The English word "Blues" was first recorded during the 1500s. The word was used to describe an anxious or troubled state of mind. By the 1600s,"the Blue Devils" became a common term for evil spirits that brought depression and despair. In the 1800s, in the U.S., people would claim to have a case of "the Blue Devils" to describe a mood of low spirits or being under stress. During the Reconstruction Era, blacks applied the term to folk music that spoke to the social realities in their lives.