty Parris, Abigail Williams, 12-year-old Ann Putnam, Jr., and Elizabeth Hubbard were Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne and Tituba. The accusation by Ann Putnam Jr. is seen by historians as evidence that a family feud may have been a major cause of the witch trials. A vicious rivalry had been underway between the Putnam and Porter families. The people of Salem became engaged in this rivalry. Salem citizens would often have heated debates, which escalated into full fledged fighting, based solely on their opinion regarding this feud.[28]
Sarah Good was a homeless beggar, known to seek food and shelter from neighbors. She was accused of witchcraft because of her appalling reputation. At her trial, Good was accused of rejecting Puritan ideals self-control and discipline when she chose to torment and “scorn [children] instead of leading them towards the path of salvation".[29]
Sarah Osborne rarely attended church meetings. She was accused of witchcraft because the puritans believed that Osborne had her own self-interests in mind following her remarriage to an indentured servant. The citizens of the town disapproved of her trying to control her son's inheritance from her previous marriage.
Tituba, an African slave, likely became a target because of her different ethnicity from the Puritans. She was accused of attracting young girls like Abigail Williams and Betty Parris with stories of enchantment from Malleus Maleficarum. These tales about sexual encounters with demons, swaying the minds of men, and fortune telling were said to stimulate the imaginations of young girls and made Tituba an obvious target of accusations.[30]
Each of women were outcasts of a sort, fulfilling the character of the "usual suspects" for witchcraft accusations, and nobody defended them. Brrought before the local magistrates on the complaint of witchcraft, they were interrogated for several days, starting on March 1, 1692, then sent to jail.[31]
In March, additional women were accused of witchcraft: Martha Corey, Dorothy Good and Rebecca Nurse in Salem Village, and Rachel Clinton in nearby Ipswich. Martha Corey had voiced skepticism about the credibility of the girls' accusations, and drawn attention. The charges against her and Rebecca Nurse deeply troubled the community because Martha Corey was a full covenanted member of the Church in Salem Village, as was Rebecca Nurse in the Church in Salem Town. If such upstanding people could be witches, then anybody could be a witch, and church membership was no protection from accusation. Dorothy Good, the daughter of Sarah Good, was only 4 years old. When she was questioned by the magistrates, her answers were construed as a confession that implicated her mother. In Ipswich, Rachel Clinton was arrested for witchcraft at the end of March on charges unrelated to the afflictions of the girls in Salem Village.[32]
Accusations and examinations before local magistrates
When Sarah Cloyce (Nurse's sister) and Elizabeth (Bassett) Proctor were arrested in April, they were brought before John Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin, not only in their capacity as local magistrates, but as members of the Governor's Council, at a meeting in Salem Town. Present for the examination were Deputy Governor Thomas Danforth, and Assistants Samuel Sewall, Samuel Appleton, James Russell and Isaac Addington. Objections by Elizabeth's husband, John Proctor, during the proceedings resulted in his arrest that day as well.
Within a week, Giles Corey (Martha's husband, and a covenanted church member in Salem Town), Abigail Hobbs, Bridget Bishop, Mary Warren (a servant in the Proctor household and sometime accuser) and Deliverance Hobbs (stepmother of Abigail Hobbs) were arrested and examined. Abigail Hobbs, Mary Warren and Deliverance Hobbs all confessed and began naming additional people as accomplices. More arrests followed: Sarah Wildes, William Hobbs (husband of Deliverance and father of Abigail), Nehemiah Abbott Jr., Mary Eastey (sister of Cloyce and Nurse), Edward Bishop, Jr. and his wife Sarah Bishop, and Mary English. On April 30, the Reverend George Burroughs, Lydia Dustin, Susannah Martin, Dorcas Hoar, Sarah Morey and Philip English (Mary's husband) were arrested. Nehemiah Abbott Jr. was released because the accusers agreed he was not the person whose specter had afflicted them. Mary Eastey was released for a few days after her initial arrest because the accusers failed to confirm that it was she who had afflicted them; she was arrested again when the accusers reconsidered.
In May, accusations continued to pour in, but some of those suspects began to evade apprehension. Multiple warrants were issued before John Willard and Elizabeth Colson were apprehended, but George Jacobs Jr. and Daniel Andrews were not caught. Until this point, all the proceedings were still investigative, but on May 27, 1692, William Phips ordered the establishment of a Special Court of Oyer and Terminer for Suffolk, Essex and Middlesex counties to prosecute the cases of those in jail. Warrants were issued for more people. Sarah Osborne, one of the first three accused, died in jail on May 10, 1692.
Warrants were issued for 36 more people, with examinations continuing to take place in Salem Village: Sarah Dustin (daughter of Lydia Dustin), Ann Sears, Bethiah Carter Sr. and her daughter Bethiah Carter Jr., George Jacobs, Sr. and his granddaughter Margaret Jacobs, John Willard, Alice Parker, Ann Pudeator, Abigail Soames, George Jacobs, Jr. (son of George Jacobs, Sr. and father of Margaret Jacobs), Daniel Andrew, Rebecca Jacobs (wife of George Jacobs, Jr. and sister of Daniel Andrew), Sarah Buckley and her daughter Mary Witheridge, Elizabeth Colson, Elizabeth Hart, Thomas Farrar, Sr., Roger Toothaker, Sarah Proctor (daughter of John and Elizabeth Proctor), Sarah Bassett (sister-in-law of Elizabeth Proctor), Susannah Roots, Mary DeRich (another sister-in-law of Elizabeth Proctor), Sarah Pease, Elizabeth Cary, Martha Carrier, Elizabeth Fosdick, Wilmot Redd, Sarah Rice, Elizabeth Howe, Capt. John Alden (son of John Alden and Priscilla Mullins of Plymouth Colony), William Proctor (son of John and Elizabeth Proctor), John Flood, Mary Toothaker (wife of Roger Toothaker and sister of Martha Carrier) and her daughter Margaret Toothaker, and Arthur Abbott. When the Court of Oyer and Terminer convened at the end of May, the total number of people in custody was 62.[33]
Cotton Mather wrote to one of the judges, John Richards, a member of his congregation, on May 31, 1692,[34] expressing his support of the prosecutions, but cautioning him, "do not lay more stress on pure spectral evidence than it will bear... It is very certain that the Devils have sometimes represented the Shapes of persons not only innocent, but also very virtuous. Though I believe that the just God then ordinarily provides a way for the speedy vindication of the persons thus abused." [35]
Formal prosecution: The Court of Oyer and Terminer
The Court of Oyer and Terminer convened in Salem Town on June 2, 1692, with William Stoughton, the new Lieutenant Governor, as Chief Magistrate, Thomas Newton as the Crown's Attorney prosecuting the cases, and Stephen Sewall as clerk. Bridget Bishop's case was the first brought to the grand jury, who endorsed all the indictments against her. Bishop was described as not living a puritan lifestyle, for she wore black clothing and odd costumes, which was against the puritan code. When she was examined before her trial, Bishop was asked about her coat, which had been awkwardly “cut or torn in two ways”.[36] This, along with her immoral lifestyle, accused her of a being a witch. She went to trial the same day and was convicted. On June 3, the grand jury endorsed indictments against Rebecca Nurse and John Willard, but it is not clear why they did not go to trial immediately as well. Bishop was executed by hanging on June 10, 1692.
Immediately following this execution, the court adjourned for 20 days (until June 30) while it sought advice from New England's most influential ministers "upon the state of things as they then stood." [37][38] Their collective response came back dated June 15 and composed by Cotton Mather:
The afflicted state of our poor neighbours, that are now suffering by molestations from the invisible world, we apprehend so deplorable, that we think their condition calls for the utmost help of all persons in their several capacities.
We cannot but, with all thankfulness, acknowledge the success which the merciful God has given unto the sedulous and assiduous endeavours of our honourable rulers, to detect the abominable witchcrafts which have been committed in the country, humbly praying, that the discovery of those mysterious and mischievous wickednesses may be perfected.
We judge that, in the prosecution of these and all such witchcrafts, there is need of a very critical and exquisite caution, lest by too much credulity for things received only upon the Devil's authority, there be a door opened for a long train of miserable consequences, and Satan get an advantage over us; for we should not be ignorant of his devices.
As in complaints upon witchcrafts, there may be matters of inquiry which do not amount unto matters of presumption, and there may be matters of presumption which yet may not be matters of conviction, so it is necessary, that all proceedings thereabout be managed with an exceeding tenderness towards those that may be complained of, especially if they have been persons formerly of an unblemished reputation.
