The English Priest’s Powder: A 17th-century quack doctor’s advertisement

The marketing strategies of 17^th and 18^th-century quack doctors are now familiar territory. As Roy Porter’s outstanding book Quacks did so well to bring alive, early modern Britain was a vibrant medical market, a panoply of colourful characters and dubious remedies. They were, to use Porter’s phrase, “a ragtag and bobtail army of quacks”.

Taking advantage of the newly-available cheap print, quack doctors produced reams of advertisements to peddle their wares. Ranging from brief, straight to the point details to more sophisticated means of selling, quack doctors were often skilled wordsmiths; in many ways they needed to do something to stand out from the crowd. With so many different medicines and vendors jockeying for position, they needed to be innovative. This might include elaborate descriptions of the virtues of their medicine. They often included testimonials from those who, they claimed, recovered through the use of their pill or potion. They might use imagery to embellish their advertisements. Occasionally, though, some particularly innovative strategies can be found. One of my favourite is the clever tool of selling without appearing to sell. One of the ways this was done was by disguising the advertisement in the form of a book. A case in point is the engagingly titled Riddles mervels and rarities: or, A new way of health, from an old man’s experience, published in 1698 by Thomas Mace.

Title page from ‘Riddles and Mervels’ – availble on EEBO (copyright)

At first glance this appears to be a typical ‘self-help’ book, a genre popular in the period. In his opening preamble, Mace sets out his philosophy that age and experience are better than any university-trained, licensed physician. Anticipating howls of derision from the faculty, Mace acknowledged that “I am no physician either by education, graduation, licence or practice’. And yet, he argued, a man like himself of 80 years knew his own body better than any young man of 20 or 30 who had merely spent 5 years reading books in a university. Compelling stuff!

The first hint that all might not be as it first seems occurs early on with the inclusion of the following:

“TO Prevent all Frauds, know, That This Rare Power, known by the Name of the English PRIEST’S-POWDER, is to be had No where but at These few Places Following, viz. By the Author (Tho|mas Mace) at his House in St. Peter’s Parish in Cam|bridge, near the Castle; And at Mr. Daniel Peachcy’s in St. Buttolphs Parish there: And in London, by Mr. Adam Mason at his House in Old Bedlam near Bishops|gate; And by Mr. William Pearson, Printer, at the third Door in Hare Court in Aldersgate-street near the Meet|ing House; And by Mr. John Vaughan, Milliner, at his House in Grivil-street near Hatton Garden; and by Mr. Will. Benson in the Old Baily”

Indeed, advertisements in ‘proper’ books were not unusual, but the alert reader will no doubt note the name of the creator and seller of the powder…one Thomas Mace – the man who claims to be no physician. Disguised within an ‘explication of the title page’, the sell goes on…

“Universall-Physical-Me|dicine, for all sorts of Constitutions, and all sorts of Maladies, Sicknesses, and Diseases, is a Chymical Prepar’d Powder which for some late years past I have Publish’d in the Name of the English PRIE                         T’S POWDER, and which it self is never to be Taken, either Inwardly (as Physick) nor Ap|plyed Outwardly to any Wound, Sore Scab, Bruise, Swelling, Pains, Aches, Head-Ach Rheumetick-Sore-Eyes, &c. All which, and many more, tis most Ad|mirably good for.) I say, it is never (it self) to be us’d or Apply’d (as Me|dicine) But (only) a lycture, which It sends forth, into some Certain Li|quors; into which it is to be Infus’d, for some certain Hours: And Those Li|quors, (Retaining its Virtue) are only to be us’d; And (as Physick) are to be taken, into the Body, in the way of Potion; [...]ther for Vomit, Purge, Glister, or Sweat; But in the way of Chirurgery, are only Outwardly Applyed, by Washings or Bathings &c.

As the book progresses, it seems to revert to the ‘every man his own physician’ style. Mace assured the reader that his intentions were honourable and that he only wished to “Accommodate the Meaner sort of Men; but more especially the Poorest of all, who stand most in Need of Help and Comfort in their Sicknesses, seeing no Great and Skillfull-Physicians, will so much as look after Them, or scarce think of their Miseries; so that many Thousands live in Misery; Languish and Dye, for want of That which every ordinary House keeper might Easily Purchase, and not only have the Benefit of it for himself and his whole Family, during his Life, in all common Sicknesses, and Disea|ses, but might also be assisting to all his Poor Sick Neighbours round Him”

There follows a discourse on the Philosopher’s stone, including several pages of what can only be described as vernacular poetry. A short stanza should suffice:

MUch Talk has been of The Philosophers-Stone,
From Ages past; That by its livge alone,
‘Twould turn Inferiour Metals into Gold.
A Glorious Worder sure, if True; but Hold!
Where is’t? Who has’t? we no such Thing can see;
‘Tis surely Folded up in Mystery

There is even a page of music to allow the reader to literally sing the praises of the remedy!

EEBO (Copyright)

But the next sections of the book, although clothed in a discussion of the miraculous effects of the philosopher’s stone, are in fact a shining example of pure quack rhetoric. On first glance it seems that Mace is merely reporting the effects of the ‘philosopher’s stone’ on a range of conditions. But, looking more closely, his ‘priest’s powder’ has been cunningly woven into the narrative. A clue comes in the title to his first section – “The admired use of this powder (or stone)”…which one is more prominent?!

The real clincher comes in the “Eight eminent stories” of the power of the “powder (and stone)”.  Ranging from the dying man who could not sit upright but recovered almost as soon as he had taken the powder, to the cured leper, to the woman suffering from yellow jaundice, whose “foul, corrupt stomach” was poisoning her food, all were miraculously brought to recovery not only by the mysterious priest’s powder but by the personal intervention of the ubiquitous Thomas Mace…who, as he was no physician but knew his own body, clearly just happened to be passing!

This was selling by not selling. The reader, perhaps expecting a list of cures and remedies for all ailments, and lulled by the promise of being able to cure themselves of all maladies without the need for physicians, surgeons or apothecaries, was instead subject to stealth marketing. Mace provided everything about his powder, including where to buy it and how to use it, but disguised it in a discussion of the ‘Philosopher’s stone’ to try and locate his ‘Riddles and Mervels’ as a scientific discourse. Clearly this was an advertisement, but it shows the innovation of medical retailers, and the lengths to which they went to sell their goods. Little is known about Mace. By his own admission he was an old man, but was he someone with a genuine concern for his fellow man, or just another medical entrepreneur, out to make a fast buck. You decide.

Appreciating the doctor in early modern Britain!

