I'm using spring mvc in my application and I'm writing junit test cases for a DAO. But when I run the test, I get an error java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: javax.servlet.ServletContext. In the stacktrace, I see that this error is caused during getApplicationContext. In my applicationContext, I havent defined any servlet. Servlet mapping is done only in web.xml so I dont understand why I'm getting this error. Here is my applicationContext.xml:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<beans
xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xmlns:p="http://www.springframework.org/schema/p"
xmlns:context="http://www.springframework.org/schema/context"
xmlns:mvc="http://www.springframework.org/schema/mvc" 
xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans/spring-beans-3.0.xsd
http://www.springframework.org/schema/tx http://www.springframework.org/schema/tx/spring-tx-2.0.xsd
http://www.springframework.org/schema/aop http://www.springframework.org/schema/aop/spring-aop-2.0.xsd
http://www.springframework.org/schema/context 
http://www.springframework.org/schema/context/spring-context-3.0.xsd
http://www.springframework.org/schema/mvc
http://www.springframework.org/schema/mvc/spring-mvc-3.0.xsd"

xmlns:tx="http://www.springframework.org/schema/tx">

<bean id="dataSource" class="com.mchange.v2.c3p0.ComboPooledDataSource" destroy-method="close">
    <property name="driverClass" value="com.mysql.jdbc.Driver"/>
    <property name="jdbcUrl" value="jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/testdb"/>
    <property name="user" value="username"/>
</bean>

<bean id="sessionFactory" class="org.springframework.orm.hibernate3.annotation.AnnotationSessionFactoryBean">
    <property name="dataSource" ref="dataSource"/>
    <property name="hibernateProperties">
        <props>
            <prop key="hibernate.dialect">org.hibernate.dialect.MySQLDialect</prop>
            <prop key="hibernate.connection.driver_class">com.mysql.jdbc.Driver</prop>
            <prop key="hibernate.connection.url">jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/myWorld_test</prop>
            <prop key="hibernate.connection.username">username</prop>
        </props>
    </property>
    <property name="packagesToScan">
        <list>
            <value>com.myprojects.pojos</value>
        </list>
    </property>
</bean>

<bean id="hibernateTemplate" class="org.springframework.orm.hibernate3.HibernateTemplate">
    <property name="sessionFactory" ref="sessionFactory"/>
</bean>

<tx:annotation-driven transaction-manager="transactionManager"/>

<bean id="transactionManager" class="org.springframework.orm.hibernate3.HibernateTransactionManager">
    <property name="sessionFactory" ref="sessionFactory" />
</bean>

<context:component-scan base-package="com.myprojects"/>

<context:annotation-config/> 
<mvc:annotation-driven/>
</beans>

Here is the stacktrace:

java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: javax/servlet/ServletContext
at java.lang.Class.getDeclaredMethods0(Native Method)
at java.lang.Class.privateGetDeclaredMethods(Class.java:2521)
at java.lang.Class.getDeclaredMethods(Class.java:1845)
at org.springframework.core.type.StandardAnnotationMetadata.hasAnnotatedMethods(StandardAnnotationMetadata.java:161)
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassUtils.isLiteConfigurationCandidate(ConfigurationClassUtils.java:106)
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassUtils.checkConfigurationClassCandidate(ConfigurationClassUtils.java:88)
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassPostProcessor.processConfigBeanDefinitions(ConfigurationClassPostProcessor.java:253)
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassPostProcessor.postProcessBeanDefinitionRegistry(ConfigurationClassPostProcessor.java:223)
at org.springframework.context.support.AbstractApplicationContext.invokeBeanFactoryPostProcessors(AbstractApplicationContext.java:630)
at org.springframework.context.support.AbstractApplicationContext.refresh(AbstractApplicationContext.java:461)
at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractGenericContextLoader.loadContext(AbstractGenericContextLoader.java:120)
at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractGenericContextLoader.loadContext(AbstractGenericContextLoader.java:60)
at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractDelegatingSmartContextLoader.delegateLoading(AbstractDelegatingSmartContextLoader.java:100)
at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractDelegatingSmartContextLoader.loadContext(AbstractDelegatingSmartContextLoader.java:248)
at org.springframework.test.context.CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.loadContextInternal(CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.java:64)
at org.springframework.test.context.CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.loadContext(CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.java:91)
at org.springframework.test.context.TestContext.getApplicationContext(TestContext.java:122)
at org.springframework.test.context.support.DependencyInjectionTestExecutionListener.injectDependencies(DependencyInjectionTestExecutionListener.java:109)
at org.springframework.test.context.support.DependencyInjectionTestExecutionListener.prepareTestInstance(DependencyInjectionTestExecutionListener.java:75)
at org.springframework.test.context.TestContextManager.prepareTestInstance(TestContextManager.java:312)
at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.createTest(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:211)
at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner$1.runReflectiveCall(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:288)
at org.junit.internal.runners.model.ReflectiveCallable.run(ReflectiveCallable.java:12)
at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.methodBlock(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:284)
at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.runChild(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:231)
at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.runChild(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:88)
at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner$3.run(ParentRunner.java:238)
at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner$1.schedule(ParentRunner.java:63)
at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner.runChildren(ParentRunner.java:236)
at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner.access$000(ParentRunner.java:53)
at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner$2.evaluate(ParentRunner.java:229)
at org.junit.internal.runners.statements.RunBefores.evaluate(RunBefores.java:26)
at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.statements.RunBeforeTestClassCallbacks.evaluate(RunBeforeTestClassCallbacks.java:61)
at org.junit.internal.runners.statements.RunAfters.evaluate(RunAfters.java:27)
at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.statements.RunAfterTestClassCallbacks.evaluate(RunAfterTestClassCallbacks.java:71)
at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner.run(ParentRunner.java:309)
at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.run(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:174)
at org.gradle.api.internal.tasks.testing.junit.JUnitTestClassExecuter.runTestClass(JUnitTestClassExecuter.java:80)
at org.gradle.api.internal.tasks.testing.junit.JUnitTestClassExecuter.execute(JUnitTestClassExecuter.java:47)
at org.gradle.api.internal.tasks.testing.junit.JUnitTestClassProcessor.processTestClass(JUnitTestClassProcessor.java:69)
at org.gradle.api.internal.tasks.testing.SuiteTestClassProcessor.processTestClass(SuiteTestClassProcessor.java:49)
at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:57)
at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:606)
at org.gradle.messaging.dispatch.ReflectionDispatch.dispatch(ReflectionDispatch.java:35)
at org.gradle.messaging.dispatch.ReflectionDispatch.dispatch(ReflectionDispatch.java:24)
at org.gradle.messaging.dispatch.ContextClassLoaderDispatch.dispatch(ContextClassLoaderDispatch.java:32)
at org.gradle.messaging.dispatch.ProxyDispatchAdapter$DispatchingInvocationHandler.invoke(ProxyDispatchAdapter.java:93)
at com.sun.proxy.$Proxy2.processTestClass(Unknown Source)
at org.gradle.api.internal.tasks.testing.worker.TestWorker.processTestClass(TestWorker.java:103)
at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:57)
at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:606)
at org.gradle.messaging.dispatch.ReflectionDispatch.dispatch(ReflectionDispatch.java:35)
at org.gradle.messaging.dispatch.ReflectionDispatch.dispatch(ReflectionDispatch.java:24)
at org.gradle.messaging.remote.internal.hub.MessageHub$Handler.run(MessageHub.java:355)
at org.gradle.internal.concurrent.DefaultExecutorFactory$StoppableExecutorImpl$1.run(DefaultExecutorFactory.java:66)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:1145)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:615)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:724)
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: javax.servlet.ServletContext
at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(URLClassLoader.java:366)
at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(URLClassLoader.java:355)
at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:354)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:424)
at sun.misc.Launcher$AppClassLoader.loadClass(Launcher.java:308)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:357)
... 62 more

Test class:

import org.junit.After;
import org.junit.AfterClass;
import org.junit.Before;
import org.junit.BeforeClass;
import org.junit.Test;
import static org.junit.Assert.*;
import org.junit.runner.RunWith;
import org.springframework.beans.factory.annotation.Autowired;
import org.springframework.test.context.ContextConfiguration;
import org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner;

@RunWith(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.class)
@ContextConfiguration(locations = {"classpath:applicationContext.xml"})
public class UserServiceTest {

@Autowired
private UserService service;

public UserServiceTest() {
}

@BeforeClass
public static void setUpClass() {
}

@AfterClass
public static void tearDownClass() {
}

@Before
public void setUp() {
}

@After
public void tearDown() {
}
}

Even before writing any test method, I got this error.

Any idea why this error?