When the first inquiry is made into the circumstances of such as may lie under the just suspicion of witchcrafts, we could wish that there may be admitted as little as is possible of such noise, company and openness as may too hastily expose them that are examined, and that there may no thing be used as a test for the trial of the suspected, the lawfulness whereof may be doubted among the people of God; but that the directions given by such judicious writers as Perkins and Bernard [be consulted in such a case].
Presumptions whereupon persons may be committed, and, much more, convictions whereupon persons may be condemned as guilty of witchcrafts, ought certainly to be more considerable than barely the accused person's being represented by a specter unto the afflicted; inasmuch as it is an undoubted and notorious thing, that a demon may, by God's permission, appear, even to ill purposes, in the shape of an innocent, yea, and a virtuous man. Nor can we esteem alterations made in the sufferers, by a look or touch of the accused, to be an infallible evidence of guilt, but frequently liable to be abused by the Devil's legerdemains.
We know not whether some remarkable affronts given to the Devils by our disbelieving those testimonies whose whole force and strength is from them alone, may not put a period unto the progress of the dreadful calamity begun upon us, in the accusations of so many persons, whereof some, we hope, are yet clear from the great transgression laid unto their charge.
Nevertheless, we cannot but humbly recommend unto the government, the speedy and vigorous prosecution of such as have rendered themselves obnoxious, according to the direction given in the laws of God, and the wholesome statutes of the English nation, for the detection of witchcrafts.
Hutchinson sums the letter, "The two first and the last sections of this advice took away the force of all the others, and the prosecutions went on with more vigor than before." (Reprinting the letter years later in Magnalia, Cotton Mather left out these "two first and the last" sections.) Major Nathaniel Saltonstall Esq. resigned from the court on or about June 16, presumably dissatisfied with the letter and that it had not outright barred the admission of spectral evidence. According to Upham, Saltonsall deserves the credit for "being the only public man of his day who had the sense or courage to condemn the proceedings, at the start." (chapt. VII)
More people were accused, arrested and examined, but now in Salem Town, by former local magistrates John Hathorne, Jonathan Corwin and Bartholomew Gedney who had become judges of the Court of Oyer and Terminer. Roger Toothaker died in prison on June 16, 1692.
June 30 through early July, grand juries endorsed indictments against Sarah Good, Elizabeth Howe, Susannah Martin, Elizabeth Proctor, John Proctor, Martha Carrier, Sarah Wilds and Dorcas Hoar. Sarah Good, Elizabeth Howe, Susannah Martin and Sarah Wildes, along with Rebecca Nurse, went to trial at this time, where they were found guilty. All five women were executed by hanging on July 19, 1692.
Mid-July, the constable in Andover invited the afflicted girls from Salem Village to visit with his wife to try to determine who was causing her afflictions. Ann Foster, her daughter Mary Lacey Sr., and granddaughter Mary Lacey Jr. all confessed to being witches. Anthony Checkley was appointed by Governor Phips to replace Thomas Newton as the Crown's Attorney when Newton took an appointment in New Hampshire.
In August, grand juries indicted George Burroughs, Mary Eastey, Martha Corey and George Jacobs, Sr.. Trial juries convicted Martha Carrier, George Jacobs, Sr., George Burroughs, John Willard, Elizabeth Proctor, and John Proctor. Elizabeth Proctor was given a temporary stay of execution because she was pregnant. August 19, 1692, Martha Carrier, George Jacobs Sr., George Burroughs, John Willard, and John Proctor were executed.
Mr. Burroughs was carried in a Cart with others, through the streets of Salem, to Execution. When he was upon the Ladder, he made a speech for the clearing of his Innocency, with such Solemn and Serious Expressions as were to the Admiration of all present; his Prayer (which he concluded by repeating the Lord’s Prayer) [as witches were not supposed to be able to recite] was so well worded, and uttered with such composedness as such fervency of spirit, as was very Affecting, and drew Tears from many, so that if seemed to some that the spectators would hinder the execution. The accusers said the black Man [Devil] stood and dictated to him. As soon as he was turned off [hung], Mr. Cotton Mather, being mounted upon a Horse, addressed himself to the People, partly to declare that he [Mr. Burroughs] was no ordained Minister, partly to possess the People of his guilt, saying that the devil often had been transformed into the Angel of Light. And this did somewhat appease the People, and the Executions went on; when he [Mr. Burroughs] was cut down, he was dragged by a Halter to a Hole, or Grave, between the Rocks, about two feet deep; his Shirt and Breeches being pulled off, and an old pair of Trousers of one Executed put on his lower parts: he was so put in, together with Willard and Carrier, that one of his Hands, and his Chin, and a Foot of one of them, was left uncovered.
—Robert Calef, More Wonders of the Invisible World[1]
Petition for bail of 11 accused people from Ipswich, 1692
The personal seal of William Stoughton on the warrant for the execution of Bridget Bishop
Examination of a Witch (1853) by T. H. Matteson, inspired by the Salem trials
In September, grand juries indicted eighteen more people. The grand jury failed to indict William Proctor, who was re-arrested on new charges. On September 19, 1692, Giles Corey refused to plead at arraignment, and was subjected to peine forte et dure, a form of torture in which the subject is pressed beneath an increasingly heavy load of stones, in an attempt to make him enter a plea. Four pleaded guilty and eleven others were tried and found guilty.
September 20, Cotton Mather wrote to Stephen Sewall, the clerk of the court: "That I may be the more capable to assist in lifting up a standard against the infernal enemy..." requesting "... a narrative of the evidence given in at the trials of half a dozen, or if you please, a dozen, of the principal witches that have been condemned."
September 22, 1692, eight more were executed, "After Execution Mr. Noyes turning him to the Bodies, said, what a sad thing it is to see Eight Firebrands of Hell hanging there."[39] One of the convicted, Dorcas Hoar, was given a temporary reprieve, with the support of several ministers, to make a confession of being a witch. Aged Mary Bradbury escaped. Abigail Faulkner Sr. was pregnant and given a temporary reprieve (some reports from that era say that Abigail's reprieve later became a stay of charges).
Mather quickly completed his account of the trials Wonders of the Invisible World[40] and it was given to Phips when he returned from the fighting in Maine in early October. Burr says both the Phip's letter and Mather's manuscript "must have gone to London by the same ship" in mid-October.[41]
I hereby declare that as soon as I came from fighting ... and understood what danger some of their innocent subjects might be exposed to, if the evidence of the afflicted persons only did prevaile either to the committing or trying any of them, I did before any application was made unto me about it put a stop to the proceedings of the Court and they are now stopt till their Majesties pleasure be known.
—Governor Phips, Boston, October 12, 1692
October 29, Judge Sewall writes "the Court of Oyer and Terminer count themselves thereby dismissed... asked whether the Court of Oyer and Terminer should sit, expressing some fear of Inconvenience by its fall, [the] Governour said it must fall." (Sewall's Diary, I. 368.) Governor Phips' wife was among those "called out upon" by the afflicted. Spectral evidence was once again in question. There would be more trials after the new year, but not like before.
The Superior Court of Judicature, 1693
In January 1693, the new Superior Court of Judicature, Court of Assize and General Gaol Delivery convened in Salem, Essex County, again headed by William Stoughton, as Chief Justice, with Anthony Checkley continuing as the Attorney General, and Jonathan Elatson as Clerk of the Court. The first five cases tried in January 1693 were of the five people who had been indicted but not tried in September: Sarah Buckley, Margaret Jacobs, Rebecca Jacobs, Mary Whittredge and Job Tookey. All were found not guilty. Grand juries were held for many of those remaining in jail. Charges were dismissed against many, but sixteen more people were indicted and tried, three of whom were found guilty: Elizabeth Johnson Jr., Sarah Wardwell and Mary Post. When Stoughton wrote the warrants for the execution of these women and the others remaining from the previous court, Governor Phips pardoned them, sparing their lives. In late January/early February, the Court sat again in Charlestown, Middlesex County, and held grand juries and tried five people: Sarah Cole (of Lynn), Lydia Dustin & Sarah Dustin, Mary Taylor and Mary Toothaker. All were found not guilty, but were not released until they paid their jail fees. Lydia Dustin died in jail on March 10, 1693. At the end of April, the Court convened in Boston, Suffolk County, and cleared Capt. John Alden by proclamation, and heard charges against a servant girl, Mary Watkins, for falsely accusing her mistress of witchcraft. In May, the Court convened in Ipswich, Essex County, held a variety of grand juries who dismissed charges against all but five people. Susannah Post, Eunice Frye, Mary Bridges Jr., Mary Barker and William Barker Jr. were all found not guilty at trial, putting an end to the episode.