What was the position of the practitioner within the seventeenth-century community?  How did people regard both them and the services they provided? It has often been said that doctors were unpopular. It was, after all, the local doctor’s prescriptions that commonly made you either violently sick, gave you diarrhoea or otherwise left you similarly disadvantaged or distressed. ‘Damn the Doctor’ ran the title of one seventeenth-century satire. Advice given to Lord Herbert about his health in 1681 suggested that he “never see a damn’d doctor again as long as ye shall live”. According to the poet Bernard Mandeville, “Physicians value fame and wealth/above the drooping patient’s health”. Were doctors really disliked that much?

(Courtesy of Wellcome Images)

In fact, there is much evidence to show that people appreciated the services of their local practitioners. This was, remember, a world of sickness. Danger lurked in bad airs, unwholesome environments, noisome streets, unwashed bodies and verminous bedding. It has even been argued that most people felt ill in some way for most of the time.  The local doctor was by no means the answer to all of this; but, (s)he was one weapon in the continuing war waged upon sickness and disease.

It is difficult to access ‘ordinary’ people’s views about practitioners. One way we can do this is through their testimonies in prosecutions, giving a rare chance to hear the actual voices of patients. But, obviously, these only tell us of cases that had gone wrong. Finding testimonies to practitioners who had obviously done well is more challenging. One possible way to do this, though, is through the surviving records of community testimonials to the skills of their local practitioner.

For some doctors, to achieve some level of legitimacy (perhaps more for themselves than their patients) meant obtaining a licence to practice from either the Royal Colleges, the Archbishop of Canterbury or one of the various diocesan bishops. In theory, and indeed in law, all physicians should have obtained a licence, but this was neither practical nor easy to enforce beyond London and its surroundings. Nevertheless, one aspect of applying for a licence was providing some sort of proof of good, charitable or successful practice in a particular neighbourhood.

(Picture courtesy of Wellcome Images)

When David Davies of Llangurig applied for a licence to practice from the Bishop of Bangor in 1749, no less than three local vicars testified that the “said David Davies is a very usefull person in his neighbourhood, has performed several cures in surgery, and (as far as we are judges) we think him a person worthy to be licens’d”.  (National Library of Wales MS Bangor Episcopal B-SM-2).  The supporters of Richard Davies of Llanynys stressed that he was a “person of good character” and “hath performed several cures in surgery”. (NLW MS Bangor Episcopal B-SM-3). When Benjamin Powell of Brecon applied for a licence in 1708, a list of local parishioners supported his application, stating that he was “a p(er)son who is commendably instructed both in the art of Phisick and Chirurgery and is very much Experienced in both the sayd arts, as being one who hath undergone and p(er)formed severall great and desperate cures”. (NLW, Church in Wales Diocese of Llandaff episcopal 1, MS 1194).

It is worth mentioning too that it was not only men, nor ‘orthodox’ practitioners who could rely upon the support of their communities. In fact, where an unlicensed practitioner faced prosecution, the people of Ledbury in Herefordshire intervened and petitioned the Bishop of Hereford to try and save her from prosecution:

“Sir,

The bearer is an honest poor woman of ye parish of Ledbury, who is as far as we are informed, cited into your court for practising surgery. She sometime ago cured a pauper of our parish who had at that time seven small children of a sore breast, without any prospect of reward; and ye parish, hearing of ye service she had done them, ordered ye overseers of ye poor to give her five shill: wch is ye only act of this nature of we can hear she ever did. This matter being so very malitious, we request the favour she may be discharged. She is very poor therefore we hope it may be with as little expence as possible…” (NLW Bodewryd (2), MS 380)

In terms of financial gain, not all doctors were out to fleece their patients. It was not uncommon for practitioners to tailor their bills towards the financial means of their patients. A poor patient might even be treated free, or for a few pennies; a wealthy yeoman might have to spend a few shillings. Also, the local parish authorities could intervene to either bring a practitioner to attend to a sick parishioner or, alternatively, send a parishioner to a large town to secure the services of a well-known or well-respected doctor.

It is worth mentioning too that early-modern people had perhaps a different level of expectation with regard to what the doctor could do. Today, we go to the doctor and expect to be diagnosed – instantly – and sent on our way with a prescription for a ‘cure’. This worked slightly differently in the seventeenth century. When people went to the doctor, they engaged in a two-way dialogue to agree diagnosis and secure a receipt or preparation. Once this was obtained it is questionable whether the early-modern patient expected to be cured. Rather, they hoped to be cured but, if this didn’t work, there were plenty of other doctors and receipts to try – often gleaned from friends and neighbours. If they did recover, naturally they might attribute that recovery to the doctor and his preparation. This would then be retained for future use as a ‘probatum’ (proven) remedy. In this sense, the doctor might easily escape sanction if his cures failed, as the patient was only using his services as one of a range of options in any case.

Before we write off early-modern practitioners as figures of distrust, dislike or ridicule, it’s worth remembering that they were often valued members of a community whose efforts to help their fellow parishioners were appreciated. Often treating the poor for free, and providing an important source of medical knowledge and goods, they offered some degree of comfort in a world where sickness was ubiquitous.

Norovirus and the reporting of epidemics through history

This winter has already witnessed an unprecedented increase in cases of Norovirus – the so-called ‘winter vomiting bug’. For some reason, across the globe, the infection has spread with increasing virulence and also lingered longer than normal in parts of the world now moving from spring to summer.  Norovirus is an especially durable and adaptable virus. It is perfectly suited to what it does; spreading from person to person either through airborne contact with minute particles of vomit, or through surface contact with the virus…on some surfaces it can last for up to two weeks. Given that I have a pathological phobia of vomiting, this one is the stuff of nightmares!

In Britain, the Health Protection Agency is the public face of public health and is charged with providing a virtual barometer of sickness. Their website contains a list of the current maladies doing the rounds and, in the case of flu and norovirus, weekly updates on the numbers of the stricken. The site also contains tips on how to prevent the spread of the virus and some advice (if little comfort) to those who have already succumbed.

To my mind, the information on the HPA website is extremely reminiscent of the information disseminated to the public in past times of epidemic disease – say the seventeenth-century plagues. It strikes me that authorities throughout history have had to balance the need to provide practical details of encroaching sickness with the need to avoid spreading panic. The language of sickness reporting in fact has a long history, and show remarkably similar patterns.

The reporting of the numbers of sufferers, for example, is something that was certainly an important element in the way the Great Plague of 1665 was reported. In seventeenth-century London, the so-called ‘Bills of Mortality’ gave a weekly update on deaths in the city, in the form of a published pamphlet. Information for these pamphlets was gleaned from the ‘searchers of the dead’ – people (often women) who were employed to examine fresh corpses to discern the cause of their demise. Their diagnoses were diverse. In one bill dating from 1629, the causes range from predictable conditions such as measles, cold and cough and gout to other, stranger, ones such as ‘teeth and worms’, ‘excessive drinking’ and ‘suddenly’!

