This new interpretation of the New England Witch Trials offers an innovative, well-grounded explanation of witchcraft's link to organic illness. While most historians have concentrated on the accused, Laurie Winn Carlson focuses on the afflicted. Systematically comparing the symptoms recorded in colonial diaries and court records to those of the encephalitis epidemic in the early twentieth century, she argues convincingly that the victims suffered from the same disease. A unique blend of historical epidemiology and sociology. -Katrina L. Kelner, Science. Meticulously researched...the author marshalls her arguments with clarity and persuasive force. -New Yorker

By Laurie Winn Carlson

Part 1 Preface xiii
Part 2 The Witch Craze in Seventeenth-century New England 3
Part 3 The Afflicted 9
Part 4 The Response 38
Part 5 Mental Illness and the Persecution of Witches 61
Part 6 The Forgotten Epidemic 76
Part 7 What Happened at Salem? 114
Part 8 Alternative Outcomes 147
Part 9 Could Encephalitis Lethargica Return? 157
Part 10 Afterword: Satanic Possession and Christian Beliefs 157
Part 11 Chronology 159
Part 12 Statistical Appendix 167
Part 13 Notes 171
Part 14 Bibliography 183
Part 15 Index 189