It's The 333rd Anniversary Of The Salem Witch Trials (And Yet It Seems Like It Could Still Happen Today)

That's like, half a Mark of the Beast.

The charming Tulip O’Hare, courtesy of our pal Binky’s Broad

333 years ago today, Three women — Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne and Tituba — were brought before town magistrates and interrogated for several days regarding some wild accusations from teenage girls who accused them of practicing witchcraft, thus beginning the Salem Witch Trials.

There are very few feelings I miss like I miss the feeling that something like the Salem Witch Trials could never happen again, on account of how we are so very evolved now. Because here, in the future, we still have people out here claiming that the Salem witches were actually guilty.

Infowars Guy Can't Believe You All Don't Know The Salem Witches Were Guilty As Hell

And literally running anti-witchcraft campaigns.

Tim Kaine's GOP Challenger Ready To Go Witch Hunting, For Actual Witches, So They Don't Take Over Virginia

Anyway, your present for this morning is not a video, but THE MOST BEAUTIFUL PAINTING IN ALL THE WORLD, which I stumbled upon whilst caught up in something of a witch trial internet hole.

OK, so I don’t know which (because they all look alike), but one of those ladies is Catherine Charlotte De la Gardie, an 18th century Swedish Countess who is now my idol. The other ladies are her fellow “hovfröken” (maids-of-honor, which was like a step down from being a lady-in-waiting) to Crown Princess Lovisa Ulrika.

Via Atlas Obscura:

The painting was commissioned by Count Karl Tessin, who collected and commissioned art. The painting depicts six hens (single ladies) with a rooster in the background, which was meant to be Tessin himself. This painting was a private one, intended to be seen only by a narrow circle of people. Today the closest comparison might be pornography collection, but less erotic. Only slightly so however, as Tessin had a reputation as a peeping tom who allegedly got inspired after seeing the court ladies "in a sufficiently natural state, while they were to dress."

Sexy, sexy chicken ladies.

But back to Countess Catherine Charlotte De la Gardie! Like many Countesses, she was something of a trendsetter. The trend she started? The smallpox vaccine! After she became the second woman in the Swedish aristocracy to vaccinate her kids, De la Gardie set out on a campaign to get everyone, aristocrats and commoners alike, to vaccinate their kids, and it became the hip thing to do.

Our girl also was responsible for saving the lives of 13 women and 5 men by putting a stop to the very last witch trial in Sweden. Like, this one kind of rural area tried having a witch trial about 100 years after everybody else in Sweden stopped doing witch trials — and when De la Gardie got wind of that whilst traveling throughout the countryside, she was horrified and went back to alert the proper authorities. The Swedish parliament investigated and set all of the accused free and sent the Governor who had led the whole thing to prison. De la Gardie also paid for their legal help and got them some monetary compensation, as all the torture they were put through made it impossible for them to work.

Love her! Also love her sister-in-law, Eva Ekeblad, the scientist/salon hostess who helped seriously curb famine in Sweden and beyond and got everyone wasted by figuring out that you could make both flour and alcohol with potatoes. Her discovery led her to become the first woman admitted to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

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