As the plague increased though, the Bills of Mortality became rapidly dominated by these numbers, and Londoners pored over the pages every week to gauge the seriousness of the situation. News of the contagion was a regular topic of conversation and people were eager to learn if things were getting better or worse. The newly burgeoning cheap presses of the mid seventeenth century went into action, with everything from treatises on the causes of the plague to ‘strange newes’ about the latest outbreaks or figures and even popular cures.

The authorities were clearly worried about the danger of epidemic sickness, and took measures to try and limit its spread. One of these was to try and restrict popular gatherings such as fairs, to try and prevent the disease running rampant. This Royal proclamation from 1637, for example, entreated people not to attend the popular Sturbridge Fair that year, the king ‘Forseeing the danger that might arise to his subjects in generall”.

So, the authorities published the numbers of sufferers, took preventative measures against the spread of contagion and, in general, maintained a dialogue with the public, updating them on disease types, currency and potential ways to avoid them. The popular press also served to stir up fears, however, and perpetuated public dialogue about infection. Disease and health have always been topics of conversation but, in times of contagion, they tend to become more concentrated, and people become more engaged in dialogue about them.

Fast forward to 2013 and it is remarkable how similar the situation still is. The HPA website, for example, gives a weekly update on numbers of norovirus sufferers, not only in terms of clinically-reported cases, but of an assumption that for every reported case there are a further 288 or so unreported cases – people who simply decide to stay home and self-medicate. Indeed, at the present time, people are being actively discouraged from attending doctors’ surgeries, and hospital wards are being closed to the public. The impression is one of a wave of contagion breaking over the British Isles and, for me at least, one that is coming to get me!

There is indeed a fine line to tread between reporting facts and sparking panic. When SARS first emerged, there was a great deal of information (and misinformation), with various ‘experts’ calling it variously a massive threat to humanity, or simply the latest in the processional line of epidemics to afflict humankind.  A few years ago, a virtual global panic was instigated by the apparent mutation of avian flu, or bird flu. This outbreak made ‘pandemic’ the buzzword of the late 2000s and, again, much space was devoted (and indeed still is to some degree) on educating people on what it is, who has got it, and how to avoid it. In 2005, a UN health official warned that bird flu was capable of killing 150 million people worldwide. According to Dr David Nabarro, speaking to the BBC at the time “”It’s like a combination of global warming and HIV/Aids 10 times faster than it’s running at the moment,”. The World Health Organization, perhaps seeing the potential panic that this could cause, immediately distanced itself from the comment. The fact that the outbreak was ultimately relatively mild emphasises the problem that epidemic disease causes for health officials. How to alert people without scaring them?

None of this is helped by the press who, like their seventeenth-century counterparts, are keen to give the largest mortality figures, or emphasize the spread of diseases. In June 2012, for example, Reuters were still warning that a global bird flu pandemic could happen at any moment.  http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/21/us-birdflu-pandemic-potential-idUSBRE85K1ES20120621

The same pattern is now happening with the norovirus – although clearly this does not carry the same levels of danger. Here we are talking about contagion, rather than mortality.  Let’s take the headline on the Western Mail newspaper of 20^th December though: “Norovirus: Now more wards are closing as hospitals in Wales hit”. The breathy style of this banner line emphasises its rapidity, not just a straight report, “NOW” it’s coming. What purpose do these reports ultimately serve? Put another way, why do we need to be told? Logically, if preventative measures are possible then it makes sense to tell as many people as possible. But often this is not the purpose of newspaper copy in times of sickness which, to me, almost seems at times to be deliberately provocative.

The answer seems to be a deeply-set human interest in sickness, ultimately linked to our own mortality. Even in this apparently scientific and modern age of medicine, there are still many things which are incurable, and many diseases which have the ability to wipe us out at a stroke. It is this uncomfortable reality which perhaps continues to fascinate and frighten us. We live in an age of control, but some things are still beyond our control, and it is perhaps this innate fear of disease – of our own transience – which makes these headlines ultimately so compelling.

The early modern remedy that should have been!

Just a little light relief to stave off the joint miseries of man flu and a rainy day.

(Dis)ability? Living with impairment in early modern Britain

It is perhaps too easy to view disability in terms of what a person cannot do, as opposed to what they can. Even the terminologies used to describe people (DISability, INcapacity, impairment) all carry negative connotations or suggest a deviation from an ideal or ‘normal’ body. Where sickness or congenital conditions have altered the fabric or capacity of individuals’ bodies, something is implicitly (or often explicitly) assumed to have been ‘lost’, whether physically or functionally.

Looking back at the sickness experiences of individuals through history, it is also too easy to assume that people simply gave up in the face of sickness, or that they were incapable of carrying out a normal life once sickness, injury or old age had afflicted or altered them. In the early modern period, it is highly likely that impairment far more visible than today. In fact, it could be argued that a (by today’s standards) ‘normal’ body would have been highly exceptional.

Given the ubiquity of potentially disabling conditions through sickness and poor diet, for example, skeletal deformities would probably have been much more common, with childhood conditions such as rickets being caused through lack of calcium and vitamin D. Any form of lameness was largely untreatable, except by crude support devices, leaving sufferers to make the best of what they had and, in severe cases, rely on the support and charity of others. As old age set in, the ability to work became restricted and decline could set in rapidly.

Life in pre-industrial society was also highly dangerous in terms of the potential for accidents. Any idea of a bucolic, rustic idyll is shattered by accounts of horrendous accidents caused by seemingly innocuous tasks. In the diary of the puritan minister Philip Henry of Broad Oak, Flintshire, in the mid seventeenth century, for example, is the account of a labourer killed when the man he was working next to swung his pickaxe backwards and took the man’s eye out. The young son of William Bulkeley of Dronwy, Anglesey, called Theophilus, had both of his legs broken when stacks of hay tumbled down on top of him. Theophilus was taken to see specialist bonesetters in Anglesey, but likely walked with a limp for the rest of his life.

There were any number of conditions that could hamper daily life, from skin conditions, lumps and excrescences, to painful and debilitating illnesses, from gout to cancer. With medical treatment for these conditions largely ineffective (at least in biomedical terms), the sick and afflicted were essentially left to shift for themselves. But evidence also suggests that, rather than simply giving up and taking to their beds, many people lived remarkably ‘normal’ lives in the face of seemingly insurmountable physical difficulties. In fact, the resilience of ‘disabled’ people through history is often remarkable.

There are accounts of people, for example who, despite their conditions, endeavoured to carry on regardless, even in the face of severe illness. An entry in Philip Henry’s diary in February 1680 records that he preached twice one Sunday despite the fact that he ‘quakt of ye ague from 8. to 11’ and could not eat or drink in-between. In September 1661, he went to Chester where he developed severe ‘cold and tooth-ake” but still managed to “assisted in study, blessed bee God’. His daughter, also a diarist, noted in one 1692 entry that her elderly father ‘notwithstanding his illness…went on Sabbath June 12, limping to the pulpit’, clearly still intent on carrying out his ministerial duties.

