– by Charlie Dawson, Visitor Services/Gallery Associate
George Cheyne was a Scottish physician best remembered as an early advocate of vegetarianism. Born in 1672, he moved to London as a young man and became a regular in the local taverns. After ballooning in weight, he adopted the extremely restrictive diet for which he is best remembered today.
Cheyne – a corpulent physician who chided his patients to eat less – became a target of satire for his hypocritical sermonizing: Yet he was a strong believer in his own advice, writing in one book:
“Some perhaps, may controvert, nay ridicule, the Doctrin laid down in these positions. I shall neither reply to, nor be moved with, any thing that shall be said against them.”
This article considers two books by George Cheyne in possession of the Library of the College of Physicians. In The English Malady (1733), Cheyne looks at nervous disorders as a trait predominating among the English. In The Natural Method of Cureing Diseases of the Body and the Disorders of the Mind (1742), he sums up his philosophy of illness as arising primarily from poor diet.
Even in the early eighteenth century, Cheyne was beholden to the wisdom of the ancients. He begins The Natural Method with a reference to the long lives of the Old Testament patriarchs, saying that people live longer when times are tougher because their diets are plainer and they exercise more. He notes that alcohol was unknown before Noah’s flood, and that it led to drunkenness and incest afterward.
This was only the dawn of the “micromechanical evolution,” as physicians became increasingly aware of the finer details of human anatomy. Although his books display awareness of the body’s interior structure, Cheyne concentrated on practical, lifestyle advice centered on diet. His writing is silent on communicable diseases like plagues and smallpox.
Cheyne envisioned the body as a system of pipes requiring an even, easy flow of liquid. (The body’s solids come from the father, he tells us, and its juices from the mother.) He’s primarily concerned that the blood be “fluid, sweet, and balsamic.” He condemns animal fats, by contrast, as tending to make the blood “hot, viscid, and glewy.”
Although an early vegetarian, Cheyne’s recommended diet is heavy on milk. For the ailing, he prescribes a total milk and seed diet, particularly for people past middle age and those in sedentary occupations.
Cheyne touts the importance of exercise, although the examples he gives are not exactly cardio intensive: “Hunting, Shooting, Bowls, Billiards, Shuttle-cock.” He also recommends inducing vomiting for the exercise it gives via the spasming and convulsing of the digestive system.
When Cheyne does touch on medical intervention, his answer is almost invariably mercury: for rabies (called Hydrophobia), for cancer, for gout. He believed mercury particles to be perfectly spherical, and so ideal for flushing out obstructions in the veins.
Natural Methods touches only briefly on issues particular to women. He rails against constant bed rest during pregnancy, writing, “It is a vulgar Error to confine tender breeding Women to their Chambers, Couches, or Beds.” He approves of breast milk, or at least he would if the majority of nursemaids weren’t so unclean and lowborn.
The English Malady takes its title from a phrase, apparently in use in Europe, to describe melancholy, lethargy, and a range of symptoms described as nervous disorders. At their mildest, nervous disorders include yawning and symptoms. At their most severe, they include epilepsy and mania.
A chapter in The English Malady (left) and the title page for Natural Methods (right).
Cheyne believed, as others did, that nervous disorders were particularly common among the English, and he blames:
“The Moisture of our Air, the Variableness of our Weather,…the Richness and Heaviness of our Food, the Wealth and Abundance of the Inhabitants, (from their universal Trade) the Inactivity and sedentary Occupations of the better Sort (among whom this Evil mostly rages) and the Humour of living in great, populous, and consequently unhealthy Towns.”
He also details “Spleen” or “Vapours,” which most encompass modern ideas of mental illness. This extends to:
“All Lowness of Spirits… Noise in the Bowels or Ears, frequent Yawning, Inappentency, Restlessness, Inquietude, Fidgeting, Anxiety, Peevishness, Discontent, Melancholy, Grief, Vexation, Ill Humor, Inconstancy, [and] lethargick or watchful Disorders.”