Legal procedures
Overview
After someone concluded that a loss, illness or death had been caused by witchcraft, the accuser entered a complaint against the alleged witch with the local magistrates.[42]
If the complaint was deemed credible, the magistrates had the person arrested[43] and brought in for a public examination, essentially an interrogation, where the magistrates pressed the accused to confess.[44]
If the magistrates at this local level were satisfied that the complaint was well-founded, the prisoner was handed over to be dealt with by a superior court. In 1692, the magistrates opted to wait for the arrival of the new charter and governor, who would establish a Court of Oyer and Terminer to handle these cases.
The next step, at the superior court level, was to summon witnesses before a grand jury.[45]
A person could be indicted on charges of afflicting with witchcraft,[46] or for making an unlawful covenant with the Devil.[47] Once indicted, the defendant went to trial, sometimes on the same day, as in the case of the first person indicted and tried on June 2, Bridget Bishop, who was executed on June 10, 1692.
There were four execution dates, with one person executed on June 10, 1692,[48] five executed on July 19, 1692 (Sarah Good, Rebecca Nurse, Susannah Martin, Elizabeth Howe & Sarah Wildes),[49] another five executed on August 19, 1692 (Martha Carrier, John Willard, George Burroughs, George Jacobs, Sr. and John Proctor), and eight on September 22, 1692 (Mary Eastey, Martha Corey, Ann Pudeator, Samuel Wardwell, Mary Parker, Alice Parker, Wilmot Redd and Margaret Scott). Several others, including Elizabeth (Bassett) Proctor and Abigail Faulkner, were convicted but given temporary reprieves because they were pregnant. Five other women were convicted in 1692, but the sentence was never carried out: Ann Foster (who later died in prison), her daughter Mary Lacy Sr., Abigail Hobbs, Dorcas Hoar and Mary Bradbury.
Giles Corey was pressed to death during the Salem witch trials in the 1690s
Giles Corey, an 80-year-old farmer from the southeast end of Salem (called Salem Farms), refused to enter a plea when he came to trial in September. The judges applied an archaic form of punishment called peine forte et dure, in which stones were piled on his chest until he could no longer breathe. After two days of peine fort et dure, Corey died without entering a plea.[50] His refusal to plead has sometimes been explained as a way of preventing his estate from being confiscated by the Crown, but according to historian Chadwick Hansen, much of Corey's property had already been seized, and he had made a will in prison: "His death was a protest ... against the methods of the court".[51] This echoes the perspective of a contemporary critic of the trials, Robert Calef, who claimed, "Giles Corey pleaded not Guilty to his Indictment, but would not put himself upon Tryal by the Jury (they having cleared none upon Tryal) and knowing there would be the same Witnesses against him, rather chose to undergo what Death they would put him to."[52]
Not even in death were the accused witches granted peace or respect. As convicted witches, Rebecca Nurse and Martha Corey had been excommunicated from their churches and none were given proper burial. As soon as the bodies of the accused were cut down from the trees, they were thrown into a shallow grave and the crowd dispersed. Oral history claims that the families of the dead reclaimed their bodies after dark and buried them in unmarked graves on family property. The record books of the time do not mention the deaths of any of those executed.
Title page of Cases of Conscience (Boston, 1693) by Increase Mather
Much, but not all, of the evidence used against the accused was spectral evidence, or the testimony of the afflicted who claimed to see the apparition or the shape of the person who was allegedly afflicting them. The theological dispute that ensued about the use of this evidence centered on whether a person had to give permission to the Devil for his/her shape to be used to afflict. Opponents claimed that the Devil was able to use anyone's shape to afflict people, but the Court contended that the Devil could not use a person's shape without that person's permission; therefore, when the afflicted claimed to see the apparition of a specific person, that was accepted as evidence that the accused had been complicit with the Devil. Increase Mather and other ministers sent a letter to the Court, "The Return of Several Ministers Consulted," urging the magistrates not to convict on spectral evidence alone (spectral evidence was later ruled inadmissible, which caused a dramatic reduction in the rate of convictions and may have hastened the end of the trials). A copy of this letter was printed in Increase Mather's Cases of Conscience, published in 1693. The publication A Tryal of Witches, was used by the magistrates at Salem, when looking for a precedent in allowing spectral evidence. Finding that no lesser person than the jurist Sir Matthew Hale had permitted this evidence, supported by the eminent philosopher, physician and author Thomas Browne, to be used in the Bury St Edmunds witch trial and the accusations against two Lowestoft women, held in 1662 in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, England, they also accepted its validity and the trials proceeded.[53]
Witch cake
At some point in February 1692, likely after the afflictions began but before specific names were mentioned, a neighbor of Rev. Parris, Mary Sibly (aunt of the afflicted Mary Walcott), instructed John Indian, one of the minister's slaves, to make a witch cake, using traditional English white magic to discover the identity of the witch who was afflicting the girls. The cake, made from rye meal and urine from the afflicted girls, was fed to a dog.
According to English folk understanding of how witches accomplished affliction, when the dog ate the cake, the witch herself would be hurt because invisible particles she had sent to afflict the girls remained in the girls' urine, and her cries of pain when the dog ate the cake would identify her as the witch. This superstition was based on the Cartesian "Doctrine of Effluvia", which posited that witches afflicted by the use of "venomous and malignant particles, that were ejected from the eye", according to the October 8, 1692 letter of Thomas Brattle, a contemporary critic of the trials.[54]
According to the Records of the Salem-Village Church, Parris spoke with Sibly privately on March 25, 1692 about her "grand error" and accepted her "sorrowful confession." During his Sunday sermon on March 27 he addressed his congregation on the subject of the "calamities" that had begun in his own household, but stated "it never brake forth to any considerable light, until diabolical means were used, by the making of a cake by my Indian man, who had his direction from this our sister, Mary Sibly," going on to admonish all against the use of any kind of magic, even white magic, because it was essentially, "going to the Devil for help against the Devil." Mary Sibley publicly acknowledged the error of her actions before the congregation, who voted by a show of hands that they were satisfied with her admission of error.[55]
Other instances appear in the records of the episode that demonstrated a continued belief by members of the community in this effluvia as legitimate evidence, including accounts in two statements against Elizabeth Howe that people had suggested cutting off and burning an ear of two different animals Howe was thought to have afflicted, to prove she was the one who had bewitched them to death.[56]
This 19th-century representation of "Tituba and the Children" by Alfred Fredericks, originally appeared in A Popular History of the United States, Vol. 2, by William Cullen Bryant (1878)
Traditionally, the allegedly afflicted girls are said to have been entertained by Parris' slave woman, Tituba, who supposedly taught them about voodoo in the kitchen of the parsonage during the winter of 1692, although there is no contemporary evidence to support the story.[57] A variety of secondary sources, starting with Charles W. Upham in the 19th century, typically relate that a circle of the girls, with Tituba's help, tried their hands at fortune telling using the white of an egg and a mirror to create a primitive crystal ball to divine the professions of their future spouses and scared one another when one supposedly saw the shape of a coffin instead. The story is drawn from John Hale's book about the trials,[58] but in his account, only one of the girls, not a group of them, had confessed to him afterwards that she had once tried this. Hale did not mention Tituba as having any part of it, nor when it had occurred. Yet the record of her trial with Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne holds her giving an energetic confession, speaking before the court of "creatures who inhabit the invisible world," and "the dark rituals which bind them together in service of Satan," and implicating both Good and Osborne while asserting that "many other people in the colony were engaged in the devil's conspiracy against the Bay."[59]
Tituba's race is often cited as Carib-Indian or of African descent, but contemporary sources describe her only as an "Indian." Research by Elaine Breslaw has suggested that she may well have been captured in what is now Venezuela and brought to Barbados, and so may have been an Arawak Indian.[60] Other slightly later descriptions of her, by Gov. Thomas Hutchinson writing his history of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the 18th century, describe her as a "Spanish Indian."[61] In that day, that typically meant a Native American from the Carolinas/Georgia/Florida.