But others in his community displayed a similar stoicism. Henry recorded, for example, the case of Matthew Jenkyn, a local conformist minister who, suffering from ‘a pining sickness…preacht to the very last, being carry’d in a chaiyr from his house to the pulpit’. It was not only religious figures who were keen to defer their opportunity to submit to sickness, perhaps even viewing the adoption of a sick role as inviting misfortune in the same vein as superstitions regarding the making of wills. In 1728, for example, Thomas Edwards, a bailiff from Llanfechell on Anglesey, was ‘indisposed…tho’ getts up every day, yet can hardly crawl from his room to the house & back agen immediately upon the bed’. Despite his obvious pain, Edwards clearly felt obligated to continue his duties and not withdraw from public life.

By the latter half of the eighteenth century, a raft of popular accounts attested to the often astonishing abilities of severely impaired or disabled people. In the 1720s and 30s, one Matthew Buchinger, the “famous little man” of 29 inches high, and born without hands, feet or thighs, made a living by performing a range of tricks and acts including writing, painting and playing musical instruments.  Thomas Pinington could reputedly shave himself despite having no hands, feet or legs, as could John Sear of London. William Kingston of Somerset had no arms, but instead used his feet for everything from shaving to boxing. Handling a lethally sharp blade without injuring oneself was difficult enough, and demonstrating the ability to do so with severe impairments required astonishing dexterity. Perhaps the emphasis upon shaving in accounts of such men as Sear and Kingston was a deliberate tactic given its potential danger, and introduce a frisson of danger, but the overall picture was one of surprise, and even admiration, at the dexterity and capability of such men.

Matthew Buchinger. (For a great blog post on Buchinger, see http://modernconjurer.blogspot.co.uk/2010/04/little-man-of-nuremburg-matthew.html)

The figure of the doddering, elderly fool was a comic staple in early modern Britain as elsewhere, and people expected that age brought loss of facility. Even for the elderly, however,  it was often remarked upon how much they were able to do, rather than how little. Consider the ‘old grandfather’ of the Reverend Arthur Charlett of Oxford in 1716, who noted that the old man could still “shave without spectacles, crack nuts and make his bed” despite his advanced years.

 Such examples remind us that the terminology of ‘disability’ is often unhelpful. Firstly, in contemporary times, it is an often unhelpful and even patronising term. The problem lies in finding something neutral or, perhaps better still, removing the distinction. Secondly, however, such terminologies shift over time. People have understood physical impairment, sickness and deformity differently over time, and it is a mistake to back-project current ideas onto our forebears, or to assume a common experience. As these examples show, living with an impaired body, or an acute medical condition, certainly bore its own troubles, but sufferers adapted and, in many cases, lived normal lives.

By way of conclusion, I heartily recommend a new book, Disability in Eighteenth-Century England (London: Routledge, 2012) on this subject by my friend, and former PhD supervisor, Dr David Turner of Swansea University. Many of the themes and issues I’ve raised here are covered in far more detail in his book and other recent articles for History and Policy. http://www.historyandpolicy.org/papers/policy-paper-130.html

Medicine by Post: A 17th-century doctor’s directions

Medicine in pre-industrial society was loosely structured. Finding a possible practitioner to minister to your ailments wasn’t difficult; they were virtually ubiquitous. From village tooth-drawers, bonesetters, diviners and wise women across to trained, apprenticed or licensed physicians, the range of potential choices for the early modern patient were legion. And yet, this very ubiquity often serves to mask the most basic element in these encounters; what actually happened. What did the doctor say or do? What was the relationship like between treater and treated?

Early modern doctors could not necessarily command authority. Unlike today, where we go to the doctors to find out what it wrong with us, the seventeenth-century patient effectively self-diagnosed. They told the practitioner what the complaint was, and expected them to prescribe accordingly. In Galenic medicine, people knew their own humoural constitutions and largely determined – through their own knowledge and by reference to others – what this problem was.

Nevertheless, the doctor could claim to have esoteric knowledge about how the body functioned. As far as learned physicians were concerned, while the sufferer might well know what was wrong with them, they did not have the necessary understanding of the body to be able to treat it safely. It was therefore only the trained and licensed physician who was qualified to treat the sick properly…at least that was the claim of the trained and licensed physician!

One means through which we can get an idea of the early modern equivalent of the ‘doctor’s appointment’ is through the occasional letters written to patients by practitioners after such encounters. One such letter I encountered during my PhD research, and is located at Glamorgan Record Office, MS D/DF V/202. It is a letter from 1628 addressed to a ‘Mrs Bridges’ but is (extremely frustratingly) anonymous, since the last portion of the letter is missing. Below is my transcription:

‘For Mrs Bridges

When yow come home yow may begin with the Physick wch yow have from hence so soon as yow will: taking it in a manner following, Provide the like Possetale as you did here. To a reasonable draught of that Posetale yow may put two spoonefull and an half of the opening wine. Mix them and put a little sugar to them to relish them: and so drinke it in the morning fasting. Walke, or use some good exercise after it for the space of an hour and halfe, and fast after it for the space of three howers: then make a light meale of boyled meate. The like yoe may do a little before foure of the clock in the afternoons and observe the like course.

But because your body will be apt to be bounde upon the use (of) this physick, therefore I have set you down some syrupes in a glasse, wherof I would have you to take three spoonefull mixed in the former draught any morning when you please.

And, the day after that the full course of the opening wine is finished I would have you take five spoonefulls of the syrupes to a draught of the former posetale and so drinke them warme. And two houers after take a draught of warm thin broth. And at any time when you are costive you may use a suppositorys made with honey and salt boyled to a height and put a little fine powder of Aniseeds and fenell seeds to it when you make it up.

Be carefull in your diet. Eat noe meatte but flesh as is of an easy digestion: as mutton, veale, lambe, capon, chicken or the like: Avoide all raw salletts, or fruites: But for sallets use capers washed in warme water. And sallett of broome budds, or Asparagus or the topps of young hopps are good. Or Cowslipp flowers candiyed and mixed wth a little vinegar. Or rosemary flowers wth a little vinegar and sugar.

I am afrayd your body will not endure the use of wine: but if you use any Let it be onely a draught of mulled claret wine with a sprigg of rosemary, and sweetened wth sugar, and take it in the middle of your meale.

All salt meates and baked, or spiced meates are nought for you: and milk or milky meates are worse.

Yow must endeavour to be cheerefull and avoyde all passions of fear, anger or melancholye.’

