17th Century New England, with special emphasis on the Salem Witchcraft Trials

A 17th Century Colonial New England Bibliography

This is a sometimes-annotated bibliography of the books in my personal reference library as I research 17th century colonial New England. There are a lot about the Salem witch-hunt, Puritan thought, and Anglo-Indian contact, but also a few odds and ends that make sense to me to have on hand. Please note: I do not lend books. To anyone. Most of these titles can be borrowed from any good public or university library. If you want to purchase a copy of any of these titles, I have included direct links to Amazon.com for all but a handful of out-of-print or hard-to-find local imprint titles. To print out the whole bibliography, please use the printer-friendly version to save paper.

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Anderson | Bailyn | Bouchard | Bradford | Bremer | Calloway | Condé | Daniels | Dow | Fisher
Gildrie | Grumet | Hayes | Holifield | Koehler | Lockridge | Mather | Miller | Norton | Powers
Robinson | Scot | Slotkin | Tapley | Ulrich | Vaughan | Whiting | Woodward

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  1. Gildrie, Richard P.. Salem, Massachusetts, 1626-1683: A Covenant Community. University Press of Virginia: Charlottesville, VA. 1975. Order from Amazon.com

  2. Gildrie, Richard P.. The Profane, the Civil, and the Godly: The Reformation of Manners in Orthodox New England, 1679-1749. Penn State: University Park, PA. 1994. Order from Amazon.com

  3. Godbeer, Richard. Escaping Salem: The Other Witch Hunt of 1692. Oxford: New York. 2005. Order from Amazon.com

    I had hoped for more from an historian of Godbeer's caliber, but for anyone who knows nothing about the concurrent witchcraft cases in Connecticut in 1692, this is a decent introduction.
  4. Godbeer, Richard. The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England. Camridge University Press: New York. 1992. Order from Amazon.com

  5. Gragg, Larry. A Quest for Security: The Life of Samuel Parris, 1653-1720. Greenwood: New York. 1990. Order from Amazon.com

    Gragg's biography is based on just about all the known primary sources about Parris's life. No great surprises, but a nice summary of his life. Gragg finds that Parris's role in the trials was "decisive," and that many of his decisions were to "diminish material uncertainty" -- the "security" mentioned in the title.
  6. Gragg, Larry. The Salem Witch Crisis. Praeger: New York. 1992. Order from Amazon.com

  7. Greven, Philip J., Jr.. Four Generations: Population, Land, and Family in Colonial Andover, Massachusetts. Cornell University Press: Ithaca, NY. 1970. Order from Amazon.com

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This page was last updated Feb. 15, 2009 by Margo Burns, My email address.