Tag: Catholic Church
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Martyrs and saints in art, history, and medicine
The concept of martyrdom has deep roots in religious traditions. Christian martyrs suffered and died for their faith, such as Saint Stephen, who was the first Christian martyr, as well as St. Sebastian pierced with arrows and St. Joan of Arc burned at the stake. In Islam, the term “shahid” refers to persons who died…
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Santa Margherita da Cortona
Susan Brunn PuettJ. David PuettChapel Hill, North Carolina, United States From humble beginnings to years as a mistress, Margherita altered her path to become a tertiary Franciscan penitent, attending the ill and poor, founding a hospital, and devoting herself to Christ. She was in the vanguard of several other women of the late Middle Ages…
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Can headless martyrs really walk? The belief in cephalophores in the Middle Ages
Andrew Wodrich Washington, DC Saint Denis of Paris holding his severed head. Mid-15th century depiction from an illuminated prayer book (Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Ms. 5, fol. 35v, 84.ML.723.35v). The halos surrounding his decapitated head as well as the stump of his neck suggest that the soul and saintliness of St. Denis remain in…
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St. Fabiola and her hospital
In about AD 380, a wealthy patrician matron gave money for a hospital to be built in Portus, the ancient port of Rome. This hospital was one of the first of its kind in the western part of the Roman empire, designed to provide care for the multitude of poor people living in the capital.…
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A tangled web: stealing newborns in twentieth-century Spain
Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden Newborn infant. Photo by United States Children’s Bureau, 1940s. National Library of Medicine Images from the History of Medicine. The National Library of Medicine believes this item to be in the public domain. “We were Europe’s baby supermarket and babies were stolen for sixty years.”1 — Inés Madrigal Twentieth-century…
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What’s inside us?: Socio-cultural themes in anatomical naming
Frazer A. TessemaChicago, Illinois, United States Anatomical terms often read as Latin or Greek gibberish whose main purpose is to be obscure trivia in the first-year medical school ritual called anatomy class. But a surprising trend emerges through the English translations of these archaic names: many parts of the human body are named not for…
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Maria Lorenza Longo and the birth of the “Incurabili” Hospital in Naples
Marco LuchettiMilano, Italy In the Middle Ages hospitals were charitable institutions that took care of those that could not afford a doctor at home, such as the poor, elderly, orphans, and single mothers. In Naples there was an urgent need for a large facility with many doctors where “incurable” people could be treated for free.…
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“Some little show of nail”: the health of Anne Boleyn
Mariel Tishma Chicago, Illinois, United States Anne Boleyn. Unknown English artist. Late 16th century, based on a work of circa 1533-1536. National Portrait Gallery. Of all the wives of England’s King Henry VIII, the most well known is Anne Boleyn. She is the woman who, one way or another, caused the split between Henry…
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John Calvin: his rule in Geneva and his many illnesses
At the age of twenty-three the great French religious reformer abandoned his Catholic faith, becoming in time the founder of one of the most important branches of Protestantism. During his life he wrote numerous tracts on various aspects of religion, notably emphasizing predestination and the supremacy of the Trinity, and advocating a simpler and more…