There are a number of interesting elements to this letter. Firstly, it is clear that Mrs Bridges visited this practitioner. The letter itself is virtually a follow-up to the appointment, containing some record of the encounter but, more importantly, a full set of instructions and directions for her recuperation. This suggests that the face-to-face encounter was one stage in a process. Where, today, one generally leaves the doctor’s surgery armed with a prescription, this encounter was holistic, and involved a further stage. Put more simply, the ‘appointment’ didn’t end when Mrs Bridges left the physicians premises. This, too, is an important point. In this case – somewhat unusually – she has visited the doctor, rather than the other way around. He mentions her returning home, and also the physic he sent ‘from hence’.

Also noteworthy is the emphasis upon lifestyle, much of which would seem familiar in today’s health-conscious society. Here, the advice is to eat certain foods at certain times, and then in moderation, to ‘be carefull in your diet’ and, crucially, to stay cheerful, stoic and calm. It is worth noting too that the practitioner is ‘afrayd’ that Mrs Bridges’ body would not tolerate wine, although he did leave the door slightly open for the odd tipple.

In early-modern parlance, this was known as ‘regimen’. As surprising as it might seem, given their seeming predilection for dangerous or disgusting remedies, this was a very health-conscious society. Good health was something to be cherished and maintained. It was far better to prevent illness than to treat it. Mrs Bridges’ practitioner took pains to understand her humoural makeup, and based his comments directly upon this. Medicine, in this sense, was individualistic. It is one of the many contradictions of humoural medicine that a remedy meant for one individual should not theoretically have treated another. In practice, people shared and accrued recipes vigorously.

But what this letter gives us most is a little window into the consultation process itself. It gives us some insight into the processes of consulting a practitioner, albeit at probably the upper reaches of society. Bearing in mind that the vast majority of people couldn’t write, the very fact that this letter survives marks it out as exceptional. As more of these fascinating documents are uncovered, we may start to learn more about the early modern doctor’s ‘appointment’, at other levels of society, and with other types of practitioner.

What is a ‘remedy collection’?: Recording medical information in the 17th century

What exactly is a ‘recipe collection’? The most obvious answer is something like the example shown below, a formal ‘receptaria’ book of medical receipts and remedies. In the early modern period, and across Europe, these types of collections were fairly common, and especially in wealthier households. These were often carefully constructed documents, containing indices and sometimes containing groups of remedies according to various types of remedy, or parts of the body. In many ways these were the high-end of domestic medicine.

But were such formal collections necessarily representative? In other words, did everyone (or at least everyone capable of writing remedies down) collect their medical information this way? No. As a great deal of recent work by historians is revealing, the committal of recipes to paper was often a much more haphazard, and far less regimented, process.

For a start, paper was an expensive commodity in the early modern period. It could often be bought easily enough; apothecaries often sold reams or ells of paper, as did other retailers from merchants to haberdashers. But it was nonetheless quite costly. Unlike today, where scribble pads and notebooks can be bought for pennies, the buying of paper, or a bound book of notepaper, would have been something out of the ordinary, especially for those on low incomes.

Firstly, the recording of remedies was an expedient and often pragmatic process.  Remedies usually spread firstly by word of mouth, with people passing on their favourite receipts to friends, neighbours and acquaintances. As Adam Fox’s work on early modern oral culture has shown (Oral and Literate Culture in England, 1500-1700 (Oxford: Clarendon, 2000)) people had a strong ability to commit information to memory, and this made sense at a time when the majority of the population couldn’t read or write. Nevertheless, for those wishing to record the remedy accurately for future use, there was a need to do so quickly, and often using whatever was to hand.

As such, many ‘remedy collections’ are little more than assemblages of roughly scribbled notes, sometimes on torn bits of paper, sometimes on the back of unrelated documents, and sometimes even including a variety of other information on the same page. In fact, the very survival of many remedies is probably attributable to the fact that they have been incorporated into other, non-medical, documents.

Nevertheless, the recording of remedies in certain types of document was often a more deliberate decision. In Wales, for example, there were several instances of medical remedies being written on notepaper purloined from a church. In one sense this was pragmatic and reflected the simple availability (and probably abundance) of paper, given the needs of the church to keep records. But some were written inside church documents. In parish registers, for example, it was not uncommon to find receipts. A common example was that of a ‘receipt for the biteinge of a mad dogge”, often originally attributed to the register of Cathorp Church in Lincolnshire, but which seemed to move around the country. An example of the remedy, occurring in the Monmouthshire church of Llantillio Pertholey, can be seen here: http://www.peoplescollectionwales.co.uk/Item/7637-a-recipe-to-cure-the-bite-of-a-mad-dog-llanti

In another sense, though, putting remedies in amongst religious verses, as often occurred in commonplace books and notebooks, was a way of allying the remedy to the power of religion. If it was next to God’s word on paper, perhaps it would have more power?

Above all, for the remedy to be of any use, it had to be easy to find when needed. Some, for example, kept remedies within the pages of their business ledgers. Here, the regimented layout perhaps suited ease of future reference. But perhaps most common was to keep remedies within the pages of personal sources. Many diarists noted down examples of favoured remedies, especially when they had suffered from an ailment and attributed their recovery to the taking of a particular remedy.

Commonplace books, notebooks and copy books were also common places for the jotting down of useful information, and could be easily referred to if needed. It was not uncommon to put remedies within pages of miscellany, including accounts, quotes, poetry and family records, locating it firmly within the context of ‘useful’ information. Many literate families also kept letters. Health was a regular topic of conversation amongst letter writers, and it was common to fire off a few missives seeking potential remedies from within one’s social network. When a reply duly came, here was a ready-made receipt that could be kept without needing to write it down again. Prescriptions and directions from practitioners might be especially prized as they represented a virtual consultation, specially tailored to the recipient’s humoral constitution.

One often-overlooked method, however, were medical almanacs. It’s worth looking at a typical example of how these sources could be used. Cardiff Public Library MS 1.475 is a small memoranda book dating to around 1708, and seemingly originating from London, with the names John and Elizabeth Price prominent. A little list of family notes inside the front cover reveal a touching and tragic tale.

“February 10^th 1708/9

Married then to the pretty, the charming Mrs Elizabeth Price by the Rev’d Dr Typing of Camberwell.

My daughter Anne was born the 17 of April 1712 about twenty min(utes) after eight in the morning and baptised the 1. of May

She was a very beautifull, lovely child but God was pleased to take it May 3. 1712”

Much of the document, however, is actually drawn on the reverse side of copies of almanacks. These were part-astrological, part-magical and part-news documents which contained everything from prognostications and predictions to religious dates, weather information and medicine. The first almanac in this document is ‘Merlinus Liberatus, being an alamanack for the year of our Blessed Saviour’s Incarnation, 1708…by John Partridge, student in Physick and Astrology at the Blue Ball in Salisbury Street in the Strand, London”. Partridge was clearly an entrepreneur; the very next page of his almanck is dedicated to ‘Partridges Purging Pills, useful in all cases where purging is required”!

