The Development of Medicine in 17th Century Italy

 Deborah Swift

My fourth book in the Giulia Tofana series, The Cameo Keeper, focuses on medicine and healing in the 17th Century, a time of significant transformation in Italian medicine. As Europe shifted from the Renaissance towards the era of scientific exploration, Italy became a key centre for medical thought and innovation, blending ancient traditions of healing and herbalism with new discoveries. The old medicine and the new were less-than-happy bedfellows, and the advent of printing meant that men’s version of remedial medicine was more often promoted in written texts than the women’s traditional remedies. Men’s thought was widely disseminated in printed books, whereas women’s cures were left in the kitchen notebooks.

The Old Tradition

At the dawn of the seventeenth century, Italian medicine was still deeply rooted in the classical theories inherited from Greek and Roman scholars such as Galen and Hippocrates. Universities such as Padua, Bologna, and Pisa were renowned for their medical faculties, teaching aspiring physicians from these ancient texts. In my novel, Jacopo has studied at Padua University, but he is now intent on a career in the Santo Spirito Hospital in Rome. Medical education was still emphasising the balance of the four humours—blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile—as the foundation of health and disease.

Above: Early Italian Pharmacy

Below: Anatomy Theatre

But in the new age of medicine anatomical dissection became increasingly important, with doctors such as Giovanni Alfonso Borelli and Marcello Malpighi leading the field. Malpighi, celebrated as the "father of microscopical anatomy" for his pioneering use of the microscope, was able to observe capillaries, organs, and tissues, thus advancing the study of physiology.

Surgeons were often required to show off their skills in public demonstrations, and anatomy theatres were popular entertainment for the rich. Some of these were experiments on the dead, but there were also ‘trials’ on the living. These took the form of ‘competitions’ or ‘trials’ where those competing for a surgeon’s position would have to demonstrate their abilities before a hospital board.


The 17th century was also marked by recurrent outbreaks of plague. The outbreak in Rome in 1656 led to stringent quarantine measures – isolating affected neighbourhoods and the fumigation or burning of infected items. City states established boards of health, enhancing the management of infectious diseases. Quarantine hospitals on city outskirts became a hallmark of the new Italian public health strategy, and in Rome one of the quarantine hospitals that features in The Cameo Keeper is one run by monks, and isolated on an island in the middle of the Tiber.

Herbalism and Pharmacy

During this period, women’s role in healing changed. The old tradition of herbal remedies persisted, but influenced by the new science of chemistry, apothecaries began incorporating chemicals and metals into their preparations. Paracelsian ideas, which promoted chemical remedies over traditional humours-based treatments, began to gain ground. Italian pharmacists and physicians experimented with compounds such as antimony and mercury. (see picture below)

Although women were largely excluded from formal medical education, they played crucial roles as midwives, herbalists, and caregivers. Some women, especially in religious orders, managed hospital wards and contributed to nursing and patient care.

The common people still relied on the cheaper, more available care from the women in their households, and care in hospital depended on how much you could afford to pay.

The seventeenth century in Italy was a time of great experimentation, with the three kinds of treatment offered intersecting - herbalism, pharmaceuticals and surgery. For the first time, documentation existed because of the invention of printing and the ability to disseminate the results of experiments more widely.

The Cameo Keeper takes this experimentation as one of its themes and I thoroughly enjoyed researching the 'new' medicine of the era.

Spying during the Napoleonic Wars - by Rosemary Hayes

 

Researching for my second book in the 'Soldier Spy' trilogy, it’s been quite a journey to learn about the extent of spying, on both sides, during the Napoleonic Wars. Not only at a diplomatic level, through overseas embassies and through the Alien Office, in London, and highly placed double agents, but there were networks of ordinary people who passed on maps and documents, letters, money and even arms. Agents smuggled intelligence sewn into clothing or hidden in hollowed out walking sticks. Both sides employed complex codes and ciphers to protect their communications. Codebooks and cipher wheels were standard kit. One captured French codebook was worth its weight in gold to the British Intelligence Service. A British officer, George Scovell, a gifted linguist, famously cracked the French ‘Great Paris Cipher’ which was pivotal in the Peninsular War.