Touch test
The most infamous employment of the belief in effluvia – and in direct opposition to what Parris had advised his own parishioners in Salem Village – was the touch test used in Andover during preliminary examinations in September 1692. If the accused witch touched the victim while the victim was having a fit, and the fit then stopped, that meant the accused was the person who had afflicted the victim. As several of those accused later recounted, "we were blindfolded, and our hands were laid upon the afflicted persons, they being in their fits and falling into their fits at our coming into their presence, as they said. Some led us and laid our hands upon them, and then they said they were well and that we were guilty of afflicting them; whereupon we were all seized, as prisoners, by a warrant from the justice of the peace and forthwith carried to Salem"[62] Rev. John Hale explained how this supposedly worked: "the Witch by the cast of her eye sends forth a Malefick Venome into the Bewitched to cast him into a fit, and therefore the touch of the hand doth by sympathy cause that venome to return into the Body of the Witch again".[63]
Other evidence
Other evidence included the confessions of the accused; testimony by a confessed witch who identified others as witches; the discovery of poppits, books of palmistry and horoscopes, or pots of ointments in the possession or home of the accused; and observation of what were called witch's teats on the body of the accused. A witch's teat was said to be a mole or blemish somewhere on the body that was insensitive to touch; discovery of such insensitive areas was considered de facto evidence of witchcraft.
Various accounts and opinions about the proceedings began to be published in 1692. Deodat Lawson, a former minister in Salem Village, visited Salem Village in March and April 1692. Later that year, he published in Boston an account of what he saw and heard, entitled, "A Brief and True Narrative of Some Remarkable Passages Relating to Sundry Persons Afflicted by Witchcraft, at Salem Village: Which happened from the Nineteenth of March, to the Fifth of April, 1692".[64]
Rev. William Milbourne, a Baptist minister in Boston, publicly petitioned the General Assembly in early June 1692, challenging the use of spectral evidence by the Court. Milbourne had to post £200 bond or be arrested for "contriving, writing and publishing the said scandalous Papers".[65]
On June 15, 1692, twelve local ministers—including Increase Mather, Samuel Willard, and Cotton Mather—submitted The Return of several Ministers to the Governor and Council in Boston, cautioning the authorities not to rely entirely on the use of spectral evidence, stating,
"Presumptions whereupon persons may be Committed, and much more, Convictions whereupon persons may be Condemned as Guilty of Witchcrafts, ought certainly to be more considerable, than barely the Accused Persons being Represented by a Spectre unto the Afflicted".[66]
First page of "Some Miscellany Observations On our present Debates respecting Witchcrafts, in a Dialogue Between S. & B.", attributed to Samuel Willard.
Sometime in 1692, minister of the Third Church in Boston,[67]Samuel Willard anonymously published a short tract in Philadelphia entitled, "Some Miscellany Observations On our present Debates respecting Witchcrafts, in a Dialogue Between S. & B." The authors were listed as "P.E. and J. A." (Philip English and John Alden), but the work is generally attributed to Willard. In it, two characters, S (Salem) and B (Boston), discuss the way the proceedings were being conducted, with "B" urging caution about the use of testimony from the afflicted and the confessors, stating, "whatever comes from them is to be suspected; and it is dangerous using or crediting them too far".[68]
Title page of Wonders of the Invisible World (London, 1693) by Cotton Mather
Sometime in September 1692, at the request of Governor Phips, Cotton Mather wrote "Wonders of the Invisible World: Being an Account of the Tryals of Several Witches, Lately Executed in New-England," as a defense of the trials, to "help very much flatten that fury which we now so much turn upon one another".[69] It was published in Boston and London in 1692, although dated 1693, with an introductory letter of endorsement by William Stoughton, the Chief Magistrate. The book included accounts of five trials, with much of the material copied directly from the court records, which were supplied to Mather by Stephen Sewall, his friend and Clerk of the Court.[70]
Cotton Mather's father, Increase Mather, published "Cases of Conscience Concerning Evil Spirits," dated October 3, 1692, after the last trials by the Court of Oyer & Terminer. (The title page mistakenly lists the publication year as "1693.") In it, Mather repeated his caution about the reliance on spectral evidence, stating "It were better that Ten Suspected Witches should escape, than that one Innocent Person should be Condemned".[71] Second and third editions of this book were published in Boston and London in 1693, the third of which also included Lawson's Narrative and the anonymous "A Further Account of the Tryals of the New-England Witches, sent in a Letter from thence, to a Gentleman in London."[72] Thomas Brattle, a wealthy businessman in Boston and fellow Harvard graduate, circulated a letter in manuscript form in October 1692, in which he criticized the methods used by the Court to determine guilt, including the use of the touch test and the testimony of confessors. He wrote, "they are deluded, imposed upon, and under the influence of some evill spirit; and therefore unfit to be evidences either against themselves, or any one else"[73]
Aftermath and closure
Although the last trial was held in May 1693, public response to the events has continued. In the decades following the trials, the issues primarily had to do with establishing the innocence of the individuals who were convicted and compensating the survivors and families. In the following centuries, the descendants of those unjustly accused and condemned have sought to honor their memories. The trials have figured in American culture and been explored in numerous works of art and literature.
Reversals of attainder and compensation to the survivors and their families
Title page of A Modest Enquiry Into the Nature of Witchcraft by John Hale (Boston, 1702)
The first hint that public call for justice was not over happened in 1695, when Thomas Maule, a noted Quaker, publicly criticized the handling of the trials by the Puritan leaders in Chapter 29 of his book Truth Held Forth and Maintained, expanding on Increase Mather by stating, "it were better that one hundred Witches should live, than that one person be put to death for a witch, which is not a Witch".[74] For publishing this book, Maule was imprisoned twelve months before he was tried and found not guilty.[75]
On December 17, 1696, the General Court ruled that there would be a fast day on January 14, 1697, "referring to the late Tragedy, raised among us by Satan and his Instruments."[76] On that day, Samuel Sewall asked Rev. Samuel Willard to read aloud his apology to the congregation of Boston's South Church, "to take the Blame & Shame" of the "late Commission of Oyer & Terminer at Salem".[77] Thomas Fiske and eleven other trial jurors also asked forgiveness.[78]
From 1693-1697, Robert Calef, a "weaver" and a cloth merchant in Boston, collected correspondence, court records and petitions, and other accounts of the trials, and placed them, for contrast, alongside portions of Cotton Mather's Wonders of the Invisible World. Calef's title: More Wonders of the Invisible World,.[1] He could not get it published in Boston and had to take it to London where it was published in 1700. Scholars of the trials-- Hutchinson, Upham, Burr, and even Poole-- have relied on Calef's compilation of documents. John Hale, a minister in Beverly who was present at many of the proceedings, had completed his book, A Modest Enquiry into the Nature of Witchcraft in 1697, but it wasn't published until 1702, after his death, and perhaps in response to Calef's book. Expressing regret over the actions taken, Hale admitted, "Such was the darkness of that day, the tortures and lamentations of the afflicted, and the power of former presidents, that we walked in the clouds, and could not see our way."[79]
Various petitions were filed between 1700 and 1703 with the Massachusetts government, demanding that the convictions be formally reversed. Those tried and found guilty were considered dead in the eyes of the law, and with convictions still on the books, those not executed were vulnerable to further accusations. The General Court initially reversed the attainder only for those who had filed petitions,[80] only three people who had been convicted but not executed: Abigail Faulkner Sr., Elizabeth Proctor and Sarah Wardwell.[81] In 1703, another petition was filed,[82] requesting a more equitable settlement for those wrongly accused, but it wasn't until 1709, when the General Court received a further request, that it took action on this proposal. In May 1709, 22 people who had been convicted of witchcraft, or whose relatives had been convicted of witchcraft, presented the government with a petition in which they demanded both a reversal of attainder and compensation for financial losses.[83]
Repentance was evident within the Salem Village church. Rev. Joseph Green and the members of the church voted on February 14, 1703, after nearly two months of consideration, to reverse the excommunication of Martha Corey.[84] On August 25, 1706, when Ann Putnam Jr., one of the most active accusers, joined the Salem Village church, she publicly asked forgiveness. She claimed that she had not acted out of malice, but was being deluded by Satan into denouncing innocent people, and mentioned Rebecca Nurse in particular,[85] and was accepted for full membership.
