June: Summer Solstice

Find out the history and origins of these traditional festivals and customs as well as anniversaries and a what's on guide to events around the world.

June Events Guide

From the Festival of Roses to the Coney Island Mermaid Parade and the Summer Solstice, we cover this month's pagan rituals, moots, parties and events. Find out what's on around the world with our June events guide.

June Events

Historical Pagan Calendar

June is named in honour of Juno, the wife of Jupiter, known to the Greeks as Hera.

June Calendar

Anniversaries

Witchcraft Trials

Salem 1692

In June the town of Salem saw the first convicitions for witchcraft, death sentences, executions and further symptoms of alleged witchcraft.

• June 2, 1692: Bridget Bishop is the first to be tried, convicted and sentenced to death for witchcraft.
• June 8, 1692: Eighteen year old Elizabeth Booth shows symptoms of affliction by witchcraft.
• June 10, 1692: Bridget Bishop is hanged at Gallows Hill. After the execution Nathaniel Saltonstall resigns from the court. He is replaced by Corwin.
• June 15, 1692: Cotton Mather writes a letter requesting that the court does not admit spectral evidence as a standard and urging that the trials be conducted with greater speed. The Court of Oyer and Terminer pays more attention to the request for speed and less attention to the criticism of spectral evidence.
• June 16, 1692: Roger Toothaker dies in prison.
• June 29-30, 1692: Rebecca Nurse, Susannah Martin, Sarah Wildes, Sarah Good, and Elizabeth Howe are tried, pronounced guilty and sentenced to hang.