You were not wrong to think you'd survive. That was the trap.
“I don't editorialize. I compile. Every trap in this instance is filed below, with the paperwork attached — because unlike the court that ran this simulation the first time, I don't ask you to take anything on faith.”— Orphea, Archive Administrator
Between February 1692 and May 1693, roughly 200 people across Massachusetts Bay were formally accused of witchcraft. Nineteen were hanged. One was crushed to death under stones for refusing to enter a plea. At least five more died in jail — some still waiting for a trial, one of them six weeks after a jury had cleared her. Twelve of the mechanisms behind those numbers are filed below, with sources.
“I saw your ghost strangle me in my sleep.” Try building a defense against that.
No lawyer, no right to silence, and a clerk writing down every word you said.
There was no version of this test you could pass.
Nineteen people told the truth. All nineteen hanged.
“She’s obviously faking it” was the last logical thing some people ever said.
Naming an animal as a witch's accomplice was standard practice. It didn't end with the animal.
Rebecca Nurse had 39 signatures testifying to her character. She was hanged anyway.
One scientist’s theory: the accused and their accusers may have shared a fungus.
A guilty verdict could turn your farm into the county’s farm.
A jury cleared Lydia Dustin in January 1693. She died in her cell that March, still unable to pay for the months she had already served.
Giles Corey’s last words were an instruction to his executioners: “More weight.”
The court would wait for the baby. It would not spare the mother.