Who is Tituba from I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem and what is their importance?

Tituba is the book's central character, its protagonist and narrator. Her story is at least partly based on the life of an actual person - a black servant named Tituba appears in transcripts and court records made at the time of the legendary Salem Witch Trials. Another interpretation of the life of this character appears in the well known play "The Crucible". In contrast to both sketchy portrayals, the version of Tituba that appears here is, as suggested in both the Forward (by activist Angela Davis) and the Afterword (by the author herself), an attempt to bring dimension, meaning and value to what has essentially been a legal, historical and/or dramatic footnote.