The ability to control when to have a child has had different histories for women of color and white women in the United States. Then as now, African American women experienced higher levels of poverty and risk of dying in childbirth than their white American sisters. Before Roe v Wade between 1965/67, black maternal death
Black Reproductive Health Read More »
These are the faces of Irish people overjoyed with the passing of the Health Act 2018, allowing abortion in limited cases. The bureaucratic title belies the long history of abortion’a outlawry in Ireland. Two women galvanized the country to change Irish law — and their stories show how ubiquitous abortion debates have been in modern
Irish Health Act of 2018 Read More »
Here are the mug shots of some members of the Jane Collective — seven were arrested, but none put on trial, saved because the 1973 Roe v Wade decision was pronounced just in time. The Janes were a group of women who provided safe but underground abortions in the Chicago area before the procedure was
The Jane Collective Read More »
Ephedra (technically Ephredra sinica) or ma-huang, is a shrub with small scaly leaves that comes from northeastern China, Russia, and Mongolia, and is especially interesting in the history of medicine. Recipes using ephredra have been used for thousands of years in Classical Chinese medicine. Frequently the plant has been a key ingredient in treating asthma
Medicinal Properties of Ephedra Read More »
You are looking at a Colonial American recipe for abortion. Published in 1748, it was not the only at-home herbal abortifacient of the time, but it was one of the most well read. And given the publisher, that makes sense — it was Ben Franklin. Eager to adapt a British guidebook that had set out
A Colonial Recipe for Abortion Read More »
Wanna be a smidge happier? Learn about an extremely rare illness discovered in 1882 by the French neurologist Dr. Jules Cotard — if you can read this post, you almost certainly don’t have it. And for that, you will be gladdened. At his hospital at the Pitié-Salpêtrière University in Paris, the doctor saw a patient
Cortard’s Syndrome Read More »
Take a guess as to what this Medieval illustration is a drawing of: upside-down fallopian tubes? Sea-creatures? Mirror-image diagrams of some planetary motion? The answer is below, but before you look — ask yourself how you are arriving at your guesses. The process of investigative inquiry to figure out the nature of reality is something
Hasan Ibn al-Haytham and the Scientific Method Read More »
Paleo-anthropologists have recently analyzed the skeletons of two humans dating over 2,300 years ago from Ancient China which suggest that deliberate amputation of the limbs of one leg might have been done as a type of legal punishment. The skeletons came from the former Eastern Zhou Dynasty (771-256 BCE) near the modern city of Sanmenxia.
Amputations in the Eastern Zhao Dynasty Read More »
We need to talk about pig farming in the Early Middle Ages. Pigs weren’t usually the most important domesticated animal for folks living in Western Europe between 500-1000 CE, but they shaped the lives of almost everyone. In a Michael Pollan “who’s-dominating-whom,” sort of vibe, historian Jamie Kreiner’s research demonstrates that although Medieval folks of
Pig Farming in the Middle Ages Read More »
The effects of relentless (often religious-based) warfare in 16th-first half of 17th centuries brought horrifying new ways to suffer and die. Due to the widespread emergence of firearms and cannons, soldiers faced gunshot wounds, burns (often caused when the equipment blew up on the combatants intending to use their weapons), and loss of limbs. Although
Medical Advancements in Early Modern European Warfare Read More »
Here are fine specimens of an unusual plant called ghost pipes (sometimes Indian pipes), or Monotropa uniflora (“one-turn one-flower”). Although they grow on three continents (both Americas and Asia), the conditions they require are not simple to come by and they cannot be cultivated. Ghost pipes lack chlorophyll, something all plants require, and so these
This view of the southern French city of Uzés is taken from the top of a Medieval tower that now forms part of the town’s Medieval garden. The photos that follow show some of the many plant specimens that were grown in this region in the Middle Ages for all sorts of medical and alimentary
Behold the Cairo Toe, the earliest surviving prosthesis ever made. About 3,000 years ago in an Ancient Egyptian chamber lying west of Luxor, Egypt, a high-status woman was buried, and accompanying her remains was an artificial big toe made of leather and wood to fill in for a missing digit. The site was at Sheikh
Although my posts for the next few weeks are mostly going to be repeats as the website gets built, I couldn’t help but write up this story about willow tree bark and aspirin. Dear reader, you, like me, may have been under the impression that for millennia, people in different parts of the world relied
Willow Bark Medicine Read More »
The title here “A brief discourse of a disease called the Suffocation of the Mother” is really misleading. Not a tract about matricide, instead it was the first English publication (1603) on hysteria — thought to be a disease that only infected women. And it’s pretty messed up from every angle. For instance, the intent
Studies on Hysteria Read More »
There’s a famous children’s book called _Everybody Poops_, and this photo might look like some sort of rendition of that. Here you can see birds, horses, dogs, pigs, and rabbits all in the act of defecating. Our own human species is represented in the second row, right next to the donkey. This visual diagram is
Bald’s Leechbook is an Anglo-Saxon medical text from the 9th century. In 2015 one of the recipes (it used garlic, a bronze pot, and bile from a cow, among other things) was found to be successful in treating MRSA.
And what, pray tell, is going on here? This macabre device is a 1694 illustration of the weighing chair of Sanctorius Sanctorius (1561-1636), an Italian scientist who was the first (that we know of) to mesh quantitative experiments with the study of how the human body works. For thirty years, Santorio measured people’s sweat. Influenced
The Weighing Chair Read More »
The symbol you see here that means “prescription” comes from an abbreviation of the Latin word “recipe” meaning “take”, as in the command form of the verb recipere, which means “to hold or contain.” It doesn’t come from a joining of the letters R and x, but rather the slashed line through the “R” was
Latin Etymology of Rx Read More »
Late 18th-century Georgian Britain had such fascinating trends. An age of Enlightenment, it brought forth people who were in love with science and anything that sounded “science-y”, even when the actual science was missing. And, no surprise, interest peaked when said pseudo-science trend dealt with sex. This brings me to one James Graham (1745-1794), a
Sexologist James Graham’s Celestial Bed Read More »