For the sufferer, there is at least the consolation of good company. Cheyne tells us that nervous disorders are almost unknown among “Fools, weak, or stupid persons, heavy and dull Souls.” In addition, although people of fair hair color have weaker nerves, they are quick thinkers, and most readily feel both pleasure and pain.
Though Cheyne offers a number of factors contributing to nervous disorders, he is most concerned with a diet consisting of “the Too-high or Too-much.” Vegetables, by contrast, avoid “unnatural Cramming.” God made us for a purpose, Cheyne tells us, but disease arises from abuse of this freedom as well as “spurious Self-love.”
It can be a blessing, then, to have weak nerves and thus be saved from the temptation to overindulge available to the robust and healthy. One is reminded here of Cheyne’s estimation of his own constitution:
“As for myself, I have been all my Life of a Spongy, flabby, relax’d Habit, of weak Nerves originally, easily ruffled, surprised and hurried.”
If concern for one’s body is not enough to take diet seriously, Cheyne points to the “obtuse intellectual organs of those who consume recklessly,” which end in that most unfortunate figure, the “Mediocria Ingenia.”
For those like himself, who approach middle age regretting a youth of overindulgence, Cheyne recommends periodic fasting, though never, thankfully, for more than three or four days. He points to his colleague Isaac Newton, who made his greatest breakthroughs while confining himself to only bread and water. Cheyne instructs us to treat our body like a domestic animal: with a disciplined diet and a focus on cleanliness and exercise.
Cheyne is not above resorting to purges – of blood and other substances. But he insists on the primacy of diet, averring that his total milk and seed diet:
“Would sooner, more pleasantly, and more durably, cure and extirpate all kinds of Mania, Phrensies, and Madness, (which are so shamefully frequent in Britain) than the common one of treating them with tearing Emetics, and scraping Cathartics.”
After focusing for so long on the body’s delicate pipes and fibers, Cheyne closes The English Malady by zooming out to leave us with some perennial good advice, writing:
“Nothing will more contribute towards the Felicity of Green Old Age, than innocent and entertaining Amusements, engaging and light Studies, and rational Diversions in a chearful and affectionat Society.”
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Shapin, Steven. Trusting George Cheyne: Scientific Expertise, Common Sense, and Moral Authority in Early Eighteenth-Century Dietetic Medicine. Bulletin of the History of Medicine 77:2. 2003
Cheyne, George. The Natural Method of Cureing the Diseases of the Body and the Disorders of the Mind, Depending on the Body. George Strahan and John and Paul Knapton, 1742.
Cheyne, George. The English Malady: Or a Treatise of nervous diseases of all kinds; as spleen, vapours, lowness of spirits, hypochondriacal, and hysterical distempers, etc. S. Powell, 1734.
– by Charlie Dawson, Visitor Services/Gallery Associate
George III of the United Kingdom (1738–1820)
In 1789, King George III of England began experiencing signs of mental distress, including rambling speech, insomnia, and sexually inappropriate behavior. His behavior became so troublesome that doctors would confine the king to a straitjacket for hours at a time. During this period, Parliament considered deposing the ailing king in favor of his son, the prince of Wales. These events would eventually be known as the Regency Crisis.
An interesting artifact of this period resides in the Historical Medical Library (HML). It’s a pamphlet written by Philip Withers, a former chaplain and courtier in the household of George III. Its over long title can be summarized History of the Royal Malady. It came to the library thanks to the Fund for Rare Books sometime between 1910 and 1912.
Title page
Book cover
History of the Royal Malady features accounts of conversations supposedly overheard by Withers in the palace. It takes a particular stick to the eye of the prince of Wales, the would-be regent, and his semi-secret wife, Maria Fitzherbert.
