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Y312: Popular Culture and the Witchcraze of the 16th and 17th Centuries

Depth study: Hopkins and the witch hunt of 1645–1647 — the hunt, Hopkins’s methods and why it happened

  • 3 things to know
  • Unit group 3

Overview

Recall questions on Matthew Hopkins, the start and spread of the hunt, numbers accused and executed, Chelmsford, the clergyman executed in Suffolk, the methods of Hopkins and Stearne, familiars and the conditions that made 1645 possible.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

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Process

Why was 1645 to 1647 the moment such a hunt became possible?

Key term

State how many people were accused and how many were executed.

Key term

What happened at the Chelmsford assize of July 1645?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    Identify Matthew Hopkins.

    Model answer

    He was a young man of obscure background from Manningtree in Essex who from 1645 styled himself Witchfinder General and, with John Stearne, led the largest witch hunt in English history.

  2. 2

    How did the hunt begin?

    Model answer

    It started at Manningtree in the spring of 1645 with accusations against Elizabeth Clarke, a poor one-legged woman, who was watched until she confessed and named others.

  3. 3

    Which counties were affected?

    Model answer

    It spread from Essex through Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, the Isle of Ely, Huntingdonshire, Northamptonshire and Bedfordshire, across the eastern counties held for Parliament.

  4. 4

    State how many people were accused and how many were executed.

    Model answer

    Perhaps two hundred and fifty to three hundred people were accused and around a hundred were executed, roughly a fifth of all the executions in English witchcraft history.

  5. 5

    What happened at the Chelmsford assize of July 1645?

    Model answer

    More than thirty women were tried and at least nineteen were hanged, in the largest single English witchcraft trial.

  6. 6

    Which clergyman was among those executed in Suffolk?

    Model answer

    John Lowes, the elderly vicar of Brandeston, who was swum and watched until he confessed and was hanged at Bury St Edmunds in 1645.

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