On October 17, 1711, the General Court passed a bill reversing the judgment against the 22 people listed in the 1709 petition (there were seven additional people who had been convicted but had not signed the petition, but there was no reversal of attainder for them). Two months later, on December 17, 1711, Governor Joseph Dudley also authorized monetary compensation to the 22 people in the 1709 petition. The amount of 578 pounds 12 shillings was authorized to be divided among the survivors and relatives of those accused, and most of the accounts were settled within a year,[86] but Phillip English's extensive claims weren't settled until 1718.[87]
Finally, on March 6, 1712, Rev. Nicholas Noyes, and members of the Salem church reversed Noyes' earlier excommunications of their former members, Rebecca Nurse and Giles Corey.[88]
Memorials by descendants
Rebecca Nurse's descendants erected an obelisk-shaped granite memorial in her memory in 1885 on the grounds of the Nurse Homestead in Danvers, with an inscription from Whittier. In 1892 an additional monument was erected in honor of 40 neighbors who signed a petition in support of Nurse.[89]
Not all the condemned had been exonerated in the early 18th century, and so in 1957, descendants of the six people who had been wrongly convicted and executed but who had not been included in the bill for a reversal of attainder in 1711, or added to it in 1712, demanded that the General Court formally clear the names of their ancestral family members. An act was passed pronouncing the innocence of those accused, although it listed only Ann Pudeator by name. The others were listed only as "certain other persons," phrasing which failed specifically to name Bridget Bishop, Susannah Martin, Alice Parker, Wilmot Redd and Margaret Scott.[90]
Trials-related family-history groups offer places where descendants can memorialize their ancestors while sharing ideas and information about their research. The Associated Daughters of Early American Witches was founded in 1987 in California. It invites members who are women and able to prove descent from an ancestor who was accused of witchcraft including those at the Salem trials.[91]Bloodlines of Salem was founded in 2007 in Utah. It welcomes members who are able to prove descent from a trials participant or who choose simply to support the group.
The Salem Witch Trials Memorial Park in Salem
Fanciful representation of the Salem witch trials, lithograph from 1892.
The 300th anniversary of the trials was marked in Salem and Danvers by a variety of events in 1992. A memorial park was dedicated in Salem with a stone bench for each of those executed in 1692. Speakers at the ceremony in August included Arthur Miller and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel.[92] Danvers erected its own new memorial,[93] and reinterred bones unearthed in the 1950s, assumed to be those of George Jacobs, Sr., in a new resting place at the Rebecca Nurse Homestead.[89]
In 1992, The Danvers Tercentennial Committee also persuaded the Massachusetts House of Representatives to issue a resolution honoring those who had died. After much convincing and hard work by Salem school teacher Paula Keene, Representatives J. Michael Ruane and Paul Tirone and others, the names of all those not previously listed were added to this resolution. When it was finally signed on October 31, 2001, by GovernorJane Swift, more than 300 years later, all were finally proclaimed innocent.[94]
The story of the witchcraft accusations, trials and executions has captured the imagination of writers and artists in the centuries since the event took place, many of which interpretations have taken liberties with the facts of the historical episode in the name of literary and/or artistic license. Occurring at the intersection between a gradually disappearing medieval past and an emerging enlightenment and dealing with torture and confession, such interpretations draw attention to the boundaries between the medieval and the postmedieval as cultural constructions.[95]
The cause of the symptoms of those who claimed affliction continues to be a subject of interest. Various medical and psychological explanations for the observed symptoms have been explored by researchers, including psychological hysteria in response to Indian attacks, convulsive ergotism caused by eating rye bread made from grain infected by the fungus Claviceps purpurea (a natural substance from which LSD is derived),[96] an epidemic of bird-borne encephalitis lethargica, and sleep paralysis to explain the nocturnal attacks alleged by some of the accusers.[97] Other modern historians[who?] are less inclined to believe in biological explanations, preferring instead to explore motivations such as jealousy, spite, and a need for attention to explain behavior that they contend was simply acting. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
10th greatest movie villain (AFI's 100 Years.... 100 Heroes and Villains)
Character information
Full name
Queen Grimhilde
Other names
Evil Queen Wicked Queen Bad Queen Ol' Granny, Wicked Witch (as the Witch) Regina (in Once Upon a Time)
Personality
Bad, unfeeling, vain, ruthless, sinister, evil, jealous, devious, extremely cold
Appearance
Slender, regally beautiful, fair skin, green eyes, long black hair, red lips, thin black eyebrows, rosy cheeks (in her traditional form): Long black cloak as part of her cowl lined with red on the inside and white fur on the bottom, high white collar attached to her cloak with a golden pendant and its red center attached to it, purple long-sleeved gown, red rope belt, black balaclava, ochre pumps, gold crown atop her head with 5 spikes on the front and a jewel on the tip of the middle and tallest spike (in her witch form:) Elderly (due to her alter-ego's magic potion), very careworn face, large eyes with gold pupils, white hair, thick black eyebrows, hooked nose with a wart on it, long bony fingers, prominent chin, black cloak, gray Dutch-style slippers
“But to make doubly sure.... you do not fail, bring me back her heart.... in this.”
―The Queen orders the Huntsman to bring her Snow White's heart[src]
The Evil Queen is the main antagonist of Disney's 1937 film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and the first Disney animated features canon villain. Determined to remain the fairest of all, the Queen becomes insanely jealous of Snow White, the only one whose beauty surpasses her own. She eventually uses dark magic to transform herself into the Witch, in a final attempt to do away with her only, unknowing rival. Depicted in early designs as a fat character, her appearance eventually evolved into a much more sinister, stately beauty. She is generally one of Disney's most iconic and menacing first villains, once being voted the 10th greatest movie villain of all time. The Queen was animated by Art Babbitt and the Witch by Norman Ferguson. Both were voiced by veteran actress Lucille La Verne.
Her name was given as Queen Grimhilde in some old publicity material and comics, but the Disney company does not seem to acknowledge it as canon anymore. She is sometimes referred to as the Wicked Queen, while theme parks sometimes refer to her as the Snow Queen. The Witch is sometimes referred to as the Old Hag. The Evil Queen is also an official member of the Disney Villains.
Background
Physical Description
The Queen is an icily beautiful woman with a serene, unfeeling face and a slender figure. She is pale-skinned with green eyes, long raven black hair, red lips and seemingly penciled-on eyebrows. Her features and her royal attire create a very stunning and beautiful Queenly image. The Queen is seen wearing a purple gown with long sleeves and a red rope belt tied around her waist. She wears a black balaclava that covers her ears, neck and hair, leaving her face exposed. The Queen wears a long black cloak that appears to be part of the cowl. The cloak is lined with red inside and the bottom of the cloak is lined with white fur. She has a high white collar attached to her cloak. She also wears a golden pendant that seems to connect with the collar. She also wears orange-yellow high-heel pumps. To top off her royal appearance, the Evil Queen wears a golden crown atop her head with 5 spikes on the front and a jewel on the tip of the middle and tallest spike. The color scheme of her attire represents her pride and vanity.
In her witch disguise, the Queen's physical appearance changes from that of a youthfully beautiful queen with an unfeeling look on her face to that of an ugly, old peddler with face of displaying emotions. She has long, tangled white hair, thick eyebrows, gold eyes and dark rings around her eyes. Her nose becomes long and crooked with a large wart, and she only has one visible tooth on her bottom jaw. Her hands are gnarled and have pointed, dirty fingernails. She dons a black, cowled robe that retains the hanging sleeves of her gown. She also seems to wear gray slippers.
Walt Disney described the Queen as "a mixture of Lady Macbeth and the Big Bad Wolf... her beauty is sinister, mature, plenty of curves... she becomes ugly and menacing when scheming and mixing her poisons; magic fluids transform her into an old. witch-like hag."
Personality
The Queen does not appear to be significantly involved in governing her kingdom. Rather, she wants nothing more than to be the fairest in the land. She is cold, cruel, and has an extreme vanity that made her utterly intolerant of rivals. Her vanity and jealousy of Snow White's superior beauty and the Prince's attentions eventually drove her to murderous insanity. That she transforms herself into a hideous hag and conjures a poison named 'The Sleeping Death' to achieve this end is a sign of her determination and desperation.