George III was a fairly popular king, give or take the loss of some American colonies. After this loss, the king turned more to domestic affairs and left decisions of state to his prime minister, William Pitt the Younger. The king earned the affectionate nickname “Farmer George” for his interest in the minutia of his agricultural nation. He kept height charts for all fifteen of his children and never took a mistress. In other words, there was a certain Teutonic orderliness that led his court to be nicknamed the “Palace of Piety.”
In such a situation, the king’s son could only respond with extravagance. The prince of Wales was in many ways the quintessential spoiled rich kid – accruing gambling debts, debts to clothiers, continually appealing to Parliament for a raise in his allowance. But he was also known as a quick wit, a talented mimic, and a lively conversationalist in opposition to his somewhat dour father. He also believed, rightly or wrongly, that his father disliked him and had since childhood.
Thus disposed, the prince of Wales started hanging out with Charles Fox, leader of the Whig party that was largely opposed to everything the king did. Like the young prince, Fox liked to party.
We have on one side the Tory party, as represented by Pitt the Younger, advocating the supremacy of the Church of England and the king’s prerogative to do pretty much what he wanted. On the other side, the Whig Party, led by Charles Fox, were standard bearers of Enlightenment-influenced ideas of rule with consent of the governed. These are the broad outlines. In reality, George III cared deeply about a monarchy beholden to its subjects and wrote essays on how to avoid becoming a despot.
When the Regency Crisis arrived, the Whigs advocated that, as the heir to the throne, their creature, the prince of Wales, be automatically named regent. The Tories countered that, sure, the prince of Wales could be named regent, or it could be literally anybody else, and the decision is up to Parliament alone. Here is a seeming reversal, with the Whigs advocating the royal prerogative and the Tories pushing for Parliament’s supremacy.
Now, although George III was a conscientious bridegroom, his brothers were not. They married unsuitable women – Catholics and divorcees and commoners. This led to the Royal Marriage Act of 1772, whereby members of the royal family could marry only with the approval of the king. It was especially important to keep them from marrying Catholics because the 1701 Act of Settlement, which united England and Scotland, barred Catholics from the throne (this included queens). For perspective, it was only in 1778 that the Papist Acts allowed Catholics to buy property and serve in the military.
What’s a young prince to do when he’s run out of middle fingers to hurl at his father? Marry a Catholic widow in secret of course. That’s what the prince of Wales did with one Maria Fitzherbert, which seems to be what raised the hackles of our pamphleteer, the former Anglican chaplain Philip Withers.
Withers describes himself as “Senior Page of the Presence” with rooms adjoining those of the royal family. Much of the pamphlet consists of conversations overheard through latticed spyholes like in a licentious costume drama. Normally, Withers assures us, he wouldn’t listen in on such private conversations, but he has done so for the good of the nation during this crisis of the king’s mental health.
In the first section, Withers relates a story, which he claims to have witness firsthand, wherein the king addresses a tree as though it were the King of Prussia, vigorously shaking the tree’s branches as if it were a person’s hand. Even in delusion, Withers stresses the king’s piety:
“His majesty, though under a momentary dereliction of reason, evinced the most cordial attachment to freedom and the protestant faith.”
Withers relates another story where the king is riding in a coach with his daughters when he turns to the Princess Charlotte, and says, “Will you give me leave to *******?” with the implication of masturbation. Later, our pamphleteer is himself attacked when he is slow to answer the king’s questions. The king grabs Withers by the collar and punches him in the face.
There is something here about the cultural relativism of mental illness. Were a Roman Emperor to behave sexually badly and beat up his servants, would that register as mental illness? But, that era’s expectation of good manner, even on the part of the king, may be the point, as one of the king’s physicians observed:
“If a patient of consummate chastity, like the King, pronounce aloud, what I blush to repeat even in a whisper, we have reason to dread the result.”
It’s the king’s physicians who come in for the worst of it. The king tells his physicians to dance. They decline. The king then thrusts his dinner knife at them and says:
“’Here is my sceptre… and by G-d the man, who presumes to oppose my Will, shall be instantly – instantly impaled alive…’ And then the King called for his Flute… and thus ended the Sabbath day.”
