Experiencing Illness and the Sick Body in Early Modern Europe

Cover......Page 1
Frontmatter......Page 2
Title......Page 4
Copyright......Page 5
Contents......Page 6
Introduction......Page 8
Some Thoughts on Theory......Page 11
Sources......Page 17
Part I Illness in Everyday Life......Page 26
The Concern for Oneself......Page 28
Disease and the Self......Page 30
The Experience of Pain......Page 34
The Search for Meaning: Religion, Witchcraft and Astrology......Page 40
The Search for Meaning: Illness, Way of Life and Biography......Page 48
The Narrative Reconstruction of Personal History......Page 53
Anxieties......Page 55
The Physician’s Audience: Illness and the Bedside Community......Page 60
Nursing Care......Page 62
The Medical Marketplace......Page 65
The Doctor–Patient Relationship......Page 71
Part II Perceptions and Interpretations......Page 84
Medical Popularization......Page 86
The Cultural Framing of Disease......Page 89
From Temperament to Character......Page 92
Plethora and Apoplexy......Page 96
Fluxes, Gout and Rheumatism......Page 102
Gichter (Convulsions)......Page 107
Acrimonies......Page 108
Skin and Rashes......Page 112
Red Murrain (Erysipelas)......Page 116
Scurvy......Page 117
The Therapy of Acrimonies......Page 121
Miasms and Contagia: Plague, French Disease and English Sweat......Page 122
Indigestion, Winds and Slime......Page 129
Obstruction and Disrupted Excretion......Page 133
Stagnation and Deposits......Page 141
Cancer......Page 142
Pathological Heat......Page 146
Vapors......Page 149
Fever......Page 151
Consumption and Consumptive Fever......Page 154
Expenditure and Exhaustion......Page 156
Dropsy......Page 159
Seminal Economy......Page 160
Part III Dominant Discourse and the Experience of Disease......Page 164
The Sensible Body......Page 168
A New Disease: The Vapors......Page 171
Historical Roots: ‘Vapores’, Hypochondria and Hysteria......Page 172
The Rise of the Nerves......Page 177
Embodiment......Page 180
Critique of Civilization......Page 185
The Sensible Woman......Page 186
The Cult of Sensibility......Page 188
Illness as Protest......Page 192
Ennui and Narcissism......Page 198
Masturbation and Disease......Page 202
A New Crusade......Page 203
Readers’ Response......Page 210
The Social Construction of the Anti-Masturbation Discourse......Page 216
Conclusion: A New Bourgeois Habitus......Page 220
Notes......Page 226
Manuscript Sources......Page 285
Printed Sources......Page 287
Index......Page 296