Witchcraft in early North America Cover Image

Book

Witchcraft in early North America / Alison Games.

Games, Alison, 1963- (Author).

Summary:

Witchcraft in Early North America investigates European, African, and Indian witchcraft beliefs and their expression in colonial America. Alison Games's engaging book takes us beyond the infamous outbreak at Salem, Massachusetts, to look at how witchcraft was a central feature of colonial societies in North America. Her substantial and lively introduction orients readers to the subject and to the rich selection of documents that follows. The documents begin with first encounters between European missionaries and Native Americans in New France and New Spain, and they conclude with witch hunts among Native Americans in the years of the early American republic. The documents--some of which have never been published previously--include excerpts from trials in Virginia, New Mexico, and Massachusetts; accounts of outbreaks in Salem, Abiquiu (New Mexico), and among the Delaware Indians; descriptions of possession; legal codes; and allegations of poisoning by slaves. The documents raise issues central to legal, cultural, social, religious, and gender history.

Record details

ISBN: 9781442203570 (cloth : alk. paper)
ISBN: 1442203579
Physical Description: xiv, 217 p. : ill., map ; 24 cm.
Publisher: Lanham, Md. : Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, c2010.

Content descriptions

Bibliography, etc. Note:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Formatted Contents Note:

Section I. Witchcraft in early North America : an introduction -- Beliefs : Europeans -- Beliefs : west and west-central Africans -- Beliefs : Native Americans -- Colonization, witchcraft, and resistance -- New Mexico -- New France -- British North America -- Africans and their descendants in North America -- Outbreaks : putting Salem in context -- Confession -- Possession -- Prophets and witch hunts in the new United States -- Skepticism -- Notes -- Section II. Primary documents -- First impressions -- Fray Benavides sees wizards, sorcerers, and the demon in New Mexico, 1625-1627 -- Making sense of sickness in Huron Country, 1636-1637 : who's a witch? -- The execution of Isaac Jogues, 1646 -- Resistance and the Devil -- Andrš Přez de Ribas explains the origins of Tepehuan Revolt, 1616 -- Witchcraft, sorcery, and the Pueblo Revolt, 1680-1681 -- English witch beliefs cross the Atlantic -- The English Act against Conjuration, 1604 -- The law of the Colony of Connecticut, 1642 -- The case of Goodwife Wright, Virginia, 1626 -- The execution of Mary Lee en route to Maryland, 1654 -- The case of Grace Sherwood, Virginia, 1706 -- Governor Kaine Pardons Grace Sherwood, 2006 -- New worlds -- A case of witchcraft in New Mexico, 1708 -- Willem Bosman explains ritual use of poison in Guinea, 1704 -- South Carolina strengthens laws against poisoning and slave doctors, 1740, 1751 -- Items about poisoning from the South Carolina gazette, 1749, 1769 -- Poison at Monticello, 1800 -- Two cases of possession -- The possession of Elizabeth Knapp, Massachusetts, 1671-1672 -- Possession at Abiquiu, New Mexico, 1763-1764 -- Outbreaks -- The examinations of Tituba and Sarah Good, Salem, March 1, 1692 -- Nathaniel Cary's account of his wife's examination, May 1692 -- The examination of Candy, July 4, 1692 -- The petition of John Proctor, July 23, 1692 -- The examination of Mary Toothaker, July 30, 1692 -- The examinations of Abigail Faulkner, August 1692 -- Thomas Brattle's skepticism, 1692 -- Ann Putnam's confession, 1706 -- The code of Handsome Lake -- The code of the Shawnee prophet, circa 1812 -- The witch hunt at the White River Mission, 1806.