15 Other Places Besides Salem, MA That Killed People For Being 'Witches'
Saudi Arabia Has A Long History Of Executing People For 'Sorcery'
Video: YouTube
The execution of Amina bint Abdel Halim Nassar happened in the far off, medieval time of… December, 2011. She was convicted after authorities found “books on sorcery… talismans and glass bottles filled with liquids supposedly used for the purposes of magic.” As far as reasons to find someone guilty of being a witch, that counts as “barely even trying to make up an excuse.” The execution most likely came from reports that she sold spells and bottles for around $400, or possibly because she was a woman in a puritanical monarchy. Under their law, death is the punishment for sorcery, blasphemy and witchcraft. “Sorcery” is a charge the Kingdom uses fairly willy-nilly, as TV host Ali Hussain Sibat was arrested for it in 2008.
A Nepalese Mob Forced A Woman To Eat Her Own Excreta
Photo: Carl Spitzweg / Wikimedia Commons“Forced to eat her own excreta” means exactly what you think it means. Kalli Kumari B.K. was “kicked, punched and hit with a stone” by another member of her Nepalese village who said: “a witch should be killed like this.” That “villager” was her sister, Bimala Lama. This only happened after she was tortured for two days, where they threatened “to chop (her) breasts using blades.” She eventually did “agree that some animals in the village died because she practiced witchcraft upon them,” because, well who wouldn’t agree to something after all that? The villagers even threatened her husband. He was told he'd face the same treatment if he even spoke in support of her.
In Papua New Guinea, Women Suspected Of Witchcraft Are Still Burned Alive
Photo: Andreas Praefcke / Wikimedia CommonsWhen executing a suspected “witch,” people always go over the top. It’s never “we shot the witch in the head”; it's always something like this story of a rural Papua New Guinea woman who was “bound and gagged, tied to a log, and set ablaze on a pile of tires.” The explanation given for many of the executions of these “witches” is that they’re “scapegoats for someone’s unexplained death,” because obviously, the only way to deal with your grief is to light someone on fire atop a bunch of tires. This is shockingly common in Papua New Guinea; over fifty people were killed in 2007 alone for “sorcery.” Many regions of the country still live according to traditional beliefs, which is how some citizens come to blame witches for the AIDS-related deaths of 6.7 million people.
Congolese Children Accused Of Witchcraft Are Thrown Out Of Their Homes
Photo: Edward Frederick Brewtnall / Wikimedia CommonsOf the 25,000 to 50,000 homeless children on the streets of the large city of Kinshasa, roughly a majority were kicked out of their homes because they were accused of witchcraft. That would be enough people to fill a basketball or hockey stadium. These numbers are from 2006, not some distant century. This isn’t just limited to poor kids, either, as “children who do well in school can also be accused of witchcraft.” To make things even worse (which, frankly doesn’t seem like it should be possible) scam artists tied to evangelical churches charge small fees to “investigate the children and confirm they are possessed… keeping them without food for days, beating and torturing them.”
Kenyan Villagers Burn Accused Witches Alive In Their Homes
In 2008, eight women and three men were burned to death on suspicion of being witches in Nairobi. A mob went door-to-door with a list of witches and torched thirty homes. All of the people burned alive inside their houses. According to the local police, "traditional beliefs run deep." West Kenya has a long history with faith healers and witch doctors, which can lead to incidents like this. While many witch hunts focus on younger people, almost all of the victims in Kenya were between 70 and 90 years old.
Suspected Witch In Ghana Burned Alive By Mob
Photo: Bartolomeo Guidobono / Wikimedia CommonsIn Tema, Ghana, in 2010, Madam Ama Hemmah was “detained and tortured for four hours by six people in an attempt to extract confessions of being a witch from her.” They ultimately burned her alive. A photographer, a teacher, an evangelist—these people came from all walks of life to do this horrible deed. Madam Ama Hemmah’s offense? She was seen “begging for alms in the neighborhood the day of the incident.”
A Sick "Test" Involving Hot Oil Determines If You're A Witch In Parts Of Rural India
Photo: Nick Kenrick / FlickrIn 2008, a tribal family from Jaipur, Rajasthan, India accused a woman of witchcraft, claiming she was responsible for two deaths in their family. She was “severely beaten and forced to pick a silver coin from a vessel filled with boiling oil.” One villager explained that this practice is prevalent in the area; the coin and oil is a test to see if the accused is truly a witch. If the accused burns their hands trying to pick up the coin, they're deemed a witch. If they remain unburned, the accused is deemed innocent. Since this "test" is impossible to pass, the woman sustained severe burns on her hands and arms. She fell unconscious, but the villagers didn't stop their torture. They “thrashed her badly with hot iron rods” and caused severe head injuries. They dumped her body outside her house, but her family, including her husband, didn’t let her inside. She was eventually taken to a hospital and police arrested five of the 23 people responsible.
