Salem Witch Trials: The Fungus Theory Witch or Psychedelic Trip?
نویسنده
چکیده
During the winter of 1692 eight girls came down with a mysterious and terrifying illness in the colonial town of Salem, Massachusetts. They vomited, screamed incomprehensibly, claimed to see things that weren’t there, felt the crawling and pricking of invisible needles against their skin, and convulsed and contorted into impossible positions. Physicians were called to examine the girls, but they couldn’t find any medical cause for the alarming symptoms. Neighbors began to suspect that the girls were bewitched. As unease spread the girls began to accuse other townspeople of witchcraft, identifying them as their tormenters. What followed were the Salem Witch Trials and a period of paranoia and violence. When the trials abruptly ended several months’ later twenty men and women had been executed for the crime of witchcraft. The Witch Trials have become engrained in the American psyche as a near-mythical cautionary tale about the dangers of panic and hasty reaction. But what really happened in Salem nearly 400 years ago?
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