The Apothecary’s Chest: Magic, Art & Medication
University of Glasgow
Saturday 24th November 2007
9.00-9.30: Registration(all sessions till 17.00 will take place at 4 UniversityGardens, University of Glasgow)
9.30-10.45: Opening Plenary Address
Dr. Lauren Kassell, Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge,
‘Quacks and Conjurors: The Figure of the Medical and Magical Practitioner in Early Modern England’
10.45-11.00: Coffee & Biscuits
11.00-12.30: Session 1
Panel 1
Disease and Religion
Chair: Maria-Daniella Dick, University of Glasgow
Jacek Kowzan, University of Glasgow
‘“I will put none of these diseases upon thee (…) for I am the Lord that healeth thee” (Ex. 15, 26) Christ as a Pharmacist and Healer in Iconography and Literature of Early Modern Times`
Alexandra Bamji, University of Glasgow
‘By the milk of the Virgin Mary let this illness be gone`: Healing, Superstition and the Inquisition in Early Modern Venice`
Panel 2
Talismanic Materials: Statues, Stones and Pills
Chair: Warren Steele, University of Glasgow
Emily Jane Anderson, University of Glasgow
‘Kill or Cure: Sekhmet, the Lioness Goddess of War and Pestilence, Patron Deity of Physician Priests; her Veneration during theReign of Amenhotep III`
Tom Blaen,University of Exeter
‘The Popular Use of `Precious` Stones Medically in Early Modern Scotland`
Athena Peglidou,University of Thessaly, Volos, Greece
‘Theodora, `the pills` and the Saints: Female Practices Toward Psychotropic Medication and its Symbolic Uses`
12.30-13.30: Lunch
13.30-15.00: Session 2
Panel 1
Science & Superstition
Chair: David Shuttleton, University of Glasgow
Lindsey Fitzharris, University ofOxford
‘Magic, Mysticism, and Medicine: John Webster, a Helmontian Physician’
Megan Coyer, University of Glasgow
‘The Phrenological Dreamer and the Tale of Terror: An Examination of the Popular-Medical and Literary Writing of Robert Macnish’
John Miller, University of Glasgow
‘Animal Magic: Conjury and Power in Colonial Taxidermy`
Panel 2
Literary Healing & Disease
Chair: Christina Fawcett, University of Glasgow
João de Mancelos, CatholicUniversity, Viseu, Portugal
‘Old Spells, Magic Herbs and Frightening Creatures: The Curandera in Rudolfo Anaya`s Bless Me, Ultima`
Anna McHugh, UniversityCollege, Oxford
‘Cutting Out the Apothecary: Challenges to Medical Authority in Middle English Poetry`
Christa Mahalik, WesternConnecticutStateUniversity
‘The Rising Gorge: Poison, Hamlet, and the Seven Deadly Sins’
15.00-15.15: Coffee & Biscuits
15.15-16.45: Session 3
Panel 1
Art’s Antidotes
Chair: Melanie Jones, University of Glasgow
Rachel Grew, University of Glasgow
‘A Wizard / Witch’s Dual: Gender Power Struggles and the Occult in Surrealism’
Catriona Fay McAra, University of Glasgow
‘Prescription Narratives: Re-reading Joseph Cornell’s Pharmacy series as ‘Modernist Antidote’’
Corin Depper, KingstonUniversity, London
‘Theatres of Memory and Restraint: Matthew Barney amongst the Neo-Platonists’
Panel 2
Shamanism
Chair: Amy Tooth Murphy, University of Glasgow
Robert Davis, University of Glasgow
‘Shamanism Between Discovery and Invention’
Harry Whitehead, LancasterUniversity
‘The Quest for Quesalid: Myth-making and Rationality in the Initiation of a Shaman`
Gregory Burgin, University of Glasgow
‘The Healing Art: The Shamanistic Path of the Artist`
16.45-17.00: Change of Venue: GlasgowUniversityHetherington Research Club
17.00-18.15: Closing Plenary Address
Prof. Bill Herbert, School of English Literature, Language and Linguistics, University of Newcastle,
'From the Gene Genie tothe Sham Shaman: Roles of the Contemporary Poet (a talk/reading)'
18.30: Wine Reception and Buffet at Hetherington Club
Abstracts
Dr. Jacek Kowzan, Slavonic Studies, University of Glasgow
“I will put none of these diseases upon thee (…) for I am the Lord that healeth thee” (Ex. 15, 26) Christ as a pharmacist and healer in iconography and literature of early modern times”
The paper will explore the theme of Christ as a physician and apothecary, indicate the biblical sources, (eg. Ex. 15, 26; Matthew 11, 28) and study briefly the history of this motif: one frequently used in Christian art and literature since patristic times. This depiction of Christ in devotional pictures and as a literary motif became widespread in Europe, especially in Germany, in late medieval and early modern times. It is claimed to be a motif developed by Protestant theology. Although thistopic has been studiedand discussed previously by German scholars, it seems worthy to present it here, as it portrays the rich symbolismthat pharmacy, and medicine in general, offersartists and authors (eg. Thomas Moore used the motif in his Dialogue of Comfort and the Four Last Things), and itdemonstrates the immense symbolicpotential of medicine inhuman culture.