A second almanac pasted into the book is “The Country Physician; or a choice collection of physic fitted for vulgar use: Containing 1) a collection of choice medicaments of all kinds, Galenical and Chymical, excerpted out of the most approved authors 2) Historical observations of famous cures collected out of the works of several modern Physicians 3) A Cabinet of specific, select and practical chymical preparations in two parts, made use of by the Author, by W. Salmon M.D”

This sort of document was a cheap means of buying a ready-made remedy collection, complete with the latest thinking and couched in terms of the layman. There were many self-help volumes of family physick available, but these cheaper almanac and chapbook style documents were easier to read and easier to keep. It is also clear that the spaces on the back of pages were useful places to note down other remedies as they accrued.

For example, the Prices noted down a number of receipts on the back pages, including a receipt “To prevent a return of the ague”, another for the “dead palsy”, including mistletoe, oak and saffron, and another for “flushings in the face”.  Here, then, the printed and the written remedy intertwined to become a completely distinct and individual family collection. In many ways this was as formal a collection as a ‘receptaria’, and probably included many of the same sorts of remedies, but in a different form.

The recording of remedies, and the idea of a ‘remedy collection’, therefore, shouldn’t necessarily be limited to a single, formalised and regimented document. These were organic documents, sometimes constructed carefully, but often just growing as collections of rough notes. Remedies might be deliberately placed within documents, or they might be the result of a roughly-scribbled note. Equally, people might keep ready printed or written remedies, and simply add their own notes as required. In this sense, there is no single ‘remedy collection’ document; instead, there are a myriad different ways in which people collected remedies.

Concocting Recipes: The early modern medical home.

It has long been argued that the early modern home was a medical hub. And, in many ways, so it was. Sickness was first and last a domestic experience. It was almost always treated in the home and, given the range of potential conditions, the presence of one or more sick members of the family was doubtless a fairly regular occurrence.

In the main, it was women who were expected to take responsibility for medicating the household.  Women were assumed to be natural carers, and also to have acquired some skill in the preparation of medical recipes, and their application, by the time they reached the age of consent to marry. There were books dedicated to schooling literate women in the art of physick, many including what was effectively a ‘starter’s collection’ of remedies to enable them to treat a large number of common conditions. Indeed, medicine was part of the wider role of ‘housewife’, and ‘huswifery’ meant looking after the inhabitants, as well as maintaining the living space.

The role of men in household medicine is far less defined. There were, for example, no books specifically written to help men cope in the case of domestic illness. And yet they clearly did cope. Diaries, such as those by Phillip Henry of Broad Oak in Flintshire, and Robert Bulkeley of Dronwy, Anglesey, both note sickness episodes of their wives, and suggest that they played a part in caring for them. It is also clear that men played a part in the acquisition of ingredients, often keeping records of where they found herbs for sale cheaply, or which apothecary they regularly purchased from. In this sense, medicine still fitted in to the patriarchal male family role, since it involved a broader input into the physical care and support of the family.

One question that remains largely unresolved, however, is that of how well equipped the early modern home was to cope with sickness. The contents of domestic recipe books suggest not only that a very broad range of skills were needed to be able to concoct remedies, but also that a range of equipment would also be necessary. How well equipped were ‘ordinary’ homes to meet these needs?

One body of sources that lets us peer back inside the early modern home are probate records. When a person died, the probate process often required a list of their household contents to be made to allow their estate to be valued. For the study of the material culture of this period, these sources are incredibly valuable. They are, however, often frustratingly vague, and all depends on the diligence of the individual surveyor. For example, a detailed record might list every individual possession, room by room, including furniture, ornaments, valuables, but also sometimes even book titles and foodstuffs held in storage. Much depended on the intrinsic value of the goods; if they had a resale value, they might be worth including. In less detailed inventories, however, a whole room might be listed under a single entry, with a generic term like ‘household stuff’.

In terms of medical items, this causes a problem. Things like herbs and, perhaps, individual jars of ointments or medicines were too impermanent to list, so don’t appear in the inventories of ‘ordinary’ households and very seldom even in elite household inventories. Equally, finding any equipment that can be definitely be classified as ‘medical’ is problematic, since many had dual usage. Nevertheless, it is still worth speculating based on available evidence, to see if any hints about the material culture of domestic medicine can be gleaned from these sources.

Whilst writing my PhD thesis, to try and address this question, I looked at over 1300 inventories from 82 parishes in the county of Glamorgan in South Wales. I decided to look for two items of equipment in particular – the pestle and mortar, and the brewing still. Many seventeenth- and eighteenth-century self-help books extolled the virtues of a well equipped kitchen. For the seventeenth-century medical writer Thomas Brugis, top of the list of items desirous for those people wishing ‘to compound medicine themselves’ were ‘a great mortar of marble and another of brasse’. A long list of other items were included, from ‘copper pannes to make decoctions’, ‘glasses for cordiall powders’ and a range of medical implements. The popular medical author Gervase Markham, also entreated his idealised English housewife to ‘furnish herself of very good stills, for the distillation of all kinds of waters…for the health of her household’, and the emphasis all round lay firmly with a well-equipped kitchen, able to minister autonomously to sick family members within a household.#

As a baseline test, over 91% of the inventories contained at least one item of kitchen equipment, including pots, pans, crocks and so on. Overall, the suggestion was that the vast majority of homes had at least the ability to concoct basic remedies. As Elaine Leong has recently noted, for example, boiling was needed in around 20-30% of early modern remedies.

But what of more specialised equipment? The results were interesting. Out of 1248 inventories, only 148 (11%) had listed a pestle and mortar. Before 1635, there were no occurrences whatsoever, and a peak of ownership didn’t seem to occur until the early eighteenth century. Whilst this figure of 11% should definitely be taken as a bare minimum to allow for inevitable under-recording, this still seems surprisingly low. What was also clear, though, was that the item was more common in better-off households, and also in urban areas. The pestle and mortar would have been a basic utensil for grinding herbs and spices into powder. Whilst not owning one certainly can’t be used as evidence to say that a home wasn’t ‘medical’, its lack of appearance is still noteworthy.

Turning to the ‘still’ or ‘limbeck’ the results were even more striking. A still was a multi-purpose item, which could be used for home brewing, as well as the distillation and fermentation of substances for medical recipes. It has recently been calculated that around 10% of remedies required a still in this period. Despite this, the Glamorgan inventories yielded a total of only 41 references in 1248 inventories, giving an average of less than 3%. Here again, ownership was general limited to wealthier households.