Withers has a good wit if you reduce him to ellipticals.
The most memorable story in Withers’ pamphlet requires some background. A cloaca is a bird’s all-purpose orifice for reproduction and excrement. The Cloaca Maxima was the terminus of the Roman sewer system, overseen by the goddess Cloacina. In George’s day, to worship at the shrine of Cloacina became a euphemism for using the privy.
One day, Withers writes, when “His majesty has lately propitiated the Goddess by a copious sacrifice,” the king gave his physicians a good clock to the face, fetched his overflowing chamber pot, and dumped the contents on the poor physician’s head. This was a knighting of sorts, as the king intoned, “Arise, Sir George, knight of the most antient [sic], most puissant, and most honorable order of Cloacina, Goddess of the Golden Soil.” The king then laughed himself to sleep.
Withers’ account of the king’s derangement makes it far more severe than other sources. Yet his intention was not to paint the king as an invalid and so argue for a regency. It was to depict Charles Fox and Maria Fitzherbert as schemers, taking advantage of the king’s illness to impose themselves into power. If decorum prevents Withers gathering intelligence on this matter, then decorum be damned.
One night, after bidding the royal family good night, Withers writes, “I withdraw to my apartment. Curiosity, however, urged me to the screen, that from a slight aperture I might view her ladyship…The Prince again enfolded her Ladyship and claimed an intercourse of wedded rights. And I withdrew.”
Yet Withers’ recollection of this conversations continues past this withdrawal. The prince mentions that Lady Fitzherbert has been offered a stipend if she will withdraw to a convent. The Lady is adamant that although raised Catholic she is now a practicing Protestant. This is no matter to Withers, who despises her still as a schemer, a conniver, and a *****.
In addition to these conversations, the pamphlet includes one Withers supposedly overheard between the Bishop of Canterbury and someone identified as Lord Cynic. Of the king’s illness, the Bishop says, “The truth is, the King was never greatly burdened with sense, and therefore some slight derangement has overset him.”
This is a pretty sick burn, but Withers’ intention here is to depict the two participants in this conversation as the Bad Guys. You can tell because they say Bad Guy things like, “I am determined to eat, drink, and whore as long as I can,” as well as, ironically in Withers’ telling, “As to the People, we must besiege them with Pamphlets and Inflammatory Hand-bills.”
Withers’ own inflammatory handbill soon landed him in hot water. The pamphlet was supposed to be published by Jared Ridgway, known as a Whig partisan. Although not all partisan publishers were in direct contact with, or in the pay of, the party itself, many of them were. Withers may have thought that Ridgway’s loyalty was to the idea of freedom of the press beyond the particulars of party politics, but, at least in this case, it was not.
In a later pamphlet, Withers tells the story of being summoned to a meeting with Ridgway and the mysterious D., sometimes thought to be Maria Fitzherbert, sometimes the prince of Wales himself. The mysterious D. offers Withers a reward if he will withdraw his pamphlet. Withers refuses and demands their return, but Ridgway refuses.
Without Ridgway’s cooperation, History of the Royal Malady saw very little distribution. The suppressed pamphlet was a available at the author’s house – and nowhere else. However, the story of Withers’ imprisonment for libel was followed closely by Tory newspaper The World. In prison, where Withers wrote [—], his rhetoric grew more pointed. To the prince of Wales, he says, “Your highness has no better claim than a highwayman to the distinctions of a man of honor.”
Withers claims not to mind that the prince of Wales is married to a Catholic, but that parliament does mind very much, and Withers cares what parliament thinks. This is rather unconvincing. Nor is it convincing when he writes, “I hope Parliament will avail themselves of the opportunity of expelling those unworthy members, who affirmed that Her Royal Highness was a *****.”
Though his rhetoric toward the prince of Wales grew more direct, still Withers cannot bring himself to blame the prince more than those who corrupted him. Afterall, “to reproach a man for being an idiot is an insult to Almighty God.”