 

In Paris, there were underground networks of those spying for the British. Royalists, Bonapartist defectors and even double agents moved in secret, often under the noses of Joseph Fouché’s secret police (more of him later). Many were caught but a few key figures were never unmasked.

 

Both British and French agents used disguises, posing as merchants, priests, artists or diplomats. Some even used travelling theatre troupes as cover to move behind enemy lines. The more mundane the cover, the more convincing. Fishermen and smugglers took agents and documents to and fro across the Channel. One Jersey fisherman made nearly 200 trips across before he was caught and executed.

Women played an important role in Napoleonic espionage. Rachel Charlotte Biggs was an English writer and spy. Between 1802 and 1816, she repeatedly visited France and Napoleon controlled Europe. She corresponded with British politicians and reported her observations about military strength, industry and agriculture and the political state. Her extraordinary story is told in the novel ‘Georgian Heroine’. Another was a countess who allegedly passed secrets to the British via coded embroidery patterns. Femalespies came in many guises and used imaginative ways in which to move intelligence across borders, including hiding micro letters in hatpins! 

Fishermen’s wives and daughters also put themselves in danger by passing on information and giving shelter to royalist spies.

But among the many women spies, the one who really caught my attention was Arabella Williams, originally from Liverpool. Her handler was William Wickham. Wickham was a British diplomat who used his position in Bern as a cover to gather information and coordinate royalist organisations against France. Arabella became known as ‘le petit matelot’ – the little sailor – as she had acted as a courier passing papers between France and England for a number of years disguised as a sailor, without being caught. Arabella had her own property in France where she had lived for some years, which she also used as a safe house for other agents. One of her contacts was Abbé Ratel. Early in the war, Abbé Ratel organised a network of royalists to keep watch around the port of Boulogne and provide early warning of any invasion. Reports were sent to England through fishermen recruited by Ratel – who was reputed to have a very beautiful mistress.

Arabella was described as being petite, very pretty, lively and immensely busy. The group she belonged was extremely successful and despite the gendarmerie’s surveillance they managed to escape detection for many years. Sadly, I can find no portrait of Arabella though we do know that she was an English widow, the daughter of David Mallet, the poet and joint composer of ‘Rule Britannia’!

David Mallet

In France, all those spying for Britain or sympathetic to the royalist cause had to evade the clutches of Napoleon’s Minister of Police, the notorious Joseph Fouché. He was ruthless in his pursuit of British spies or those in France with royalist sympathies, torturing and executing them. He was dubbed ‘the most feared man in France’ and even Napoleon was quoted as saying ‘I fear Fouché more than all the armies of Europe’.

 

Fouché began his career as a maths teacher and evolved into a moderate and then radical legislator. He cultivated every political movement of the day. After preaching clemency for Louis XVI, Fouché voted to send the King to the guillotine. After writing "The first Communist Manifesto of Modern Times" he became a multi-millionaire. He led the brutal repression of an anti-revolutionary movement, earning him the nickname ‘The Butcher of Lyon’. After serving Robespierre, Fouché engineered his overthrow and rose to Minister of Police under the Directory, which he then helped to overthrow before putting his network of informants in Napoleon’s service. After turning against the Emperor, Fouché served the new King Louis XVIII – whose brother he had helped send to the guillotine. Thus, Fouché served the Revolution, the Directory, the First Empire and the Restoration. His face was said to resemble a weasel – and his less flattering portraits bear this out!

 

The threat from spies in France and those with royalist sympathies was very real. There were several attempts to assassinate Napoleon, the most famous being in Paris on the evening of December 24^th 1800. Almost certainly funded by the British, this very nearly succeeded when a cart exploded just after Napoleon’s carriage had passed, killing bystanders.

 

Malmaison, Empress Josephine’s country chateau, was the site of others, including the poisoned snuff put into a replica of Napoleon’s snuff box and placed on his desk there.

 

Although I have changed some of their dates and locations, many of the characters mentioned in my book ‘The King’s Agent’ are based on real people including ‘Le Petit Matelot’, Pipette, the fisherman’s wife, Abbé Ratel (disguised as Father Jacques) and, of course, the infamous Joseph Fouché.