Dr. Alexandra Bamji, Department of History, University of Glasgow
‘By the milk of the Virgin Mary let this illness be gone’: healing, superstition and the Inquisition in early modern Venice’
In the early modern world, the sick and their friends and families took a pragmatic, and pluralistic approach to disease, seeking help from healers who employed treatments which might be labelled ‘medical’, ‘religious’ or ‘superstitious’. This paper will trace the medical pluralism of healing practices in seventeenth-century Venice, and highlight how remedies used by individual healers were themselves pluralistic, drawing on multiple spheres. I will develop case studies of two groups: exorcists, and female healers who were often accused of witchcraft, and examine why such individuals were often questioned by the Inquisition on suspicion of heresy. I argue that the pattern of these trials indicates how the influence of the Church and its attempts to uphold religious orthodoxy influenced healing practices, and suggest that the labelling of certain activities as ‘superstitious’ was not simply driven by ‘professionalising’ medical practitioners. I will conclude by discussing the blurred boundaries between witchcraft, religion, superstition and healing in early modern Venice.
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Emily Jane Anderson, Department of History of Art, University of Glasgow
‘Kill or cure: Sekhmet, the lioness goddess of war and pestilence, patron deity of physician priests; her veneration during the reign of Amenhotep III’
This paper will explore the rôles of the Egyptian lioness goddess Sekhmet, her status as the patron deity of physician priests and Amenhotep III’s particular reverence for the goddess. Sekhmet is usually regarded as the goddess of war, destruction, violent storms and pestilence yetalso had the power toheal and prevent disaster. Small representations of Sekhmet were worn as amulets and she was often invoked against outbreaks of plague. One of the symptoms of the Lepromatous form of leprosy is Leontiasis, defined as the ‘lionising’ of the facial features, and this may have helped determine the appearance or responsibilities of the goddess; leprosy is described in the Ebers papyri (c.1550 B.C., Leipzig). The 18th Dynasty pharaoh Amenhotep III (reigned c.1390-52 B.C.) probably dedicated around 730 statues of Sekhmet at his mortuary temple at Kom el-Hetan on the west bank of ancient Thebes. Hundreds of these statues remain at the temple of Mut at Karnak, where many were later moved. It has been suggested that Amenhotep III may have had painful dental abscesses which perhaps inspired him to erect so many statues to the goddess. Six of these statues of Sekhmet are currently in Scottish public collections.
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Tom Blaen, Department of History, University of Exeter
‘The Popular use of ‘Precious’ Stones Medically in Early Modern Scotland’
This talk draws together some of the findings from my PhD entitled ‘Precious Stones in Early Modern Britain: Society, Culture and Belief’. This conference setting seems the appropriate place to examine the atypical use of precious stones in magic, medicine and lay religion in the Highlands of Scotland, practices which in both their number and recording seem distinct from those elsewhere in Britain. In this talk I will observe how stones (particularly rock-crystal) had a vibrant tradition of being dipped in water for various medical and animal husbandry remedies. Sometimes these were held by the local Laird or community leader, other times they can be found in the cabinets of practicing empirics. This could often lead to allegations of witchcraft and magic. In addition many of these stones had important religious connections, often to saints, yet unusually were present in firmly Protestant communities. Finally I will offer a speculative possible explanation for this culture of belief surrounding stones, which suggests that the notions and practices are historically more deep-rooted than would have previously been thought.
