May 1st, or May Day, has been a holiday associated with the arrival of summer for millennia. But dancing around maypoles is not the only way that you can celebrate the day—it can also be a good day for those suffering from scrofula to petition for divine assistance. Scrofula is a disease that we don’t [Read more]
Chances are you’re familiar with the phrase “A picture is worth a thousand words.” While this maxim originated with an American advertising firm in the 1920s, it is certainly applicable to images produced in early modern Europe. Many of the illustrative elements in books were meant to convey meanings on multiple levels. Elaborate title pages [Read more]
Bernard Becker Medical Library is fortunate to have robust collections in archives and rare books that document the history of medicine from the late 15th century up to the present. Subjects in which the library’s holdings are particularly strong include ophthalmology and optics, neurology, deaf education and the history of dentistry. To encourage researchers living [Read more]
For the past several years, the Center for the History of Medicine has sponsored a week-long trip abroad for students with an interest in medical history. While the first iterations of this program were offered for Phase I students, this year marks the first time it was incorporated into an elective for Phase III students. [Read more]
If you hear the word dracunculus in a vacuum, chances are you’ll think of dragons. The frontispiece to the 1674 edition of Georg Hieronymus Welsch’s Exercitatio de Vena Medinensi certainly supports that association. Sitting next to the two Greco-Roman deities Diana and Mercury (identifiable by their shield and staff, respectively) is a dragon, which acts [Read more]
The Olympic Games are a celebration of athleticism and physical skill, traits prized by the Ancient Greeks. But what did the people of antiquity think of fitness and exercise? These topics are explored in De Arte Gymnastica, one of the earliest books on exercise and physical therapy. De Arte Gymnastica was first published in 1569 [Read more]
To encourage researchers living more than 100 miles from St. Louis to use these collections, Becker Library offers two grants annually of up to $1,000 each to help defray the costs of travel, lodging, food and photo reproductions. Covered expenses will be reimbursed at the conclusion of the visit. Apply by Sept. 1, 2024.
Modern medical texts tend to be straightforward in their content, presenting the necessary information without artistic embellishment. Their medieval and early modern counterparts, however, made ample use of visual allegory. We’ve already talked about several famous examples, such as Vesalius’s evocation of classical statuary and the various Greco-Roman deities tucked into frontispieces, but today we’re [Read more]
Practitioners of humoral theory took the idea of a balanced diet to a whole new level as they incorporated the consumption of food and drink into their medical belief system. A prevalent medical practice in medieval and early-modern Europe, humoral theory has its roots as far back as Hippocrates and Galen in ancient Greece. The four [Read more]
One of the joys of reading primary sources is that it can provide us with a direct window into the past—browsing through an old distillation manual can lead down the path of researching medicinal cannibalism, or mentions of moon phases can provoke a segue into medical astrology. But it isn’t just the words that can [Read more]