As the Witch, her goal is the same, but she is far more excited as she comes closer to achieving her goal. However, in this new state she is slightly uncertain. She is no longer protected by her regal status and castle, she no longer has any minions, servants or magic to defend her, and she is older and frailer than before. However, this uncertainty is outweighed by her resolve to kill Snow White. However, the book My Side of the Story: Snow White/The Queen reveals that the Queen actually was very kind to Snow White at first (she even has a portrait of her stepdaughter on one of the walls of the castle), but she gets too wound up in her jealousy which ultimately results in her untimely end.[1][2][3] The book also reveals her, when not in her castle, owning a grocery store (as seen in the last page of the book)[4] and that the Huntsman was a very good friend of hers. She also, according to her explanation, made Snow White a servant in her castle to ensure that her stepdaughter is not lazy (Aside this, The Queen also tell Snow White to do chores everyday because it's a "good exercise" - this is proven in one scene from the book where Snow White eats some cake, and then The Queen snatches it from her stepdaughter, then tell Snow White not to eat some sweets because she is "still in growth & needs to diet"). Also, according to The Queen, she never asks the Magic Mirror who is the fairest in the land. But the Magic Mirror keeps complimenting on how beautiful The Queen is (in her opinion). In the scene where Snow White first meets The Prince and flirts with him, The Queen watches them from her window, with a worried look on her face, worried about Snow White's safety with an older boy (whereas in the film, she watches them with anger & jealousy of Snow White's beauty).
The Queen, jealous of her stepdaughter Snow White's beauty, forces her to work as a servant in her castle; even in rags and wooden shoes, however, Snow White's beauty shines through, causing the Queen to worry that Snow White's beauty may one day surpass her own. She has such vanity that she consults her Magic Mirror every day, ordering the slave within to reveal the name of the fairest in the land. Every day the spirit says that the Queen is the fairest, and she is content, until the mirror informs her that Snow White has finally become the fairest in the land. Outside, as Snow White works, she sings to herself, attracting the attention of the Prince, who is passing by, and they are instantly infatuated with each other. The Queen watches from her window, unseen by the two lovers, and, jealous both of Snow White's beauty and the Prince's affections, closes the curtains furiously.
The Huntsman's Orders
Summoning her faithful Huntsman to her, the Queen orders him to take Snow White far into a secluded area of the forest, where she can pick wild flowers, and kill her. She presents him with a box, in which Snow White's heart must be brought as proof. The Huntsman is reluctant to carry out such a deed, but, knowing the penalty for failure, takes Snow White deep into the forest. Just as he is about to stab the princess, he finds that he cannot bring himself to destroy such innocent beauty and, frantically warning Snow White of the Queen's vanity and jealousy, tells her to flee into the forest. He returns to the Queen, bringing in the box the heart of a pig. Meanwhile, Snow White finds the Cottage of the Seven Dwarfs, and is found by the dwarfs, whom she tells of the Queen's attempts to kill her. They are fearful of the dark magic of the Queen, not least because, Grumpy, not keen on having a woman around the house, refers to her as an "ol' witch" and suggests that she may have discovered them already, have made herself invisible, and be watching them right now. They nevertheless take pity and agree to take her in (though Grumpy is reluctant to do so, fearing the Queen's power, as well as being a self-proclaimed misogynist).
That night the Queen once again consults the slave in the Magic Mirror, who tells her that Snow White is living in the cottage of the Seven Dwarfs and that the Huntsman has brought her a pig's heart. Furious, the Queen descends a spiral staircase, entering a dark chamber filled with arcane and magical artifacts, as well as a raven perched on a skull. The Queen decides to go to the cottage herself, disguised as a peddler. Consulting a book on disguises, she mixes the required potion ingredients (though exactly how she prepared most of them into a tangible form for the concoction can be anyone's guess), such as Mummy dust to make her old, the black of night to cloak her clothing, an old hag's cackle to age her voice, a scream of fright to whiten her hair, a blast of wind to fan her hate and finally a thunderbolt to mix it well. After putting all the ingredients together, she drinks the potion and turns herself from a regally beautiful queen to an ugly old hag. She then decides to dispose of Snow White with a poisoned apple, which will send its victim into the Sleeping Death.The Queen after transforming into a Witch
The Witch brews the poison and dips an apple into the brew, turning the fruit a tempting red. (During this scene, she is speaking directly to the audience.) She reads that the victim of the poison can be revived by 'Love's First Kiss', but convinces herself that the Dwarfs, not knowing that Snow White is sleeping and not actually dead will bury the poisoned Snow White alive. Cackling to herself, she puts the apple in a basket, and walks down through the dungeon below, emerging from the castle's catacombs in a raft. As she makes her way to the dwarfs' cottage, two sinister vultures see her and, sensing that death is imminent, quietly pursue her.
She reaches the cottage and, according to plan, finds that the Dwarfs have left and Snow White is alone. Catching the girl by surprise as she is preparing food for the Dwarfs when they return home from their work in the Diamond Mines, the Witch offers her the apple, but is attacked by the animals of the forest (who sense danger when they notice the two wicked vultures). Snow White does not recognize any danger in the old woman and lets her into the house to offer her a drink of water, while the animals rush to find the Dwarfs. The Witch tells Snow White that the apple will grant wishes, and, knowing of Snow White's romance with the Prince, persuades her to wish for a happy reunion before taking a bite. Snow White falls to the floor after some moaning, taken by the Sleeping Death, and the Witch cackles with glee as a storm starts outside. The dwarfs arrive in time to see her leave and, led by Grumpy, chase her through the forest and up a tall mountain and corner her on a cliff. She attempts to crush them with a huge boulder, but lightning strikes the cliff ledge she is standing on, causing her to fall hundreds of feet off the mountain to her (believed) death. As she falls the rock tumbles down after her. The dwarfs watch as the two wicked vultures fly down to her body at the bottom of the cliff.
The Queen makes a cameo in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. She is seen in her Witch Disguise crossing the streets in Toontown to get to the Apple Store with help from Snow White.
The Queen made frequent cameos in crowd shots on House of Mouse. One episode, "Pluto Saves the Day", had her selling her poisoned apples to Pete, which he used to put the House crew to sleep.
For more information on Queen Regina, click here.
The Evil Queen, Regina, (Lana Parrilla) is the second wife of King Leopold, whom she does not love, and the step-mother of Snow White. As revealed in the episode "The Stable Boy" that before marrying Leopold Regina was kind and caring and was in love with a stable boy named Daniel (Noah Bean). However, when Snow White was little, Regina's mother Cora (Barbara Hershey) caused her horse to go wayward, leading to her being saved by Regina. King Leopold wanted to marry her as thanks and to give his daughter a mother. Resolving to run away with Daniel, Regina made Snow promise not to tell her mother, but later Snow accidentally revealed this to Cora who then killed Daniel and Regina was forced to marry Leopold From then on, Regina vowed to destroy Snow's happiness to avenge Daniel. She kills the king by taking advantage of the love the Genie holds for her. This enacts the first part of her plan and makes her ruler of Leopold's realm. She then contrives ways to kill Snow — first by enlisting the Huntsman's help. However, the Huntsman is unable to kill her, and Regina punishes him by tearing out his heart and making him her slave.
She then accuses Snow of treason and places a bounty on her head and eventually puts her into a death-like sleep with a cursed apple. However, Snow is awakened and she and Prince James are happily married. On the day of the wedding, Regina vows to cast a curse on all of the inhabitants of the Enchanted Forest and take away all of their happiness so that she is the only one who is happy. She previously traded this curse to Maleficent in exchange for the sleeping curse. However, she forcibly retrieves it from her only friend when negotiations go sour. She has difficulty enacting it and goes to see its creator, Rumplestiltskin, for advice. In exchange for the info she desires, he asks that she give him a place of comfort and respect in the "new world" the curse will send them to and that she must do anything he asks when he utters "please." Agreeing, Regina learns she must use the heart of "the thing [she] love[s] most." She understands this to be her father Henry; with reluctance, she cuts his heart out and enacts the curse. Shortly after, she travels to Snow's castle where she triumphantly exclaims to Snow White and Prince Charming that the curse is taking them "somewhere truly horrible." Her desire to "win for once" fuels her endless quest for revenge.
After the comic adaptation of Snow White, the Queen, in her hag form, returned as a recurring antagonist to the Seven Dwarfs, and later many other Disney protagonists, occasionally teaming up with fellow Disney villains like Pete and Captain Hook. One story in the 1980s provided an explanation for her return, and why she couldn't change back to her normal form. In two 1940s stories, it was also revealed that she had a deceitful twin brother.
