Watch Out for Witches

by Joanna C.


On March 1st, 1692 the Salem Witch Trials began. The people of Salem started accusing other people of being witches. Watch out for witches.

    There have been witch-hunts in Europe since the Middle Ages. Witches were at first not known as bad. Witches were an important part of the community that studied herbs and understood how the seasons changed. When more people studied Christianity, people thought of witches differently. People decided that witches worked with the Devil.

    The idea of witches has been perceived many different ways. Witches were known as old women who were outcasts of the community and were poor. Witches were supposed to have warts or other marks known as the Devil’s mark. Witches would wear black and have caldrons. They were also seen with black cats.

Witches worked at night to make plans to plot against good citizens. Some people accused witches of trying to act like men by using pointy objects like brooms and witches flew on brooms. The idea of flight was scary because it was foreign and magic. A lot of the woman that were accused of being witches were very independent. People had a lot of different ideas of what witches did, looked liked, and acted like.

    Whenever people drew a picture of witches, they drew them as old and ugly woman. The drawings show the witches dressed in black because black symbolizes evil. The drawings usually have red or orange backgrounds, which represent the fire in hell. The drawings of witches are supposed to show how unpleasant witches are.

    There are a lot of ways to find out if someone you know is a witch. One method is to ask the person to recite their favorite verse from the Bible. The devil cannot recite holy words form the Bible and only the innocent can. If the person can recite from the Bile they are not a witch. If they slip on a word, make a mistake, or anything that is not exactly right, this means they are a witch.

Also, there were puppets or baby dolls that were made of rags and stuffed with goat hair. Everyone in Salem knew that these items were used by witches so they could hurt people from a distance. It is believed that if one of these puppets were in the hands of a witch, it would make the sick girls suffer. If you found one of these puppets in someone else’s house you could tell the person was a witch.

    There is a cake called a witch cake, which was made of rye meal and urine from one of the girls that was sick. If the person was a witch the dog would have the same symptoms of the girls that were sick. The witch cake had not revealed any witches yet.

The devil also makes black marks on the witches. These witches marks could be warts, moles, or birthmarks. Look out for these marks.

    There is another way to find out if someone is a witch. It is called the float test. The accused person would be tied up and thrown into a body of water. When the person floated it means that the person is not pure and that the water rejected them and they were a witch. When the person went under the water it meant that they were pure and they were not witches. Sometimes the innocent people drowned during the float test, but since they went under the water and were pure they still went to heaven.

    If someone looks, acts, or does any of these things, try some of these methods. Sometimes people don’t seem like witches, but they are. Be very careful and watch out for witches.

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