Dr. Athena Peglidou, Department of History, University of Thessaly, Volos, Greece
‘Theodora, ‘the pills’ and the Saints: femalepractises toward psychotropic medication and its symbolic uses’
This paper explores the attitudesof female depressive patientstoward psychotropic medication, ‘the pills’ as they refer to, and its meanings by using ethnographic data from an urban context in north-western Greece. The analysis maps out that psychotropic medication is the most common psychiatric treatment and is not at all a neutral matter but an ambivalent one. Drug is represented in everyday experience either as pharmaki, poison in Greek, a substance that can kill or drive mad or as pharmako, a remedy that can cure. In this last case, my informants construct their suffering in somatic terms and they designate psychotropic drugs as ‘pills for the nerves’, ‘for the insomnias’, or ‘for the headaches’. But exposing them or talking about them can stigmatize the sufferer. So ‘the pills’ have to be carefully hidden. However the apparent women’s submission to medical knowledge and masculinity isn’t proportional to the compliance to the physician’s prescription. Very often women contradict medical power by negotiating or even by rejecting medication. The invocation of supernatural cosmology, namelyof the divine figures of saints who are considered apt to control the psyche’s fortune in an Orthodox context, is analysed as an empowering practice in the asymmetrical gender relations in the particular medical encounter. Between the medical power that is symbolized by the writing of the prescription and the religious one that is symbolized by the reading of the prayers, the case of Theodora is extremely eloquent of the ability or disability of women of low education to negotiate their submission to literate and therapeutic authorities.
Lindsey Fitzharris, Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, University of Oxford
‘Magic, Mysticism, and Medicine: John Webster, a Helmontian Physician’
In 1949, Phyllis Allen characterised John Webster as a curious mixture of science and superstition. He was a man who used occult explanations to disprove the existence of witchcraft. He was a man who combined the alchemical philosophies of van Helmont and Paracelsus with the ‘scientific’ theories of Bacon and Descartes. He was a man who believed the advancement of medicine depended on an archaic understanding of magic and alchemy. Since then, this eclectic figure has been cast in the simple role of schoolmaster and polemicist by historians only interested in his educational tract, the Academiarum Examen (1654). Nevertheless, Webster should be understood first and foremost as a seventeenth-century Helmontian physician. His writings reveal an intense interest in alchemical medicine which lasted an entire lifetime. It is his medical philosophy which shaped and guided his ideas in each of his works. Even Webster’s educational proposals in the Academiarum Examen can only be fully appreciated when seen as part of his continued battle to incorporate alchemy and chemistry into the medical curricula of seventeenth-century English universities.My paper will explore each of Webster’s three major publications within the context of his ongoing commitment to Helmontian medicine. With the exception of this one persistent strand in Webster's thought, he emerges from my study as a complex thinker who drew upon many intellectual traditions and thus defies simple generalizations.
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Megan Coyer, Department of Scottish Literature, Universityof Glasgow
‘The Phrenological Dreamer and the Tale of Terror: An Examination of the Popular-Medical and Literary Writing of Robert Macnish’
Robert Macnish (1802 – 1837) was both a literary man and a physician, and his life and career exemplifies the high level of integration between the scientific and literary communities at this time. His popular medical work, The Philosophy of Sleep (1830), scientifically examines altered states of consciousness, which were traditionally associated with supernatural experiences, and the second edition of the work, published in 1834, includes a chapter devoted to spectral illusions. During Macnish’s lifetime, several popular medical writers produced works that attempted to provide a physiological explanation for spectral illusions. Some members of the literary community argued that such works threatened the visceral impact that a reader’s belief in the supernatural added to narratives of mysterious events. However, Macnish’s fictional prose supports physiological explanations for strange subjective experiences by emphasizing the intense physicality of these experiences for the characters within the narrative. This paper will examine (1) the development of Macnish’s phrenological theory of spectral illusions in relation to the theories of his contemporaries; (2) reactions to his work in literary reviews of the periodical press; and (3) the dynamic relationship between Macnish’s popular medical and fictional prose.
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John Miller, Department of English Literature, University of Glasgow
‘Animal Magic: Conjury and Power in Colonial Taxidermy’
When the British naturalist A. R. Wallace arrived at a village in the Indonesian Aru Islands in 1857 during a specimen hunting trip among remote forests, he found himself faced with an awkward question. Looking at his carefully preserved collection of animal skins an old man asked, “What becomes of them when you go on to the sea?” Unsatisfied by Wallace’s evasive reply, the tribesman supplied his own hypothesis: “They all come to life again, don’t they?” “And so”, Wallace concluded, “I was set down as a conjurer and was unable to repel the charge”.
