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A little over 320 years ago, more than twenty people died as a result of a witchcraft hysteria that swept New England. What would have happened if you were there? Think you’d survive? Think again. Take a look at these seventeen things that would likely get you accused of witchcraft. For example:

YOU HAVE ONE OR MORE FEMALE FRIENDS

A note to all popular teens and the cast of Sex and the City: A group of women congregating without a male chaperone was deemed a “coven meeting to worship the Devil.” Ladies be communing with flirty cosmos and the devil.

YOU ARE A MIDWIFE

Put simply by writer Joel Southern, a midwife’s “age, social and marital status, autonomy, pagan influences, secret knowledge of herbs and most importantly, the vilification of her profession as unclean and demeaning served to demonize the midwife. In short, the midwife represented everything the Church feared.”

YOU HAVE EXHIBITED “STUBBORN,” “STRANGE,” OR “FORWARD BEHAVIOR”

Let loose any kind of sass or backtalk and ye be a witch, probably. Again, in the trial of Rachel Clinton, her accusers solidified the case against her with the following: “Did she not show the character of an embittered, meddlesome, demanding woman—perhaps in short, the character of a witch? Did she not scold, rail, threaten and fight?”

Full story at Mental Floss.

More cool history.

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