San Antonio College Library

It began in 1692, over an exceptionally raw Massachusetts winter, when a minister's daughter began to scream and convulse. It ended less than a year later, but not before 19 men and women had been hanged and an elderly man crushed to death. The panic spread quickly, involving the most educated men and prominent politicians in the colony. Neighbors accused neighbors, parents and children each other. Aside from suffrage, the Salem Witch Trials represent...

More than 300 years after the Salem witch trials led to the deaths of 19 innocent people, behavioral psychologist Linnda Caporael has been searching for a rational explanation for the symptoms of bewitchment. Her work has sparked an investigation into wrenching convulsions, vivid deliriums, contaminated crops, hallucinogenic drugs, and a murder victim buried in a bog for 2,300 years. Was bread tainted with toxic fungus the real cause of the symptoms...