After completely finishing writing my investigation on Wednesday night, I have since been re-reading it and compiling my bibliography. The draft that I had handed in to Mrs Russo on Wednesday during the day was returned to me on the Thursday, and I have mentioned all of the points that she raised in my final copy. As most of my resources contradicted one another, it was difficult to come to a conclusion and also to annotate a bibliography based on them, as their reliability is uncertain. However, I have finished everything and I am relieved! I just have to make sure there is plenty of ink and paper to print it all out!

Over the past week I have been collecting my last few bits of information for my investigation on the Salem Witch Trials. While I was in the middle of researching for my religion assignment, I came across some facts on Salem and Puritans, so I added them to my notes. Once I had gathered all of my notes and sorted them into paragraphs, I began writing the report. I am having some issues with my focus question, 'How do the Salem Witch Trials help us to understand the Massachusetts society at the time?' because I don't want my report to sound like a narrative, and I need to make strong points. There is a lot that I want to include, like the reasons for establishing the colony, daily life, the impact of religion and the trials but I'm unsure at the moment of how to approach it without focusing entirely on the story. Over the next few days, I want to have completely finished my investigation!

After watching part of an episode of the television show 'Lie To Me' which focused on the concept of ergot poisoning and the Salem Witch Trials, I began to look further into the initial causes of the hysteria in colonial Massachusetts. The ingestion of a fungus which is often found in rye as well as other cereals, can have convulsive symptoms such as those experienced by the girls in Salem. Therefore, the symptoms of ergotism are believed to mirror those of 'bewitchment'.

Today Ashley, Amy and I went to the State library to do some research for our Historical Investigation. Fortunately, this library had several books on the Salem Witch Trials, and so I spent a few hours taking more detailed notes on areas such as the narrative, the different colonies at the time, the two categories of witchcraft, the Puritan beliefs, the differences between Salem Village and Salem Town and the roles and expectations of women in colonial Massachusetts. Although I did not get to look through all of the books that I requested, they have been kept on hold so that I can hopefully go back sometime before school begins again to finish off more of my research.


http://www.mesharpe.com/mall/resultsa.asp?Title=America+in+World+History%3A+America+as+World+Frontier+(First+Encounters+to+1776)%3B+America+in+the+Age+of+Nation+Building+(1776+to+1898)%3B+Rise+to+Global+Power+(1898+to+1965)%3B+Challenges+of+Globalization+(1965+to+the+Present)

I found this book extremely helpful ^^

Over the last two days I have been looking into Pilgrims, their arrival on the Mayflower and other ships to Cape Cod, and the Massachusetts Bay Colony. These people had strong religious beliefs which shaped their society. Throughout my research, I found it interesting to learn that the people who were accused of witchcraft were not all of a particular social class or ranking within society, but from a range of areas.

I have written more notes from the World Book Encyclopedia (which has been extremely helpful!) in order to get some background information on my topic, and I have used the internet, but I desperately need to find more book sources! These holidays I think I need to visit the library in the city to see if they have any useful resources there, because unfortunately the school does not really have many books on my topic.

Over this past week, I have been doing some more research on the Salem Witch Trials and Puritan beliefs in colonial Massachusetts. The library at school does not have any books on the area that I am focusing on, and I was hoping to go to the library at Hurstville yesterday, but after falling down the stairs and hurting my shoulder, I decided that I would go another day. I am really struggling to find book sources, although we do own the Arthur Miller play, "The Crucible" which I thought would be interesting to read even though it is not entirely factual. Hopefully I will find some book sources soon and begin to develop some draft paragraphs for my essay!

During today's history lesson, I wrote out some more notes from the 'World Book Encyclopedia' on the Salem Witch Hunt. I found the book to be really helpful in terms of gaining a summary of the events that occurred, however I have been struggling to find websites which are useful and end in 'edu' or 'org'. Hopefully I will be able to find some more books on the daily life of the people of Salem in the library tomorrow!

Salem Witch Hunt

Map of Salem Village



My first blog post!

For my historical investigation, I have decided to research the Salem Witch Trials, which occurred in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. At the time, Salem was an immensely religious community who lived simple lives, and the witch hunt initially began as a result of the accusations of a group of girls who had been suffering from 'fits' and believed that they were bewitched. Since the people of Salem were largely superstitious, these girls were sent to source out those that were practising witchcraft. Over 200 people were thought to be witches, and nineteen of the accused were hanged.

Yesterday, Mrs Russo suggested that I make my focus question: "How do the Salem Witch Trials help us to understand the Massachusetts society at that time?"

During today's lesson, I researched and wrote notes on my topic from 'The World Book Encyclopedia'.

*Fact*: 552 original documents pertaining to the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been preserved and are still stored by the Peabody Essex Museum.