Fairest of All: A Tale of the Wicked Queen
The novel, written by Serena Valentino, shows what caused the Queen to become the monster that she is in the film. It was revealed that her father, a maker of mirrors, never told her she was beautiful thus making her insecure of her appearance. When her father died she married the King whom she met at the well by her father's house. She grows to love Snow White as if she where her own daughter. But when the King's three witch-like cousins come for a visit they give her the Magic Mirror of which the spirit was that of her dead father. It would serve as a corrupting influence on her throughout the novel. After her husband's death, the Queen slowly descends into madness. By the end of novel, Snow White gets the mirror and the Queen becomes the spirit inside the mirror after her death in the film. The Queen's Storybrook counterpart, Regina Mills
In Storybrooke, she is Mayor Regina Mills. With Mr. Gold's help, she adopts Henry as a baby, unbeknownst to her at first that the baby was really the son of Snow White and Prince Charming's daughter Emma Swan. However, her relationship with Henry is strained: he prefers the company of his birth mother, he constantly rebels, and he constantly lies to her to spend time with Emma. Because of this and after discovering who Emma really was, Regina is antagonistic toward her and is determined to keep Emma away from Henry, even going as far as to forbid Emma from seeing him without her permission and threatening to file a restraining order against Emma. Regina is also determined to convince Henry that his theory about the curse and the true identities of the Storybrooke residents is false, and she starts him on regular sessions with therapist Archie Hopper. When Archie's methods are too slow, Regina tries to force Archie to tell Henry that his idea is crazy; however, Archie refuses and threatens to declare her an unfit mother if she continues to meddle in his sessions with Henry. She has a sexual relationship with Graham, really the Huntsman, but he eventually breaks up with her. Out of jealousy, she crushes his heart and kills him, revealing that she remembers her identity as the Evil Queen. Regina manipulates Emma's trust of Sidney Glass to keep an eye on Emma's activities. She also tries to prevent the relationship between David Nolan and Mary Margaret Blanchard, really Prince James and Snow White, by reuniting David and his wife Kathryn, as well as using David's and Mary Margaret's affair to discredit Mary Margaret after the Nolans' marriage falls apart, and stealing Kathryn's letter stating that she never loved David and that she is allowing him to be with Mary Margaret.
On May 5, 2013, during the episode "Second Star to the Right," Queen Regina appeared in a commercial promoting New Fantasyland. During it, she mused over how she would change the stories of the new arrivals. At the end of the commercial, she sees a girl dressed like the classical Disney Snow White and says "Seriously?"
The Queen is first seen in the fourth book at Disney Quest. She and Cruella replace Maleficent and Chernabog as leaders of the Overtakers when they were captured and casted a spell on some friends and schoolmates of the keepers to spy on them or send their messages. In the fifth book, she and Cruella appear again aboard the Disney Dream while following the hyenas who caught the Keepers' scent.
The Queen appears as an antagonist in Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, in her homeworld of Dwarf Woodlands, taking on both her Queen and hag forms. The Queen's first appearance in the Kingdom Hearts series was actually in Kingdom Hearts, a picture of her hag form appearing on Snow White's stain-glass podium in the Dive to the Heart.In Terra's scenario, the Queen has just learned form the Magic Mirror that Snow White is now fairer than her in beauty. However, the mirror continued to say Snow White's heart is pure light. It is then the Queen notices that Terra has been listening in from the shadows and is asked is she has met Master Xehanort. Truthfully answering that she does not, the Queen sends Terra away. However, she then calls him back with an offer: kill Snow White and bring her heart back as proof of the kill in exchange for asking the Magic Mirror where Master Xehanort is. However, Terra didn't plan on doing so and returns soon after the Unversed chase Snow White into the forest. The Queen voices her rage at Terra for his failure. However, Terra points out he never intended to do so and that thick shadows of jealousy/vanity hang on her heart, clouding any radiance from actually shining. The Queen is now at wits end and tells the Magic Mirror to suck Terra into its realm and deal with him. However, the mirror refuses the Queen's order as it lacked any power except answering answers with the truth (and rhyme). Snapping, the Queen (in the Japanese version) glows red and uses her darkness to force the mirror to obey her or (in the English version) tosses a green potion at it that transforms it into an Unversed. The Magic Mirror is now obedient to her command and sucks Terra inside. However, it soon releases him and the Queen is forced to ask the mirror the location of the elderly Keyblade Master. Upon being thanked by Terra, who then leaves, the Queen then begins to scheme up new ideas on how to kill Snow White.
In Ventus's scenario, she appears under the disguise of an old hag and prepares to carry the poisoned apple to Snow White, but drops it on her way. Ventus, unaware of her motives, politely gives the apple back. Upon seeing Ventus's Keyblade, the Queen remembers her encounter with Terra and twists the truth to make it look like Terra had threatened an old lady with his Keyblade just to learn if she knew any information about Master Xehanort. Though she succeeded in troubling Ventus, the Queen truthfully tells him she has no clue where he is now and departs for the forest, leaving Ven with a tale of half truth...
Some time between Ventus and Aqua's scenarios, the Queen succeeds in having Snow White eat the poisoned apple. She is then only briefly mentioned in Aqua's storyline by the Seven Dwarfs, who tell Aqua they chased away the Queen following her foul deeds. The Magic Mirror later tells Aqua that the Queen is dead and he is no longer under her control.
The Queen is a stock character who makes appearances at all of the Disney Theme Parks. She appears both as a normal human and sometimes as the witch.She can often be found at Disney's Hollywood Studios for the Random Afternoon Pop-Ups that take place on The Streets of America, and around Echo Lake. She also joined her fellow Disney Villains lead by Hades for the "Unleash the Villains" event in 2013. These meet-and-greets are scheduled around Fantasmic!. She makes appearences Walt Disney Studios Park. She is also commonly found in Disneyland Paris.
The Queen practically stars in this ride. She is seen more than any other character in all four versions of the ride, recreating classic scenes from the movie including peering out her window at Snow White in the movie (and the guests in the theme parks), transforming, creating the apple, offering the apple to the guests and on the cliffs for her comeuppance.
The Queen appears in the second act of Fantasmic!, and asks the Magic Mirror who the fairest one of all is. The Mirror, voiced by Tony Jay and projected onto water screens, replies that Mickey Mouse's imagination creates fairer things than she. Jealous, the Queen transforms herself into the Witch and uses the Mirror to summon various 'forces of evil', including Ursula, Cruella De Vil (only in Florida), Scar (only in Florida), Judge Claude Frollo (only in Florida), Jafar (only in Florida), Hades (only in Florida), Chernabog and Maleficent, who transforms into a dragon. Mickey is able to defeat the villains with a glowing white sword, which he first uses to defeat the dragon. This causes white sparks to surround every one of the villains. The Witch is the last to be defeated, transforming back into the Queen as she dies.
In the show located in Tokyo Disneyland, The Queen appears alongside Maleficent and Judge Frollo in the villains act of the show. The Queen seems to be the leader of the trio in the show.
Aboard the Disney Magic and Disney Dream cruise ships, Hades' evil meter has gone down, which can result in him being fired as Lord of the Underworld. To regain his evil, Hades calls forth Disney's most powerful villains for help. He sends Pain and Panic to give The Queen an invitation, but she denies since Hades also invited Maleficent. The Evil Queen and Maleficent are rivals for Hades' affections, and for the status of "The Evilest of Them All". In the end however, they put their differences aside as all villains should stick together. The Queen, and Maleficent, advises Hades to find evil within himself, and not from others.
Behind the Scenes
Voice
Lucille La Verne was first asked to provide only the voice of Vengeace in A Tale of Two Cities,[5] but read for both parts and was later offered the part of the Queen when no other actress was found. Some at the studio felt that her voice was too deep, but David Hand argued that she "knew how to deliver lines," particularly when adding ingredients to the potion. Bill Cottrell and Joe Grant were in charge of La Verne's recording session. At first they felt that her voice was too smooth for the Witch. Asking herself to be excused, La Verne left the room; upon returning a few moments later, her voice was exactly what Cottrell and Grant wanted. When asked how she had achieved this, La Verne admitted that she had removed her false teeth. Cottrel was so convinced by La Verne's performance that, at the line "a glass of water! Please!" he leaped from his chair to fetch her a drink. Joe Grant noticed La Verne's changing attitude and posture when voicing the Queen and Witch, and sketched these poses down for animation reference.