Withers was fined fifty pounds for libel and sentenced to a year in Newgate prison, but he died before the year was up.
While parliament was arguing who had the authority to appoint a regent, the king recovered. This may be owing to the work of Dr. Wallis, whose slightly more modern approach to mental health was depicted by Ian Holm in The Madness of George III. Or it may be owing simply to the cyclical nature of the condition, which can come and go throughout a person’s life, as it did for George III.
1789 also saw the outbreak of the French Revolution. There is speculation by historians that, if the Regency Crisis occurred a few years later, George III would have been replaced promptly by a regent. Afterall, if France was getting rid of perfectly healthy kings, why would the British tolerate an incapacitated one?
The whole brouhaha permanently stained the reputation of the prince of Wales and Charles Fox, who were seen as taking advantage of the king’s illness in order to seize power for themselves. The prince of Wales stopped being seen in public with Maria Fitzherbert after 1790. He eventually married someone more suitable after his father promised to intercede on behalf of the prince’s debts if he would do so. The prince treated this more suitable bride abominably and periodically took back up with Lady Fitzherbert.
George ruled for another twenty years after the Regency Crisis with some relapses. In 1810 [?] his mental acuity deteriorated to the point where the prince of Wales was declared regent. There is speculation that the king’s final illness was prompted by the death of his beloved daughter, Amelia. The cloistering of the king’s daughters, the way the Queen seemed to respond to her husband’s illness by suffocating her daughters and refusing to allow them to marry, is worthy of a Sophia Coppola investigation itself.
As George’s mental condition grew worse, he went blind due to cataracts. The image of the king’s last few years is a dark one, and a stark reminder of the equality of all mortals under nature. When George III died in 1820], the prince of Wales, though he had been de facto monarch for nearly a decade, officially became George IV.
You have scarcely seen a Wikipedia page so full of condemnation and contempt as that of George IV. In an era of rising republican sentiment, George spent lavishly and ostentatiously. He grew very fat and dependent on laudanum for gout. He was given to flights of fancy like claiming to have disguised himself in order to fight in the Napoleonic wars, although unlike his father, these tales were regarded not as delusions of grandeur but merely as lies.
George IV died without legitimate children. He was succeeded by his brother and eventually his niece, Victoria. By relying so heavily on their ministers, George III and George IV accelerated the monarchy’s transition into a more or less innocuous figurehead, which has allowed it to survive into the present day.
Bibliography
The Badness of King George IV. Directed by Tim Kirby. Flashback Television, 2004.
Catania, Steven, “Brandy Nan and Farmer George: Public Perceptions of Royal Health and the Demystification of English Monarchy During the Long Eighteenth Century.” 2014. Loyola University Chicago, PhD dissertation.
Gronbeck, Bruce E. “Rhetorical invention in the regency crisis pamphlets.” Quarterly Journal of Speech 58.4 (1972): 418-430.
Kass, Joshua. “A Royal Disappointment: The Private Scandals of George IV, 1785–1820.” 2007. Bryn Mawr College, PhD dissertation.
The Madness of King George. Directed by Nicholas Hytner. Film4 Productions and the Samuel Goldwyn Company, 1994.
Robinson, Peter. “Henry Delahay Symonds and James Ridgway’s Conversion from Whig Pamphleteers to Doyens of the Radical Press, 1788–1793.” The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 108, no. 1 (2014): 61–90.
Withers, Philip. Alfred Or A Narrative of the Daring and Illegal Measures to Suppress a Pamphlet Intituled, Strictures on the Declaration of Horne Tooke, Esq. Respecting” Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales,” Commonly Called Mrs. Fitzherbert: With Interesting Remarks on a Regency; Proving, on Principles of Law and Common Sense, that a Certain Illustrious Personage is Not Eligible to the Important Trust…. London, 1789.
