Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
The myth of the witch had a strong cultural presence in 17th century New England and, as in Europe, witchcraft was strongly associated with devil-worship. [3] About eighty people were accused of practicing witchcraft in a witch-hunt that lasted throughout New England from 1647 to 1663. Thirteen women and two men were executed. [4]
Connecticut was “much harsher” in its treatment of accused witches than Massachusetts, according to one historian. Colonists accused of being witches were executed 300 years ago. They may be ...
A year later, in the guildhall at Newcastle's Quayside, the 31 trials of the accused took place. [3] Following these trials, 16 were found guilty and hanged on 21 August 1650 alongside criminals convicted of other crimes.
Hanging of Hibbins on Boston Common, June 19, 1656. Sketch by F.T. Merril, 1886. Ann Hibbins (also spelled Hibbons or Hibbens) was a woman executed for witchcraft in Boston, Massachusetts Bay Colony, on June 19, 1656. Her death by hanging was the third for witchcraft in Boston and predated the Salem witch trials of 1692.
Throughout the medieval era, mainstream Christian doctrine had denied the belief in the existence of witches and witchcraft, condemning it as a pagan superstition. [14] Some have argued that the work of the Dominican Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century helped lay the groundwork for a shift in Christian doctrine, by which certain Christian theologians eventually began to accept the possibility ...
This was a period of intense witch hunts, known for witch hunters such as Matthew Hopkins. In the 16th and 17th centuries people across England, irrespective of status, believed in witches. Witchcraft was first made a capital offence in 1542 under a statute of Henry VIII but was repealed five years later.
In the years since the witch trials, the unfairly-accused have been exonerated and, in 1957, Massachusetts issued a formal apology for the trials, stating that the proceedings were "shocking" and ...
Witches of Scotland was a campaign for legal pardons and historic justice for the people, primarily women, convicted of witchcraft and executed in Scotland between 1563 and 1736. A formal apology was made on 8 March 2022. The aim was also to establish a national memorial for the convicted from the Scottish parliament. [1]