The glow-in-the-dark Easter feast
An essay by Dr Robert Graves of Dublin, published in The London Medical and Surgical Journal in 1835, contains this […]
Bewildering research
Prodigies and monsters, Unfortunate predicaments
The human piggy bank
Eels seem to have featured regularly in this blog, for some reason. First there was the physician who had a
Horrifying operations
A difficult labour
This blog usually takes a fairly light-hearted approach to its subject: I tend to look for cases which arouse amusement as
A suicidal machine
In 1837 The Lancet reported a cause of death previously unknown in the annals of medical science. Its report begins:
Notable deaths
Death by cucumber
In 1763 a doctor from Malling in Kent, identifying himself only as ‘W.P.’, reported this strange case in The Medical
Mysterious illnesses, Unfortunate predicaments
The man with three testicles
In September 1842 a young man called William Howard went to the army recruiting depot at Coventry, hoping to join
The stomach eel
Earlier this week a reader of this blog introduced me to a term I hadn’t encountered before: the ‘bosom serpent’.
Mysterious illnesses
Jaundice and night blindness
English is littered with words which were originally medical in their application but which have found broader or figurative usage.
Cured by a lightning bolt
On April 16th 1828 a ship called the New York sailed from its eponymous home port destined for Liverpool. She
‘Powder a Toad’ – Wesley’s Primitive Physick
John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, was one of the most celebrated Englishmen of the eighteenth century. He spent years