The Popularization of Medicine, 1650-1850

In the early modern centuries disease was rampant, medicine had few powerful weapons in its armoury, and the provision of professional medical care was patchy. Under such circumstances it is no surprise that a body of popularised medical writings appeared, aiming to explain how ordinary people could best take care of their own health, in the absence of, or by way of supplement to, professional medical care. Often written by doctors, such books gave simple advice for home treatments, while commonly warning of the dangers of magic, quackery, old wive's tales and faith healing. The Popularization of Medicine explores the rise of this form of people's medicine, from the early days of printing to the Victorian age, focusing upon the different experiences of Britain and France, more marginal European nations like Spain and Hungary, and upon North America. It assesses the wider social and cultural history contexts of the tradition: its religious rationales in radical Protestantism, conflicts between elite and popular culture, challenges to medical monopoly, the spread of medical hegemony. And it addresses the problems of the historical interpretation of medical texts that were probably read and used in ways unfamiliar to us nowadays. The history of the popularization of regular medicine has hitherto been neglected. This pioneering volume charts for the first time a major dimension of the history of medicine in culture.