Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Syphilis

  • The Plague of Ashdod, by Nicholas Poussin

    The Plague of Ashdod, Poussin’s famous painting of 1630, is based on the Old Testament account of an epidemic affecting the Philistines after they had captured the Ark of the Covenant from the Israelites and moved it to their coastal city of Ashdod. According to Samuel 1:5, the Lord first destroyed the statue of their…

  • “Moonlight” and silence

    Anne Jacobson Oak Park, Illinois, United States   Woman at the Piano. Pierre-Auguste Renoir, 1875/76. Art Institute of Chicago. At seventeen, I knew little about the limitations or losses that might cause a person to second-guess a vocation, deeply held belief, or identity. Perhaps those questions about the unknowable future inhabit the soul of a…

  • Smetana, his music, his illness

    Bedřich (Frederic) Smetana was one of the major figures of nineteenth century European music. Regarded as the founder of the Czech national school of music, he composed The Bartered Bride opera and the symphonic poem “Má Vlast” (My Homeland) with its beloved Vlatava (The Moldau) melody. Like Ludwig van Beethoven, he composed exceptional music even…

  • Lorenzo Costa: A painting for services rendered?

    Giovanni Battista Fiera was born in Mantua in 1465. He studied at the University of Pavia, from where he graduated in 1485 with a degree in medicine, but extended his interests to poetry, philosophy, and theology. Moving to Rome after graduation, he published there in 1490 one of the first books on dietetics, La Coena…

  • Medicine and trust, behind bars

    Gail Burke New Orleans, Louisiana, United States   The Little Prisoner. Goya, Francisco c. 1810–1812. Etching and Engraving on Woven Paper. Published in Gazette des Beaux-Arts, Vol. XXII. Public Domain: Artstor through Michigan State University Library. Goya enjoyed great prestige as portrait painter of the Spanish elite. However, in his private work his focus was…

  • The forgotten many of the Guatemalan Syphilis Experiments

    Harsh Patolia Roanoke, Virginia, United States   Inoculation site of participant. Image from the Records of Dr. John C. Cutler housed in the National Archives. In 2005, medical historian Dr. Susan Reverby foraged through boxes in the stuffy archives of the library of the University of Pittsburgh for the papers of Thomas Parran, the surgeon…

  • An abominable habit

    Michael Crossland London, United Kingdom   Onania, by John Marten. 1730. Eighteenth Century Collections Online (accessed April 4, 2019). Link Jay is a large man in his twenties with a plume of unruly red hair, giving him the air of an oversized rooster. He is a great storyteller with a contagious laugh, and I always…

  • Women changing medicine

    Lesley CampbellDarlinghurst, New South Wales, Australia This is my account of three generations of women doctors in my family who in different times and different places were subjected to persecution or at least discrimination because of their race, religion, and gender. The account is written in the hope that society in general and medicine in…

  • Clifford Allbutt

    Sir Thomas Clifford Allbutt (1836-1925) was an immensely influential British physician who spanned the transition from Victorian to modern medicine, a Renaissance man who helped advance our understanding of disease in many different areas. He is especially remembered for his work on hypertension and cardiac disease, writing as he was at a time when it…

  • Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and medicine: A triumph over infirmity

    William R. AlburyGeorge M. WeiszNew South Wales, Australia The “Toulouse-Lautrec Syndrome” Renowned 19th century French painter Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s most obvious association with medicine is through his bone disease. The condition from which he probably suffered was first described in 1954 by the French physician Robert Weissman-Netter. It was named pycnodysostosis in 1962 by Marateaux…