[A full statistical analysis, including comparisons with other Welsh counties was included but, for the sake of brevity, it’s not detailed here. See Alun Withey, Health, Medicine and the Family in Wales, 1600-1750 (Swansea University, Phd Thesis, 2009)]

It is also worth noting (albeit perhaps unsurprisingly as noted earlier) that no inventories contained any reference to medical remedies, ingredients or substances, and only a bare few contained items which could be construed as ‘medical’, such as a blood dish in one home, and a ‘nurseing chayre’ in another.

What do these results tell us? They certainly don’t tell us that early modern homes did not manufacture their own medicines, nor that they were incapable of doing so. Even the most basic of utensils could be used in this process, and the majority of homes possessed these.

They also don’t reveal much physical evidence of medicine, such as a ‘storehouse’ of remedies or ingredients, but this is, in many ways, entirely logical. Medicine was transitory and pragmatic. Recipes were often concocted as and when needed. Some, like ointments, could last for years and be kept, but many were too impermanent to keep. Also, just because they weren’t listed, doesn’t mean they weren’t there. Whilst some historians are beginning to question the extent to which each household physically grew its own herbs, it’s plausible that many did.

But what is also interesting is the availability of ingredients for remedies in even the smallest rural shops. People could purchase exotic herbs and spices from their village shop, as well as compound remedies such as plague water and Venice Treacle. It is entirely possible that the extent to which domestic production was intertwined with the medical marketplace has yet to be appreciated.

In any case, there is a need for more studies into the material culture of early modern domestic medicine. If the early modern home was indeed a medical hub, a wider study should give us a broader understanding not only of what medicines people used in their homes, but how they made them.

Social Networks and the spread of medical remedies in early modern Britain:

Much recent work by historians has highlighted the extent that medical knowledge was part of a ‘knowledge economy’ in the early modern period. Put simply, health and medicine were regular topics of conversation, whether in person or by letter. Just like today people told each other of their symptoms, suggested favourite remedies or recommended particular doctors. In some ways too, early modern people were perhaps more sensitive to their own bodies than we are today; they understood their bodies through a framework of the four humours, and had some idea of their own particular humoral balance. Also, they monitored their health constantly, ever vigilant for potentially unusual or dangerous changes.

With less easy access to medical practitioners for many of the population, self-medication was the first recourse in times of sickness. It made sense to have an armoury of remedies at the ready, just in case. In literate households, manuscript collections of remedies were effectively the next best thing to a consultation with a physician. But how were these collections assembled? Where did the remedies come from? By looking at a typical eighteenth-century recipe book in more detail, we can start to see the ways that medical information travelled through social networks in early modern Britain.

Between roughly 1706 and 1717, Amy Rowlands of the wealthy Rowlands family of Plas Gwyn, Anglesey, compiled her own book of medical and culinary receipts (available to see at the University of Bangor library, as MS Henblas A5). Her book is typical of the form. It is carefully laid out, written in a fair hand and fully indexed, following the format of a ‘receptaria’ medical book.  The image below is from the first page of the book, where Amy seems to be trying out a few writing exercises, based on a moral pnemonic.

Amy’s book contains more than a hundred recipes for a variety of conditions and using a wide range of ingredients. This one, “for the stone”, is fairly typical.

“Dry the roots of Red nettles and make them into pouder and drink a spooonfull of the powder thereof in a draught of white wine something warme and it will break the stone though itt bee ever soe great. And that with speed use it every day until the stone and gravell be all broken and consumed, A thinge of smale prices and great virtue”.

Looking through the book, it is clear that the sources of Amy’s recipes were broad, and included local acquaintances as well as a variety of more intriguing sources. Some, for example, were clearly given directly to her by people from her network of family and friends. Examples of these include:

‘To make Ginger Bread with honey Madam Griffiths way’‘To make Ginger Bread the best way Cosen Sidney Rowland is way’.

“Madam Griffiths is more difficult to trace, but ‘Cosen Sidney Rowland’ lived in Dewis Bren near Llangollen, and therefore in reasonably close proximity to Amy.  “A Reciept for a Consumptick Cough” was provided by  “Mrs Jane Williams of Ty yn ystrithsons”, clearly another acquaintance, as was a recipe for “flower water” attributed to Mrs Griffiths of Carnarvon – again, in very close proximity to Amy’s Anglesey home.

Aside from family and friends, there were other potential sources of remedies. One recipe, for example, was kept from a consultation with a practitioner:

“A Diett drink Dr Humphreys Recett to me Amy Rowlands

Take of the bark of Ash of the tender twigs of tamarisk of each two ounces of the same of Brooklime: scurvy grass, Liverwort, Hartshorn, Agrimony: Sage of each one handful: of Sene three ounces. Bruse all these and infuse them in seven quarts of smale(?) ale: after 24 hours you may drink of itt about half a pint furst in the morning and last att night you may ad quince seeds Brused to correct the wind if you please”.

For me, these records are especially interesting. Firstly, and obviously, they confirm that Amy sought the help of a doctor – one ‘Dr Humphreys’. Receipts attributed to doctors often appear in remedy collections, without the author having necessarily ever consulted the physician in question. Hence can be found remedies such as “Dr Butler’s receipt for the plague water”, noted in several collections from Wales at this time.  The inclusion of the title leant provenance and value to the remedy, especially if it had a positive reputation. Amy’s note here, however, strongly suggests that she had met (or perhaps consulted by post) this “Dr Humphreys”, and she recorded his directions for future use. Locating Humphreys is difficult given the commonness of his surname, but he was likely a local practitioner or apothecary, and unlikely to have been licensed.

Indeed, Amy Rowlands was seemingly not overly concerned about the ‘professional’ credentials of a practitioner; it was the reputation of a remedy that mattered more. A remedy for a ‘Meigrim in the head’ is included, attributed to “Pembrockshir Bess” – perhaps a cunning woman or magical healer.

Sources could, though, also come from much further afield, and suggested spread by word of mouth, rather than personal acquaintance.  The remedy below is attributed to “Mrs Pitt who lived in Stippleton in Dorsettshire” and is a receipt to make “a very good seercloth”. Amy included a note that she had made this recipe herself, and found it good – perhaps the best indicator of its reliability.

The efficacy of a remedy, though, was not just based on whether it had cured the author of the collection; the opinions and testimonials of others were just as valuable.

‘An infallible cure for sore Eies effected on Captain Fitspatrick in London when Given Over by all doctors, Given me by Mr Moris Owens of Holy Head

Taking some Garlick and pound them and bay salt together into a sort of a pultiss and apling them to the soles of the feet spread on leather for nine nights sucksesifly the which has done a wonderful cure upon the above Gentilman

In this example, the benefactor of the remedy was “Mr Moris Owens’ who perhaps (although by no means certainly) knew the ‘Captain Fitspatrick’ upon whom the initial remedy was so successful. Here, the remedy had travelled a physical distance (from London to North Wales), but had also moved through a social network by several removes, connecting people who otherwise had nothing to link them.