Withers, Philip. History of the royal malady of George III: with variety of entertaining anecdotes, to which are added strictures on the declaration of Horne Tooke, Esq. respecting “Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales,” commonly called (The Hon.) Mrs. Fitzherbert. With interesting remarks on a Regency. London, 1789.
– by Shirley Choi, Library Administrative Assistant
“This book is very scarce in an absolutely perfect state, with the marginal notes uncut, and the magical leaves at p. 352… The rarity of the magical leaves above noted is not generally known.”
From its rare leaves, clear marginalia, and (somewhat hilarious) page-turning contents, The Discouerie of Witchcraft by Reginald Scot is a beautiful and unique item in the Library. We own three editions of this work: An original 1584 edition obtained through the Fund for Rare Books in 1916, a 1665 edition (the first reprint since Scot’s death) obtained through the same fund four years later in 1920, and the third is part of our Robert L. Sadoff collection from 1930, and is no. 294 of 1275 copies printed.
The Discouerie of Witchcraft starts with a disparagement of the idea of witchery, which claimed their supposed power– even without any credible witness– was an ignorant insult to God. Reginald Scot questioned their fortitude against “melancholie,” or mental illness, and he believed witchcraft to be superstitions from idolatry. Those who interacted with witchcraft, either the alleged perpetrators or the victims, were dismissed as “erroneous novelties and imaginary conceptions,” and those who trialed the (usually poor, intellectually disabled, and/or old) accused peoples were bad actors who “extort[ed] confessions by terrors and tortures.”
As it directly opposed the monarchy’s belief that witchcraft was real and dangerous, The Discouerie was printed without registry and never reprinted in Scot’s lifetime. In 1597, 13 years after the publishing, Scottish King James I wrote Daemonologie in response, where he sneered at Scot in the introduction–
“so farre as I can, to resolue the doubting harts
of many; both that such assaultes of Sathan are most certainly
practized, & that the instrumentes thereof, merits most severly
to be punished: against the damnable opinions of two principally
in our age, wherof the one called SCOT an Englishman, is not
ashamed in publike print to deny, that ther can be such a thing as
Witch-craft: and so mainteines the old error of the Sadducees,
in denying of spirits.”
Physician and Chemist Edward Jorden testified during the 1602 trial of Elizabeth Jackson, an elderly neighbor who was accused by teenager Mary Glover of bewitching her. He called her a faker suffering from Passio Hysterica, or hysteria. The judge was not convinced. However, it was convincing enough for the public and several advocates to free Jackson from death (she instead served a prison sentence and spent time in pillories).
The 1600s was a violent time of enlightenment from superstition and beliefs, with emerging skeptics amid feverous witch hunts. King James I ascended to the English throne and reprinted Daemonlogie in 1603, reemphasizing the governing position.
Scot decided to take a strange turn midway through the 16 books (or sections). He transformed the treatise into an extensive guide of summoning faeries, magic tricks and illusions, with the addition of celestial tables and magic circles. He made generous mentions of Sibylia, the “gentle virgine of fairies,” and insisted upon invoking the names of other faeries like Milia and Achilia to complete spells.
“This is the waie to go invisible by these three sisters of fairies.”
Not just for summoning faeries, Scot instructed us how to play card tricks and other classic magician acts, such as: “How to deliver out foure aces, and to convert them into foure knaves,” he shared. “How to tell one what card he seeth in the bottome, when the same card is shuffled
into the stocke,” and my favorite, “To tell one without confederacie what card he thinketh.”
“To cut off ones head, and to laie it in a platter, which the jugglers call the decollation of John Baptist.” pg 352.
The entire e-text of The Discouerie of Witchcraft is freely available on Project Gutenberg. Highly recommended for those who are easily bored or need a faerie spell refresher.
Sources:
“The Reception of Reginald Scot’s Discovery of Witchcraft: Witchcraft, Magic, and Radical Religion,” S. F. Davies
“The Discouerie of Witchcraft,” editor Brinsley Nicholson. 1886 Reprint of 1584 edition, Gutenberg eBook.