Design and Animation of the Queen
In the early stages of design, the Queen was drawn as a fat, frumpy, comical character, in the style of the characters of the Silly Symphonies. The Fleisher Betty Boop short Snow White, which, like much of Fleisher's work, had probably been La Reina Grimhilde studied by Disney's animators, also has a fat, ugly Queen. However, when Albert Hurter introduced a more realistic style of character design to the Disney animators, it was ultimately decided that the Queen should be more beautiful, regal, cold and sinister, creating a much scarier character than had ever been attempted in animation before. Rather than a comical villain, she became a femme fatale, a type of character with which the Disney artists would have been familiar, through the silent screen; at the same time she is a figure from ancient Europe, viewed by American audiences in the 1930s as a symbol of not only charm and elegance, but also decadence and self-destruction. The Queen's costume is rumoured to be based on that worn by Helen Gahagan in the 1935 film She, though animator Art Babbit and other Disney artists have denied this. At a meeting on October 30, 1934, Disney suggested that the papier mache masks by Art Deco illustrator Vladislav Theodor Benda (an influence on Joe Grant's work) be used as inspiration for the Queen's face. Her 'Hollywood mask' of a face may also draw inspiration from Joan Crawford, particularly in the lips and eyes. The Queen's costume and general silhouette may have been inspired by a column statue at Naumberg Cathedral depicting Uta, wife of the Margrave of Meissen. There are also facial similarities to George de Feure's La Femme au chapeau noir (1898-1900).
Babbit based the Queen on "all of the women I've ever known", and noted that, while the animation of the Queen relied, to an extent, on live-action footage, he felt the need to 'caricature' and 'invent' in order to justify the medium of animation; the animation was not rotoscoped as The Prince's was.
Abandoned Concepts
Imprisoning the Prince
It was originally planned that, jealous of the Prince's affections for Snow White, the Queen would have him brought to her, and she would have him locked in her dungeon. As the Witch, she would have made the skeletons in the dungeon (one of whom would have been identified as 'Prince Oswald') rise up and dance. She would have left the Prince in the dungeon, and he was to escape in the manner of Errol Flynn, enabling him to reach Snow White and break the spell.[6] The idea was abandoned when it was realised how difficult it was to animate the Prince convincingly, and the character only appeared when he needed to further the story, which centered primarily around the relationship between Snow White and the Queen.
However, comics released to promote the film include such scenes; the Witch locks up the Prince and tells him of her plans for Snow White, telling him that she will win his affections, while the Prince is defiant. Later, as the animators became more experienced at animating human characters, a similar concept was used in Sleeping Beauty, in which Maleficent has Prince Phillip captured and taken to the Forbidden Mountains, where she shows him visions of the future she has planned for him.
Deleted Scenes
A very short sequence involving the Witch stirring her cauldron was fully animated and completed, and was among the scenes cut from the film by Walt Disney at the last minute. In the sequence, the Raven looks on as the Witch stirs the cauldron with a huge bone. She pauses to see that the smoke rising from the brew is shaped like skulls, and adds a drop of an unknown ingredient to the concoction. At this, smoke from the cauldron fills the room. This sequence would have occurred immediately after the scene of the Seven Dwarfs going to sleep in their cottage; the sequence would have been followed by the scene in which the Witch dips the apple into the brew to make it poisonous.
Deviations from Source Material
In the first Brothers Grimm version of the fairy tale, the Queen was Snow White's real mother; however, in all later versions she was the heroine's stepmother, as she is in the film.
In the original Snow White fairy tale, the Queen did not drink a potion to transform into a peddler woman, but merely 'painted her face'.
The Queen also visited Snow White three times, each time in a different disguise and with a different object; first, she came with a corset, which she used to draw the breath from Snow White (the dwarfs arrive in time to remove the corset); second, she came with a poisoned comb, which she put in Snow White's hair (the dwarfs simply remove it); finally, she came with the poisoned apple, the effects of which the dwarfs were unable to undo. However, as noted in the Deleted Scenes section above, they were considered to be implemented, but were removed due to time constraints.
Snow White was not cured in the original story by being kissed; the Prince was amazed at her beauty and had her carried in the glass coffin to his castle; on the way, she was knocked, and the piece of poisoned apple fell out of her mouth.
In the fairy tale, the Queen was killed much later, at the wedding of Snow White; she was forced to wear red hot iron shoes, in which she danced until she fell down dead.ç
In the fairy tale The Queen was returning back to the castle to reveal her herself and she asked the magic mirror the same questoin as usual. He says she is the most fairest of all. And she finally can sleep well.
Critical response
The Queen is considered one of the greatest movie villains of all time and, along with Cruella De Vil, Maleficent and Ursula is one of Disney's most popular villains, regularly appearing in polls; she was nominated for a place in 'AFI’s 50 Greatest Villains list' (along with Stromboli, Man, Lady Tremaine, Maleficent, Cruella De Vil and Ursula; the Disney Villains to make the final list were the Queen (10), Man (20), and Cruella De Vil (39) and was ranked fourth in fan site Ultimate Disney's countdown of the most popular Disney Villains. The Witch was voted to seventh place in an official poll for favourite animated Disney Villains (behind Cruella De Vil, Maleficent, Ursula, Captain Hook, Scar and Jafar). The Queen was also ranked as the greatest Disney Villain in the tongue-in-cheek Disney Villains: The Top Secret Files (which includes a photo of her in her 'first modelling job', and a list of foods she contemplates poisoning). The Queen is also one of Terry Gilliam's favorite villains. However, Gilliam noted that her transformation into ugliness in order supposedly to become the fairest of all was "a truly strange thing". Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston considered the Queen to be one of Disney's greatest villains, citing, as reasons for the good villain-victim relationship, in particular the fact that her motivations were clear, that she had no redeeming qualities, and that Snow White was childlike in her belief that she was safe. The Queen's menace and intensity was considered too frightening for young audiences by some parental group, and the scene in which she transforms into the Witch was initially cut from the UK release. It was voted number 80 in Channel 4's 100 Greatest Scary Moments. Thomas and Johnston felt that Disney restrained his animators from creating such a terrifying villain again.
Al Hirschfeld criticized the design of the Queen, The Prince and Snow White as "badly drawn attempts at realism... Disney's treatment of these characters belongs in the oopsy-woopsy school of art practiced mostly by etchers who portray dogs with cute sayings." Similarly, Michael Barrie considers the Queen "cold and unappealing... even closer to live action than Snow White herself." However, Robin Allan considers her to succeed better than any live action equivalent could because "her character and movement have been distilled until she is the epitome of evil... in animation, nothing that we see is not intended." Barrier praises the Witch as "a striking character", but in an "ultimately false manner."
The sequence in which the Vultures watch the Witch fall to her death, then fly down to her body, impressed Sylvia Moberly-Holland enough to inspire her to apply as an Inspirational Sketch Artist at the Disney studio. The Queen provided the inspiration for many villains that followed, particularly M.G.M.'s Wicked Witch of the West and Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty. Critics have also noted similarities between the Witch and the cackling, hooded Emperor Palpatine/Darth Sidious, the ultimate villain of the Star Wars saga.
Trivia
In the original story, the Queen's comeuppance is much, much scarier. In the movie, she simply fell from the cliff to her death. In the original story, after The Prince knows that The Queen is the one that gave Snow White the poison, he and the others capture the Queen for punishment. At the time of her punishment, a pair of heated iron shoes are brought, and "she was forced to dance on those heated shoes, in front of Snow White, until she dropped dead."
In the Japanese version of Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, the Queen uses her own darkness to control the Magic Mirror and force it to battle Terra. In the English version, however, she simply smashes a potion on the Mirror to make it obey.
In the English version of Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep, the Queen is voiced by Susanne Blakeslee, who also voiced Maleficent, Flora and Lady Tremaine in the same game. Her iconic scene with the Magic Mirror is near-faithfully recreated in the English version, save for changing her term to refer to the mirror from the original film's "slave" to "spirit".
She, along with other Disney villains, helped inspire Queen Narissa from Enchanted. It is interesting to note Queen Narissa sends Giselle to the "real world" so she won't have a happy ending. Queen Regina, who is also based off the Queen, does this as well, but not just to one person to a whole kingdom.
The Queen is similar to Judge Claude Frollo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame,in the sense that the two chose to raise their respective foes in towers: Frollo's being a belltower and The Queen's being a castle.
The Queen is the first green-eyed villain of an official Disney Princess. The second is Lady Tremaine from Cinderella.
The queen is ranked number 10 on the AFI's 100 Years, 100 Heroes and Villains, being the highest ranked animated villain on the list, in front of Man (Bambi) at number 20 and Cruella De Vil (101 Dalmatians) at number 39.
The Queen never interacted with Snow White in the film on-screen. She only interacted with her in her witch form. In the original story and even in alternate versions of Snow White, however, she does indeed interact with her stepmother.
The Queen is the first Disney villain to change her appearance in order to deceive the protagonist, and gain the upper hand.
The Queen is one of the very few Disney villains to break the fourth wall literally as she while as a Witch speaks directly to the audience. She also briefly after learning Snow White is fairer than her looks at the audience.
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