Dissenters and Witches

I. Bifurcated view of women

  • Images of the witch and the “saint”
    • Both had extraordinary powers
  • Due to the special nature of the female body
    • Wet, “spongy,” open
  •  Women seen as more open to the Spirit, but also more vulnerable to evil influence
    • Dissenting views; fanaticism; Satan’s lure

II. Reformation

  • Established a separate Church of England, the Anglican Church (1530s)
    • King rather than the pope head of the Anglican Church
  •  “Priesthood of all believers”
    • Banned many rituals, veneration of saints
  •  Elevated spiritual status of marriage
    • Monasteries/nunneries eliminated

III. Impact on women

  • No more convents
    • No longer any institution where women could live independently of men; pursue celibate life
  • Status of average housewife improved
    • The competent household manager won praise for her piety
      • Example: Anne Bradstreet’s eulogy for her mother, Dorothy Dudley
  • Radical implications of the “priesthood of all believers”
    • One of the only means women had to challenge male authority

IV. Religion in New England

  • New England colonists believed the Reformation remained incomplete
  • Separatists (Pilgrims) v. non-separatists
    • (Puritans were non-separatists)
  • “Great Migration”
    • 1630-42: 20,000-30,000 people
    • More rigorous criteria for church membership
    • Members had to be examined; take a covenant; demonstrate that they had been “justified”
    • Emphasis on predestination

V. Role of Puritan women in the Church

  • Men held all positions of leadership
  • But women could become “saints”
    • Could not vote or speak
      • Apostle Paul: Women should not “teach, nor usurp authority over the man”
    •  Women subjected to private oral examination, not public testimony
  • And majority of members were women

VI. What drew women to the Church?

  • Only institution they could join
  • Informal power
  • Religious values could appeal to the weak and powerless
  • Allowed women to cultivate their intellects
    • Puritan emphasis on literacy

VII. Women and dissent

  • Women viewed as more subject to heresy
  • Women may indeed have been more likely to embrace heretical beliefs
  • Women heretics dealt with just as harshly as men

VIII. Antinomian Controversy, 1637-38

  • “Antinomian”
    • anti = “against”; nomos = “authority”
  • Anne Hutchinson
    • Arrived in MA Bay in 1634
    • Embodied the ideal of the colonial goodwife
      • Ultimately bore 15 children; midwife
      • Joined First Church of Boston in 1636
    • Held gatherings in her home
      • Preached in favor of a “covenant of grace”; against a “covenant of works”
      • Began openly questioning church leaders
  • Gov. John Winthrop denounced her:
    • “a nimble wit and active spirit, and a very voluble tongue, more bold than a man”
    • 1636-38: Hutchinson brought before the court
    • Elders: “disorderly” for a woman to expound “in a prophetical way”
      • Gov. Winthrop: “We do not mean to discourse with one of your sex”
      • Rev. Hugh Peters: “you have rather bine a Husband than a Wife and a preacher than a Hearer, and a Magistrate than a subject”
  • Hutchinson’s defiant defense
    • Drew on vast knowledge of the Bible
      • Titus: “Elder women should instruct the younger”
        • Insisted on her right to interpret Biblical passages; God spoke to her directly
      •  Directly challenged Winthrop’s authority
      • In 1638, fled to Rhode Island
      • Later moved to present-day NYC
      • 1643: Killed by Indians

IX. Quakers

  • First came to America in the 1650s
    • PA, NJ
  • Extremely egalitarian
  • Salvation universally promised
  • “Inner light”
  • No professional ministry
  • Women encourage to prophesize
  • 1681: instituted the women’s meeting
  • Impact on women’s rights movement

X. Witchcraft in the colonies

  • Pervasive belief in the reality of witchcraft
    • Including elites
      • Cotton Mather, “Memorable Providences” 1689
  • Between 1620-1725
    • 355 people accused of witchcraft; 79% women
    • Of 103 convicted, 87% were women
  • Aside from Salem, 120 trials
    • Additional 30 slander cases
  •  Most in New England; trials were held in all New England colonies
    • Often did not result in conviction
  •  Gossip and suspicion
  • Most towns had 1-2 suspected witches
  • Background:
    • British Parliament made a capital crime in 1542
    • Serious outbreak (1645-47)
      • Hundreds killed (90% women)

XI. Beliefs about witchcraft

  • Supernatural use of power for evil purposes
  • Covenanted with the Devil
    • “black book”
  • Initiated into the craft by other witches
  • Worked on two levels: the material and the spiritual
  • Interfered in the natural order
  • Sexually aggressive
  • Familiars
  • Could turn themselves into animals

XII. Who was accused?

  • Eccentric/difficult people
  • Mid-life
  • Most were married
  • Childless women or those who had fewer than the average number of children
  • Generally poor, but not always
  • Overwhelmingly female
    • Accused men often associated with accused women
  • Why women?
    • Pervasive misogyny
      • Belief that women were morally and physically weaker than men (Elizabeth Reis)
    • No other ways of targeting women for retribution (Mary Beth Norton, In the Devil’s Snare)

XIII. Salem (Essex County)

  • Unfolded between March and October 1692
  • 144 formally charged (75% women)
  • 20 people executed (14 women, 6 men)
  • 54 people confessed
    • All ended up surviving
  • Unprecedented in the colonial experience
    • Prior accusations had generally involved just one or a small number of accused
    • Most cases did not result in execution
  • Salem/Essex County witchcraft trials were the most dramatic instance of women having an impact on the public sphere during the colonial era
  • Great case for studying problem of historical interpretation

XIV. Key fact about Salem

  • Accusers primarily young women
    • More typically men in their 30s-40s
  • Accused mostly middle-aged women
    • Many did not fit the typical profile of a witch
  • Accusers mostly from Salem Village
    • Associated with traditional rural way of life
  • Accused mostly from Salem Town
    • More associated with emerging world of commerce

XV. What happened?

  • Young girls suffering odd symptoms
    • Physicians suggests supernatural cause
  • First women accused
    • Tituba (Indian slave)
    • Sarah Good (homeless beggar)
    • Sarah Osborn (widely disliked, had not been to church for a year)
  • Examination at the meeting house
    • Tituba’s confession (later recanted)
  • Trials begin
    • First execution: Bridget Bishop
    • Accused who do not fit the stereotype
      • Rebecca Nurse; Rev. George Burroughs; Lady Mary Phips (governor’s wife!)
    • Governor forbade further trials in October
      • Instituted stricter evidentiary guidelines

XVI. Historical interpretations

  • Multiple, competing explanations
    • Community under stress
    • Men leaving for frontier; young women facing uncertain futures
    • Tensions between Salem Village and Salem Town (Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum, Salem Possessed, 1974)
      • People had been split into 2 camps for 20 years or so; traditional way of life v. commercial way of life
    • Impact of the Indian Wars (Mary Beth Norton)
    • Carol Karlsen, Devil in the Shape of a Woman
      • Accused were women who stood to inherit
      • “Demographic accidents”
      • Afflicted were acting out a kind of protest against their powerlessness
        • Most had lost one or both parent
        • Many lived and worked in households without a male head
        • Unclear when or if their status would change
      • Dramatic role reversal
        • Most powerless members of the community had people hanging on their every word

XVII. Significance

  • Cannot be interpreted as simply patriarchal persecution of women
    • Accusers were mostly girls
    • Revealed intergenerational tensions within the female community
  • Ultimately reinforced view of women as a destabilizing influence