Saudi Arabia Doesn't Even Let You Take A Rigged Witchcraft Test, They Just Fake Your Confession
Photo: marviikad / flickr / CC-BY-NC 2.0In 2008, Fawza Falih, an illiterate Saudi Arabian woman, was forced to sign a confession that she used witchcraft to make one man impotent. Her conviction was "on the basis of the written statements of witnesses who said that she had bewitched them." Falih wasn’t even allowed to attend most of her hearing. She didn't even get her confession read to her. After an appeals court stayed her execution, law courts “imposed the death sentence again, arguing it would be in the public interest."
Over 3,000 People Were Lynched In Tanzania For Witchcraft... In Six Years
Photo: diana_robinson / flickr / CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0From 2005 to 2011, over 3,000 people were lynched in Tanzania for being witches. That’s more than 500 a year. Turns out that many older women were accused of being witches on account of having “red eyes,” which happens when you’re so poor you have to burn cow dung for heat instead of wood. Often, these women are murdered following the death of a relative as “payback.” The families “visit soothsayers to determine the cause of death and are often told that witchcraft is responsible.” Of course. According to a member of an organization that's trying to protect the rights of the local elderly: "You cannot separate witchcraft beliefs from the issue of development. The more developed people are, the less they believe in such things."
Over 100 Children Abused For Being "Witches" In Britain
Video: YouTube
From 2004 to 2014, 148 cases of child abuse were reported to the Metropolitan Police of Greater London on account of the children being “witches.” Parents believed their children were possessed by the devil or other evil spirits, and didn’t know what else to do. Some of these cases have been horrific, such as a child who “had chili peppers rubbed in her eyes to beat the devil out of her.” What makes it especially scary is that, while the big cases get on TV, this abuse goes on in homes all the time and no one hears about it. Often, this abuse is "supported by someone who within the community has portrayed themselves as an authority on faith and belief."
Evangelical Pastors Accused 15,000 Children Of Witchcraft In Nigeria In Just Nine Years
Photo: Anselm Feuerbach / Wikimedia CommonsAfter a local pastor accused his son of being a witch in 2009, a Nigerian boy’s father “tried to force acid down his throat as an exorcism. It spilled as he struggled, burning away his face and eyes." Other children accused of witchcraft were set on fire. Unfortunately, this is all too common, as over 1,000 children were murdered for perceived "witchcraft" between 2000 and 2009 in Nigeria alone. During that same time period, over 15,000 children in two of Nigeria's 36 states were accused of being witches. Some blame these witch hunts the rise of evangelical Christianity in the country.
750 People Were Executed In Assam And West Bengal, India, In Five Years
Photo: Henry Fuseli / Wikimedia CommonsFrom 2003 to 2008, more than 750 people were killed for “witchcraft” in Assam and West Bengal, India. Many of these stories are horrific, with tales of heads being “taken as trophies and paraded in the streets,” stoning, and being “buried alive for allegedly cursing a relative of the village chief.” You’d almost think these horrific murders are about more than someone “being a witch.” The beliefs that lead to these accusations are most widespread in rural and impoverished tribal communities. Some interesting ideas are being put in place to stop people from doing this, namely giving pensions to elderly women.
In 2013, Jharkland Had The Highest Rate Of Witchcraft-related Murders In India
Photo: John William Waterhouse / Wikimedia CommonsFifty-four women were accused of witchcraft and killed in 2013, giving Jharkland the dubious distinction of having the highest rate of witchcraft-related murders in India. As a social welfare official told The Washington Post: “often a woman is branded a witch so you can throw her out of the village and grab her land… sometimes it is used to punish women who question social norms.” In one of those murders, a 50-year-old woman and her daughter were hacked to death for “allegedly practicing witchcraft.” The mother died quickly, but the daughter was stabbed several times until she died. As of 2013, “no national law exists that addresses witchcraft killings.”
Congolese Men Get To The Bottom Of A Witch-Fueled Penis-Stealing Epidemic
Photo: Angelo Caroselli / Wikimedia CommonsIn 2008, thirteen “sorcerers” were arrested on accusations of "using black magic to steal or shrink men’s penises” in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Feel free to take a moment and read that again. Fourteen “victims” were detained by police, which means that two guys accused the same “witch” of stealing and/or shrinking their penises. Claims ranged from making their penises disappear outright to shrinking beyond repair. As ever, radio call-in shows were helpful, as “listeners advised to beware of fellow passengers in communal taxis wearing gold rings.” This would be much funnier if lynchings hadn’t been attempted in the wake of the accusations. While the police did arrest the accused sorcerers, it was only to protect them from violence, not to actually prosecute them for an imaginary crime.