 

‘The King’s Agent’ is the second novella in the ‘Soldier Spy’ trilogy, following the fortunes of the disgraced soldier, Captain Will Fraser and his wounded sergeant, Duncan Armstrong, recruited by the Alien Office to spy for King George’s government.

 

 

 

 

 

Would you like to learn some Ancient Greek? by Caroline K. Mackenzie

Following the bumper box office success of Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey this summer, online searches for ‘Learn Ancient Greek’ have soared and students of all ages are signing up for classes offering entry to this magical language.

Reading Homer’s Odyssey in the original would be my number one reason for learning Ancient Greek. But a close second would be the joy of recognising Greek everywhere in the English language. Therefore in this blog, for fun, I shall share with you fifteen of my favourite Greek words, together with their English derivatives. You may be surprised by how much Ancient Greek you already know!

Each word is introduced by an illustration by Barbarann Lang. The Greek word is given first, followed by a transliteration, i.e. a simple conversion of the Greek letters to their English equivalents, and then the meaning. Underneath each entry I have included just a few English words which owe their etymology to the Greek - you can probably think of many more - and some of the English words have a brief note or explanation. 

Fifteen of my favourite Greek words

1.    ἀγορά (agora) market-place

agoraphobia (cf. φόβος ‘phobos’ = fear)

2.    βασιλεύς (basileus) king

basilica, basilicon, basilisk

basilicon = an ointment of various kinds, as being of sovereign virtue.

basilisk = a harmless crested lizard of tropical America (with a crownlike crest).

3.    δοῦλος (doulos) slave

douleia /dulia, doulocracy, dulosis

douleia /dulia = in the Roman Catholic religion this is an inferior veneration accorded to saints and angels, as opposed to ‘hyperdulia’ that is accorded to the Virgin Mary, and ‘latria’ accorded to God alone.

dulosis = enslavement practised by certain ants on other kinds of ants.

4.    εἰρήνη (eirene) peace

eirenic, eirenicon, Irene

eirenic = tending to create peace.

eirenicon = proposition for peace.

5.    ἐκκλησία (ecclesia) assembly

ecclesiastical, ecclesiology

ecclesiology = study of ecclesiastical traditions and of church architecture and decoration, study/knowledge of the church.

6.    Ζεύς Zeus

deification, deity (cf. ‘deus’ meaning ‘god’ in Latin)

7.    θεά (thea) goddess

atheist, Theobroma, theology, theomachy

theobroma = a genus (group) of flowering plants including the cocoa tree, ‘Theobroma cacao’, the beans of which are used to make chocolate. Theobroma means ‘food of the gods’.

8.    ἄγγελος (aggelos, pronounced ‘angelos’) messenger

angel, angel-cake, angelshark

angelshark = shark with winglike fins.

9.    λιμήν (limen) harbour

limen, liminal, liminality (cf. ‘limen’ meaning ‘threshold’ in Latin)

limen = threshold of consciousness (a term in psychology).

liminality = a literary term which means the use of location, especially the threshold of a doorway, to symbolise a significant moment, e.g. Medea, in the eponymous play by Euripides, makes her dramatic entrance onto stage with the following words, ‘ “Women of Corinth, I have come out of the house” ’ and proceeds to deliver possibly her most powerful speech.

10.    μάχη (mache) battle

logomachy, theomachy

logomachy = contention about words or in words.

Theomachy = a war among or against the gods in Greek mythology, such as the gigantomachy. Book 20 of Homer’s Iliad is traditionally known under the title Theomachia; it opens with a scene on Olympus in which Zeus permits the gods to take part in the battle.

11.    οὐρανός (ouranos) heaven

Urania, Uranus, uranic, uranium

Urania was the Muse of astronomy in Greek mythology. 

Uranus/Ouranos or 'Heaven’ = the father of Kronos , whose mother is ‘Ge’ (γῆ) or ‘Earth’. ‘Uranus’ is also the name given to a planet discovered in 1781.

uranic = of the palate, lit the roof of the mouth.

