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Abigail Williams | |
|---|---|
| Born | c. 1681 |
| Died | Unknown[1] |
| Known for | First accuser in theSalem witch trials |
| Relatives |
|
Abigail Williams (bornc. 1681, date of death unknown)[2] was an 11 or 12-year-old girl who, along with nine-year-oldBetty Parris, was among the first of the children to accuse their neighbors ofwitchcraft in 1692; these accusations eventually led to theSalem witch trials.
In early 1692, Abigail Williams was living with her relative, Betty Parris's father, the village pastorSamuel Parris, along with his two slavesTituba andJohn Indian.
Tituba was part of a group of three women — withSarah Good andSarah Osborne — who were the first to be arrested, on February 29, 1692, under the accusation that their specters (ghosts) were afflicting the young girls in Parris' household. The three women were questioned separately but were aware of each other and, in a classicprisoner's dilemma, they were turned against each other. Sarah Good was the first interrogated and held to her innocence.Judge John Hathorne directed all "the children ... to look upon her and see if this were the person that hurt them ... and they all did look upon her" and claimed her specter tormented them. "Sarah Good ... why do you thus torment these poor children?" Hathorne asked. "What do I know, you bring others here and now you charge me with it," Sarah Good responded. Next Hathorne interrogated Sarah Osbourne, who claimed not to know Sarah Good or her full name. But Hathorne told her, "Sarah Good said that it was you that hurt the children." According to the transcript, this distorts what Sarah Good had said, as she had only vaguely referred to the others without naming them, in a way that was only intended to deflect blame from herself.[3] Tituba was interrogated last and was the only of the three women to offer a full and elaborate confession against herself and pointing the finger of blame at the other two women: "Sarah Good and Osbourne would have me hurt the children."[4][5]
According to an investigation byRobert Calef that began soon after the trials, Tituba later recanted her confession as forced and claimed abuse from the slaveowner Parris:
"The account she [Tituba] since gives of it is that her master [Parris] did beat her and otherwise abuse her, to make her confess and accuse, such as he [Parris] called her 'sister-witches' and that whatever she said by way of confessing or accusing others, was the effect of such usage."[6]
Further accusations against many others emerged from the Parris household (and others) and eventually led to the imprisonment of hundreds and the deaths of more than 20 in 1692. Sarah Osborne died in prison in May and Sarah Good was executed on July 19 along with four other women. Members of Parris household all managed to survive the entire episode including Tituba, who was released from jail a year later, when the slaveowner Parris paid her prison fees and sold her.[7]
After the Salem witch trials, Williams disappeared from records circa 1696.[8] Her fate is unknown.[1]
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InArthur Miller's 1953 play,The Crucible, a fictionalized story of the Salem witch trials, Abigail Williams is the name of a character whose age in the play is raised a full five or six years, to age 17, and she is motivated by a desire to be in a relationship withJohn Proctor, a married farmer with whom she had previously had an affair. In the historical record, there is no evidence of John Proctor and Abigail Williams ever meeting before the trials had started. She was portrayed byMadeleine Sherwood in the original Broadway production and byWinona Ryder in the1996 film adaptation of the play. Other actresses who have played the role includeTuesday Weld andSaoirse Ronan.
The play was also adapted into anopera in 1961 by composerRobert Ward, an adaptation that won aPulitzer Prize for Music; Abigail is one of the prominent soprano parts.
InJohn Neal's 1828 novelRachel Dyer, Abigail Williams appears as the character Bridget Pope.[9] Neal links the origin of the witch hysteria to her sexual development, and her bewitched behavior stems from sexual frustration that is calmed too late when she is reunited with her love interest, Robert Eveleth, after the trials have already begun.[10]
Abigail Williams is an Americanblack metal band formed in 2004.
Abigail Williams appears in the 2010 filmThe Sorcerer's Apprentice as a minor antagonist.
The 2013 play,Wonders of the Invisible World (originally titledA Discourse on the Wonders of the Invisible World) byLiz Duffy Adams tells the fictional story of Abigail William's return to New England ten years after the witch trials.[11]
Abigail is revealed as the antagonist of the 2014 video gameMurdered: Soul Suspect. In the story, flashbacks reveal that she was hanged for her part in the witch trials. Over the centuries, she has existed as a ghost, using her supernatural powers to kill those she believes are witches. In the game's climax, she is seized by demons and dragged to Hell.
Fate/Grand Order, a 2015 online free-to-playrole-playingmobile game, has a character under the "Foreigner" class based on both Abigail Williams andYog-Sothoth. She plays a central role in the plot of the last Pseudo-Singularity chapter, Salem, which takes place during an alternate version of the Salem witch trials.
The 2020 video gameLittle Hope includes a spin-off of Abigail's history and the Salem witch trials as one of the three timelines.[12][13]
Abigail is the central character in the playAbigail/1702: A Twice Told Tale, byRoberto Aguirre-Sacasa. Its mainstage world premiere was at theCincinnati Playhouse in the Park on January 24, 2013.[14]
In 1976,Linnda R. Caporael[15][16] put forward the hypothesis thatergot-tainted rye may have been the source of accusations ofbewitchment that spurred theSalem witch trials. Notably, ergot caused plague in the middle ages. Its poisoning was known then as "St. Anthony's Fire" or "Holy Fire"[17]. Caporael argued that many of its convulsive symptoms were all symptoms reported in the Salem witchcraft records. This theory has been refuted by both toxicologists and historians of the Salem witch trials, in part because of the difference in the ages of the core group of accusers, which would have been younger, per prior ergotism epidemics, and would have affected males and females roughly equally. The ergotism theory is critiqued for failing to explain the differences in affliction rates between males and females and that no records suggest the allegedly affected experienced all symptoms to ergotism or had long-term health effects. Additionally, most historical outbreaks of ergotism would affect entire families or communities who shared a similar diet.[18] At the severity of supposed symptoms experienced by accusers, the levels of ergot would have been high enough to cause symptoms in adults in the community.[19][better source needed][20][21]
The possible onset of his wife's illness in the winter or spring of 1696 (she died in July) may have influenced Parris. Furthermore, his niece, the afflicted girl Abigail Williams, simply disappears from the records at about this time, and some believe that her death may have had an effect.