The author, Jerome of Brunswick, was born in 1450 in Strasburg Germany. Brunswick was responsible for writing the first surgery book in English with illustrations. This book was written in the year 1525. It has three sections: Anatomy of the body, Surgery, and Antidotharium, which is based on recipes from plants and minerals. The body section highlights detailed instructions on how to heal fractures, dislocations, wounds, ointments and plasters. Plasters are a kind of sterile bandage or cast, a covering sometimes referred to as dressing the wound. Determining a proper plaster can be very important for a patient’s comfort level.
Book spine with “Handiwork of Surgery” written in gold leaf.
Book page showing illustrations of cranial procedures.
In this book you will find plasters, powders, oils, herbs and drinks for wounds. People who desire the knowledge of science read this book and better understand the works of noble surgery. Brunswick writes about how it’s best to accept payment only for problems that can be cured as opposed to ones that cannot. He believed doing such a thing maintains a persons good name and reputation, which is especially important for doctors. Brunswick studied under a reputable surgeon, many encouraged him to write a book.
Illustration showing the process of treating a leg.
Illustration showing the process of treating an arm.
The University Of British Columbia also owns a copy. Its full title is Noble Experience of the Virtuous Handiwork of Surgery.
An anatomical diagram showing astrological signs and the parts of the body they influence.
We’ve missed you. We’ve been quiet here for a while, and that’s because we’ve been incubating projects and programs behind the scenes. Here’s a sneak peek at what we’ve been up to…
Paré, Ambroise, 1510?-1590, “Woman pregnant with twenty children.”
One – Newly Renovated Norris
We’re renovating the historic Norris Reading Room to create a refreshed and welcoming space for researchers to view our materials on a desk or in display cases.
Norris Room photograph from the Sturgis Photograph Collection.
Two – Moving Some Materials
We’re moving some of our collections offsite to create space, improve discoverability, and expand access to our incunabula, medieval manuscripts, and archives.
“Writer” woodcut printed by Johann Grüninger, artist unknown.
Three – Testing for Toxins
Did we mention medieval manuscripts? We’re testing several illustrations and illuminations in our oldest items to better understand the toxic pigments used by their creators. Initial results have been promising and point to the presence of orpiment, cinnabar, vermilion, and more.
Giles of Rome, Archbishop of Bourges, “De regimine regum et principum.” Italy; early 14th century.
Four – Digitization
We’re expanding our digital collections starting with letters, medical trade ephemera, and scrapbooks on smallpox and influenza vaccinations.
We’re hiring! Do you want to spend your days working with a collection of incunabula, manuscripts, archives, monographs, maps, multimedia and more that dates to the 13th century? Come work with us as an Archivist, Special Collections and Rare Books Librarian, or Special Collections Project Librarian (2-year term)
Detailed information and application instructions on our website.
Paré, Ambroise, 1510?-1590, “Prosthetic hand.”
Check back often for updates! We have much more to show you …
– by Elijah Emerson Buchanan Doss, Visitor Services/Gallery Associate
Before influencing the West and prior to the beginning of the Scientific Revolution during the 16th century that changed modern medicine as we currently know it, Vedic texts described the relation between the movement of planetary systems and the human body centuries prior. Astrology and science were never separate entities until recently, but rather the two worked alongside of one another to explain illnesses and to treat sick patients.
According to the Vedas (the oldest scripture of Hinduism), Ayurveda, meaning, “the science of life”, is a system of medicine that is based on the highly evolved astrological system known as Vedic astrology.
It’s spring, and that means rhubarb! From strawberry rhubarb pie, to custard, to gin, this vegetable (most often used like a fruit) is either loved or hated by people the world over. Like many plants, rhubarb has been used medicinally for centuries, especially in traditional Chinese medicine. While the various species of rhubarb, and their distribution from Asian countries across the globe have been researched and discussed at length (see Sources and further reading for more), this post will examine the various types of rhubarb and their medicinal uses found in some of the Library’s herbals.
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