12.    πύλη (pyle) gate

Propylaia, pylon, pylorus

Propylaia = the monumental entrance, or gateway, to the Acropolis in Athens, built 437-432 BC.

pylorus = the opening, or gateway, from the stomach to the intestines.

13.    χείρ (cheir) hand

chirograph, chironomy, chiropractor, chiropodist, chiropteran, chiropterophilous

chirograph = a written, or signed, document.

chironomy = the art of gesticulation or mime.

Chiropteran = a member of the Chiroptera, an order of mammals comprising bats.

chiropterophilous = flowers which are pollinated by bats.

14.    κεφαλή (cephale) head

cephalalgia, cephalopod

cephalalgia = headache.

cephalopod = a member of the Cephalopoda, or molluscs. They are exclusively marine animals (including cuttlefish, squid, octopus, etc.) with a prominent head and their ’feet’ have become modified into arms or tentacles.

15.    ξίφος (xiphos) sword

Xiphias, xiphoid, xiphophyllous

Xiphias = the common swordfish genus (group).

xiphoid = sword-shaped

xiphophyllous = plants with sword-shaped leaves.

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If you have read this far, thank you! I hope you will agree that Ancient Greek is not a dead language, as often claimed, but indeed is very much alive and kicking. If you have enjoyed the Greek, you may also enjoy my recent publication, Pocket GCSE Greek Etymological Lexicon. This book is not just for GCSE students - it's for anyone who would like to learn some Ancient Greek and/or fun facts about Greek theatre, art, music, pottery, statues, temples, archaeology, philosophy, religion, literature, history, mythology and culture. If you are a Hellenophile, philologist or indeed etymologist, there is plenty for you too!

P.S. I shall be giving an online illustrated talk A Taste of Greek for The Hellenic and Roman Societies on Wednesday 18th November at 6pm, and again on Saturday 21st November at 11am. Whether you are a complete beginner or wish to brush up on existing knowledge, you will be very welcome! Please contact me for further details via my website: www.carolinetutor.co.uk

With many thanks to Barbarann Lang for her beautiful illustrations.

Pocket GCSE Greek Etymological Lexicon by Caroline K. Mackenzie is available from Bloomsbury

Bees and Brehon Law in Medieval Ireland by Kristin Gleeson

 

Brehon Bee Laws

What would happen if bees from your hive swarmed and then settled in a neighbour’s tree, or if you were stung badly by one of your neighbour’s bees? If you were living in Ireland in the 6^th century, the matter would be very clear. In the first case, your neighbour would be entitled half the yield of honey, and in the second case, you would be entitled to a sufficient amount of honey that matched the severity of the sting.

Old Irish style bee hive

Bees and the honey they produced were an important element in early Medieval Ireland and other parts of Europe. They were a significant source of nutrition for people who lived in a land that in many areas was often wet and difficult to farm. Honey also possessed an antiseptic quality that was important for internal healing, as well as external healing. And of course when fermented, it provided a drink that could make you forget how wet and difficult the land was to farm.

In Britain and the rest of Europe the hives were made of straw, coiled into the familiar cone shape and stitched together with thin branches of brambles/blackberries stripped of their leaves and thorns, called a ‘skep’ from the Anglo-Saxon word ‘skeppa’ meaning ‘basket.’ In winter they would put straw tents over the skeps to keep out the elements, called ‘hackles,’ if they weren’t in little stone nooks, or ‘boles,’ like those of the monks of Lindisfarne. In Ireland, however, where cattle grazed outdoors all year and little straw was harvested, I was told by local historians sedgegrass was used instead, well up until the last century. The hives were then thatched against the rain that fell all year round and kept against the south wall of the ‘lios’ or wall of the home area. 

Bees were kept not only on farms but also at religious communities in early Christian times. Monks (managh) and nuns (cailecha) tended the sick and injured among their community, as well people in the surrounding area. One such cailecha was Gobnait, a woman who settled in West Cork and established a convent, or community of women. She became so well known for her healing, with honey as her staple medicine, that her fame spread and eventually, after her death, she became the patron saint of bees.