It is this last point that really highlights the value of these fantastic sources. They certainly reveal much about medicines, ingredients and the physical processes of manufacturing remedies in the early modern period. But, in cases where authorship and attributions are known, they also reveal much about the diversity of sources of medical information and the sheer wealth of medical knowledge that was available. Far from being helpless in the face of sickness, people in fact were surrounded by potential sources of relief. Recipe collections offer us a unique insight into this process.

(Images are copyrighted to me, and used with permission of the archive at Bangor University: Please do not reproduce them without the express permission of Bangor archives. Thanks)

The mystery of ‘Sansom Jones’ – the phantom Welsh doctor

“This book I had from — a resident of this parish (Bettws in Monmouthshire), who swears it was the book of Sansom Jones a physician of this county, some two hundred years ago”.

This note, dated around the early twentieth century, appears in the front cover of an intriguing manuscript – Cardiff public library MS 2.126. Since I first came across the document in 2005, it has fascinated me as it represents something of a mystery. It is, or at least appears to be, a remedy collection dating to around the early seventeenth century. It looks and feels ‘right’. The palaeography is consistent with a document of that age. The layout is what you’d expect from an early modern receipt book and the remedies are neatly written and ordered. And yet it is one of the most frustrating sources I have ever looked at.

It should be a fascinating view into the medical world of that most rare of creatures – the early modern Welsh doctor. We even have his name – relatively unusual for sources of this type. Except, so far, “Sansom Jones” has eluded every attempt I have made to find out more about him…or even to establish whether he even existed. He highlights one of the big problems for historians in trying to piece together individual lives through scattered documents. We have a few pieces of the jigsaw, but not the final picture. It also raises the danger in assuming that documents in local or county archives are necessarily from their own area.

Let’s start at the beginning of the ‘Jones’ document. The first couple of pages are interesting. The book begins with a list of standard apothecary measures – a common enough inclusion, especially if this were the book of a practitioner. Lists of scruples, drachms and other measures were necessary and useful in compounding the correct measures and dosages of remedies. But then the plot thickens, and the name ‘Bethia Marsh’ is written in bold script, suggesting authorship or ownership; more about that later. But also prominently written is the following heading:

“Noblest teaching of urine to know the proffices thereof for the nature of man and woman which is known through urines. Through which urines the sicknesses of men are knowne, translated out of lattine (sic) into English. By mee Alexander Spraggot. 1569. May ixiiii”.

So the plot thickens. Here we appear to have the title page of a published book by the eponymous Mr Spraggot. We have an exact date and so, at least, a starting point. Looking at the book as a whole, it does ‘feel’ very much like a published work. It is very neatly set out and has, quite unusually, a complete alphabetical index at its end.

There is a section on uroscopy (the diagnosis of medical conditions by the appearance, smell and taste of human urine), followed by some general notes on life and health. These include “To knowe life or death/tokens of death”, “A treatise of Hypocras”, with astrological notes on sickness and other general observations including notes on why students are unhealthy – essentially because they spent so much time in motionless reading! The rest of the volume is given over to medical remedies, generally set out in order of different parts of the body.

For headaches, for example, there are remedies for “headach proceeding of a cold cause”, “headache proceeding of heate”, “for the mygrim or rigrim” and so on. Several pages deal with purges for various conditions, including “melancholie”, “palsey” and also specific diets, e.g. for the “rhewme”. There are sections on obstetrics and childbirth as well as conditions relating to both men and women. Given the standard practice of using animal, plant, and any number of other materials (!) in remedies of this time, there is ample evidence of a full range, and nothing out of the ordinary.

In many ways, there is much to support a theory of this as being the book of a practitioner; it contains just the sort of useful information that a practitioner might rely upon in his daily work. There is little evidence to suggest attributions in the book. In ‘domestic’ remedy collections (i.e. those used in families) it is common to find recipes gifted from others – e.g. my aunt’s remedy for a cold, Mrs x’s receipt for the gout, and so on. But this book has none, suggesting a more formal purpose. The fact that it is written in fair hand also supports a deliberate and disciplined document.

But if we look deeper at the document, what else might it reveal? Firstly, who was Alexander Spraggot? Did he indeed write a book called ‘noblest teachings of urine’, or might this be an unpublished manuscript from 1569? The answer to the latter is no. In terms of the date, I was partly lucky, since the paper was watermarked…but even this is slightly mysterious. Having sent a copy of the watermark to a colleague who specialises in this area, the watermark turned out to be from an unusual source for an early modern Welsh document…it was from Russia. Not only this, it dated no earlier than the mid seventeenth century, meaning that, at the very least, any copy from Spraggot’s original must have been done nearly a century later.

Searching under the name Alexander Spraggot reveals few likely candidates. Perhaps the most likely seems to be ‘Alexandrus Spraggot’, appointed the vicar of Martocke church in Somerset in 1564 – not a great distance from South Wales. But did Spraggot ever author a work of this name? Not as far as I can tell. There are no records in the British Library of a book by this title or author, so here the trail runs cold.

So what of the second name mentioned in the book – Bethia Marsh? Here again, I’ve drawn something of a blank. A lady of this name was born near Salem, Massachusetts in 1650 – roughly around the date of the creation of the book (or at least its paper), making her an unlikely candidate. The name isn’t especially Welsh either. One possibility is that Bethia was, at some point, the owner of this book which, after all, contained a large number of useful remedies. It was common for people to write their names in such books to assert ownership, and also for remedy collections to move across families as they were gifted, especially to newlyweds.

What, finally, of Sansom Jones, the mysterious Welsh practitioner of Bettws, south Wales? Is there anything to suggest that he was the true owner of the book? Sadly not. Having looked for the relatively unusual name of Sansom in likely parish records, I can find no trace…so far. He was not, at least as far as the records suggest, a licensed physician. His name doesn’t appear on any list of known doctors, nor does he appear to have been apprenticed or trained. None of this, of course, means that he never existed. He could, as many Welsh practitioners did, have simply carried on his medical practice to the local population unhindered by the need to obtain a licence, being so far from the centre in London. With such an indistinct date, he might have been of a later time period, with a misjudged attribution by the note writer. Another possibility is that he was actually from a different ‘Bettws’ than the one in Glamorganshire; there are several across Wales.

And so the search continues. As I turn my attentions back to Welsh medical practice (after a hiatus studying shaving and rupture trusses in the eighteenth century) the need to find out more about the daily life and work of Welsh doctors will again become paramount. If Sansom Jones was there, and if this was indeed his book, I want to find him, as ownership of these types of documents does much to provide an alternative to depictions of Welsh doctors as obsessed with folklore and magic.

p.s. If anyone can shed any light on any of this, I’d be very grateful.