Blog 1: Pointy Hats and Moldy Bread?
One of the first few topics in my quest for truth is the hysteria surrounding alleged witchcraft in Salem Village, Massachusetts, in 1692. After reviewing the YouTube video and History.com article provided for class, I began to wonder: how could this falsified narrative, created by teenage girls, become the fuel for a series of trials that led to the wrongful death of nineteen people in Salem?
Our class discussions first challenged my commonly held beliefs about witchcraft when I realized that the insights shared by one of my peers were indeed accurate. I was surprised to learn, after reading this Vice article, that a common feature of the witch’s uniform, perpetuated in the media—a pointy, black hat—originated from beer sellers in the marketplaces of the time. The “alewives” were women who brewed beer at home as part of their domestic duties.
I found this interesting because, more commonly, beer production (and consumption) today is accredited to and associated with men. Alewives were entrepreneurs, taking to the marketplace to sell their homemade ale with tall hats, one of the world’s first wearable advertisements, to attract customers. Unfortunately, their hats were later associated with malice, poison, and witchcraft because of the female ale sellers’ all-too-intimidating knowledge of herbal medicines and concoctions.
This concept that “intimidating” women could (and would often) be accused of malicious behavior simply because they began to make their own money and stand up for themselves reminds me of the “angry woman” stereotype perpetuated today. I think the alewives’ marketing strategy should begin anew: all female entrepreneurs should wear pointy black hats and boots to show men that they cannot police what we do, how much we know, or the money we make.
Another topic of discussion from this past week that intrigued me was: how were the teenage girls in Salem “bewitched”? What caused this to happen?
In my research, I found an article on History.com that offered one common explanation given by historians to explain the girls’ sickness: food poisoning. A condition called convulsive ergotism, which is a poisoning caused by ergot (Claviceps purpurea), a fungus that grows on staple grains like rye, could have affected these girls.
One interesting fact about ergot? In 1938, Albert Hoffman, a chemist, synthesized lysergic acid, commonly known as LSD, from one of the many psychoactive alkaloids in ergot. So, in a sense, the teenage girls who accused the members of their town of being witches were high on LSD’s great-grandma.
Ultimately, this week I learned that even widely disseminated, commonly held beliefs can be untrue. We should not assign blame before all of the facts are ascertained. After reading about the unjust murders, imprisonments, and religiously-affiliated fear- and guilt-mongering which occurred in Salem in 1692, I am inclined to call these events a tragedy instead of a series of trials.
Researching the Salem Witch Trials reminded me that history is not always as it seems. What I once thought was a simple design choice by whoever created witches for Halloween is actually rooted in the history of female alewives and their branding methods. The “intimidating, angry woman” stereotype has existed far longer than I expected and continues to be perpetuated today. And, what on the outside seems to be a case of mass hysteria in a small town in Massachusetts was actually caused by a psychophysiological experience attributed to poisonous mold growing on their crops.
If history continues to repeat itself, we may soon have a modern Salem on our hands. I’m just saying: if somewhere, some day, some county judge begins listening to intoxicated foil-hat-wearing alien fanatics and executes alleged martians for using parchment paper instead of aluminum foil on their baking trays, I warned you. And if there’s anything I’ve learned from Salem, it’s that teenage girls on LSD can seldom be believed (at least until they come down from their high).
References
https://www.history.com/articles/salem-witch-trials
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Sv93yRPQSs
https://www.vice.com/en/article/witches-hats-alewife-brewster-history/
https://www.history.com/articles/salem-witch-trials-accusers
https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/ethnobotany/Mind_and_Spirit/ergot.shtml
Such a great, insightful post, thanks. I love your idea of entrepreneurial women wearing black, pointy hats. That would be great to see. And you are right about the alewives seizing every opportunity they had to make something for themselves and their families. They had so few opportunities for self agency. Ergotism seems like it's a valid explanation. But no. Two things stand out. First, only the afflicted girls had symptoms that could be ascribed to ergotism, and no one else in Salem. Second, the girls only had symptoms when one of the accused was around them especially in court. It was as if they could turn the symptoms on and off. I think Betty and Abigail were not faking, though, at least not in the beginning. They were terrified, most probably by Samuel Parris's sermons on hellfire and damnation, and perhaps as well by Tituba's stories of Voodoo. I am grateful for your thoughtful, insightful comments.
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