6th century ruins possibly of St Gobnait's community

With bees such a vital part of the daily lives of medieval Irish people, it is no surprise that they featured in the Brehon laws. “Brehon” is an ancient Irish term for judge. Over the centuries the judges accumulated a series of laws which they passed down orally from one generation of judges to the next. To qualify to become any one of the various levels of judges and lawyers (which in all likelihood were offshoots of the poets (filidh) required that the person study at one of the nemed schools. It was a period of study that lasted a number of years in which they learned poetry as well as the laws.

Under the Brehon laws there were five paths to judgement: truth, duty, right, propriety and proper inquiries. These paths ensured that each case was considered carefully.  The choices were thrashed out beforehand by the respective lawyers in a process called airthacra, which was akin to hearing of legal arguments in modern court case.  Most disputes, however, were usually settled before they wound up in court.

During the early Christian period, from about the 5^th century to the 8^th century the laws and law cases were recorded by Christian clerics and ‘adjusted’ if it the laws didn’t fit the Christian outlook. Most of our knowledge of early Irish or Brehon law comes from these old Irish law texts, mainly composed in the 7th and 8th centuries. Some of these texts have survived in a complete form in later manuscripts (generally of the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries), but many are to be found only in fragments. The best preserved collection of early Irish law texts is that of the Senchás Mar, "great tradition," which is likely to have been organized as a unit about A.D. 800. The texts in this collection are all anonymous, and it is not known where or by whom they were put together. However, most of the place-names and personal names cited in the texts relate to the northern Midlands and southern Ulster, so it is probable that the material derived from this area. It may have been assembled in a monastic law school, such as that at Slane, County Meath.

Much of the Brehon law is founded on the principle of restitution, rather than punishment, so often the judgments involved various types of compensation for any injury done. The cases and laws therefore encompassed much of what mattered in everyday life. The Senchás Mar originally consisted of 50 law texts broken up into three sections. There doesn’t seem to be a strict logic to the arrangements except that similar subjects are grouped together. For example, the law text relating to cats is followed by the law text relating to dogs. 

Ranking of lawyers & other professionals in Ireland

In the first third of the work there is a general discussion of legal topics and a description of St Patrick’s role in its codification. This essay is followed by laws on the formal seizure of another’s property to enforce legal claims against him. There is also a discussion on the acts regarding hostages, laws regarding the “free fief” and fosterage fees, as well as free clientship and base clientship which were two different classes in the highly stratified society that was Ireland. There were also other texts dealing with the laws of marriage and divorce, the arrangement of customary behaviour and the relationship of society to the church.

The surviving final third, like the first third, is not complete by any means. It does have evidence that suggests it may have contained laws on carpenters, coppersmiths and blacksmiths, sick maintenance as well as trapping deer. It also has medical legal texts “Judgments of Blood-lying” and “Judgements of Dian Cecht” (a legendary physician). 

Included in the middle section, the most complete section, are the judgments dealing with trespass by domestic animals, fencing obligations and other related topics. Here we can learn such interesting judgements such as if an animal is killed in a jointly owned herd and the culprit cannot be identified then a lot is cast across the whole herd. The animal on which it falls is held to be responsible. Whether or not that animal is punished is a mystery. Other interesting aspects discussed in this section include rules for bringing water for a mill across a neighbour’s land. Conflict in a situation like this is easily imaginable. A final section, which understandably gets full discussion is "Judgements Concerning Thefts."

It is in this middle section that the Bechbretha or “Bee Judgements” are found. They include a discussion of trespass by honey bees.  It’s there, for instance, we can learn that a person who is blinded by a bee gets a hive in recompense.  Or that there were penalties for a person who moves a hive not belonging to them. And most reasonably we can learn that if a person shakes or disturbs a hive and the bees should attack that person as a result, the owner was free from liability for any injuries that might result.

The Brehon laws stretched back centuries and through them we can understand the daily life of the ancient Irish. If the laws are anything to go by it shows a society that relied heavily on mediation and compensation, perhaps in attempt to avoid more violent acts of retribution, vengeance and punishment.

Bee laws and the Brehon lawyers of the time come into play in my novel, In Praise of the Bees a USA Today Bestseller set in 6th century Ireland.Buy or find out more here or go to my website