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Hunter Winnie
Mr. Salow
English 11
October 24, 2016
Crucible Essay
Many books can show and have significant historical relevance. One book that shows
historical relevance is The Crucible. The crucible takes place in 1492 in Salem, Massachusetts.
The people of salem were very religious in a way that swayed their decisions in a bad way. Their
religion was so heavy in their lives that most of the people their believed that if you lived
towards the center of town, you were closer to god. If you lived farther from the center of town
or even if you lived in the woods, you were considered less religious and some thought you
worshiped the devil. This becomes very controversial later on in the book when they use it as a
point to disprove someone's theory because they live farther away from town.
If someone were to travel into the woods they would have been considered to be traveling
into the devil's lands which were mostly claimed by Native Americans at the time. If you
traveled into the woods there was a good chance you would be killed by either a wild animal or
the native americans, which is why they were considered the devil's lands. Part of the puritans
religion prohibits them from dancing. In The Crucible, a bunch of girls from the town, ranging
from the most wealthy and popular girls to the poorest least popular girls, were caught dancing in
the woods outside of town. Since these girls were dancing in the woods they should have gotten
in trouble, but instead they were going to get in life threatening trouble because they were
thought of performing witchcraft.

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Puritans believed that if you believed in God and knew your commandments then you
can never lie. The girls lied about what they were doing in the woods that one night and blamed
it on the least popular and poorest girls in the group that went into the woods. The historical
significance this shows is phenomenal because people were so trustworthy and loyal to religion
and people's word that they could get tricked by little girls that were dancing in the woods. Today
it is unheard of to be so into a religion and to be so trustworthy of people and what they say. This
shows that the time period has changed dramatically because we have a totally different view on
society and culture.
If we did not know that during the time period that this book took place the religion
overpowered every aspect of the people's lives, we would have disqualified this book as fake or
irrational. Since we know that during the time that The Crucible took place religion powered
society in every way, we can further understand why some characters made some decisions that
they did. The girls pretended to be witched by other girls, or how their elders in the town
believed them because they had an idea that since they were Puritans the girls couldn't lie to
them. If these same exact circumstances were to have happened today, our society would have
had a better understanding that the girls were just dancing around in the woods and they weren't
practicing witchcraft. The court ruled that some of the girls were practicing witchcraft and some
be banished from the town and, some be hung. Today there wouldn't have been any punishment
because their is a freedom of religion and a freedom to practice religion view of society. Sure
some people wouldn't have liked the idea of people practice witchcraft, but there would have
been no serious penalty if any penalty at all.
In 1492 in Salem, Massachusetts, there was not really any choice of what religion you
wanted to be in or what religion you identified with. If you were born a Puritan, then you would

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die a Puritan and so would your children and your children's children. There was not any real
social or religious diversity at the time, if there was they would have probably either have been
scared off by the town or would have been blamed and hung for something that they didn't do
because no one liked them in the town. This played a huge role in how the court ruled on the
decision to hang some of the girls who were practicing witchcraft because the court of salem was
strictly religion based and it had only the views of one religion. If, in fact, the court were not
religion based, then the entire court system could have been dramatically different and it would
have probably made much better decisions and rulings on cases that they had previously heard.
Based on this information, you can tell that the reader could have read and made false
decisions on the book if the reader had not first read up on the history that had been taking place
at the time such as a town that was overwhelmingly religion based and bias towards that religion.
You could also say that the reader could have missed very important information such as that it is
prohibited to dance or to go in the woods because both are associated with the devil and are
considered devil's work. Since The average reader Knows and has a someone adequate
understanding of history and the time period the author probably felt that the information was not
as necessary as others would think that it is.
The historical relevance of the book The Crucible is so great that some could argue that is
could be considered a non-fiction book. Nevertheless, it showed that the society, the people
themselves, and the social standards that people held themselves up to during this time was
dramatically different than what they are now. Maybe if our society, the people of our society,
and the social standards that we hold ourselves up to were placed into 1492 in Salem,
Massachusetts, we could have made a more fair and unbiased decision of what the girls were
doing and come to the conclusion that they were trying to cover it up. What if the people of

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Salem , Massachusetts in 1492 were placed into today's society? Would they thrive or would they
quickly get shut down for other morals and values?