Despite Wallace’s apparent discomfort, the association of magic and the taxidermic “reanimation” his specimens were destined for was often (problematically) embraced in Victorian travel narratives and the fictions they inspired. While such developing technologies of animal representation appeared to offer a determinedly rationalist exhibition of colonial might, taxidermy’s mystical trompe-l’oeil also invested the animal body with a uncanny aura: a living death that named the craftsman as priest as much as scientist. In this context colonial taxidermy appears not just as a sign of power, but also of marginality: a visceral but delicate process that while it serves the cause of Empire exiles the practitioner into a troubling realm outside normative categories of imperial masculinity.
Dr.João de Mancelos, CatholicUniversity, Viseu, Portugal
"Old Spells, Magic Herbs and Frightening Creatures: The Curandera in Rudolfo Anaya's Bless Me, Ultima"
The curandera, "the woman who heals", is a recurring figure in the novels of the most celebrated Mexican American writer, Rudolfo Anaya. Ultima, Ismelda, Lucinda Córdova, and Lorenza Villa are characters inspired by the traditional curandera, who resorts to herbs and old spells in order to cure patients, both physically and mentally, since diseases are approached from a holistic perspective.
In this paper I will concentrate solely on Ultima, the most memorable curandera in Anaya's fiction.First, I briefly analyze the folkloric and social value of this figure in the Southwestern communities. Secondly, I exemplify how Ultima: a) Involuntarily causes a clash between witchcraft and Catholicism; b) Resorts to her deep knowledge of curative plants and to the art of nagualismo (the capability of transforming herself into an animal); c) Performs a healing ritual according to the tradition. In order to do so, I resort to: the novel Bless me Ultima; the work of Mexican American folklorists; the opinion of several specialists in the fiction of Anaya; an excerpt from an unpublished interview the author granted me.
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Dr. Anna McHugh, UniversityCollege, Oxford
‘Cutting Out the Apothecary: Challenges to Medical Authority in Middle English Poetry’
The figure of the apothecary is often ridiculed as much as the lecherous friar in the Middle Ages, yet he possesses a sinister and tantalising power which commands deference and fear. Two poets sought to challenge that power by ridiculing, respectively, the figure of the apothecary himself, and the business of diagnosis which is his special purview. In Chaucer’s Summoner’s Tale, a highly specific description of the Summoner’s revolting disease is given, and the audience encouraged to act as diagnosticians, thus undercutting the dual powers of the physician and the storyteller. Some 80 years later, Robert Henryson’s classic parody of the mountebank is a brilliant reductio to the shallow mysteries and prolix self-aggrandisement of the medical profession, and carries on a (slim) medieval Scottish tradition of cynicism towards doctors and doctoring. I propose to show how these two poets undercut and expose the sinister power of the apothecary, and promote more democratic strategies for the community to heal itself.
Christa Mahalik, Professor of English, WesternConnecticutStateUniversity
‘The Rising Gorge: Poison, Hamlet, and the Seven Deadly Sins’
The seven mortal or deadly sins are an evolving product of the Hellenistic Age dating from the death of Alexander in 323 B.C. In the early centuries of Christianity magic and the concept of demons were widely believed in, and the church fathers had to contend with white and black magic in order to preserve the faith of the Christians. The comparison of sin to illness was very common in the Middle Ages. Sins were considered diseases of the soul in the sense that the soul was not functioning as it was meant to function just as a diseased organ does not function as it should. In William Shakespeare’s Hamlet the entire state of Denmark is enveloped in sin. Through all of the language of the sick, rotting, and poisonous state of Denmark one can see that through man’s gluttony and sin an entire state can become diseased. Hamlet struggles constantly between human conflict and human choice. Shakespeare portrays Hamlet as reflecting all human beings’ struggle with choice, and with choosing between virtue and sin. The play mirrors people’s own battle with the seven deadly sins. Through the exploration of each of the seven deadly sins and specifically Shakespeare’s Hamlet, one will be able to understand what constitutes each particular sin in relation to the mental, physical, and spiritual well being of man.