Ways of Dying in 1665

Ooooh, that's interesting about the Roman emperors.

The Byzantine emperors were quite bonkers as well. Hmm.

I am going to be uber generous and assume that MrsPotter is on the wrong thread.

I've just ordered Faber's Reportage from Amazon. I am one of those disgusting MNers with a bookcase in the loo.

oh arsenic - they used to use different arsenic compounds to colour sweets...

That's interesting re. lead poisoning of emperors, TSP!

Fish still get dropsy. But in humans it's mostly called oedema now, I think.

It is fascinating that the same words stayed in use for animals, isn't it?! I love language.

I'm skim reading atm,and will read it properly,including the links later.I love this sort of thing.Pepys had a kidney stone removed without anaesthetic and survived.He had a silver box made for the stone and celebrated the anniversary of the operation every year.

There was a very interesting book called 'Underground London' where the author visited the excavation of a plague pit under a London church.After all those centuries,the people excavating still had to take precautions,just in case....

We still talk of calves and lambs scouring-it kills them surprisingly quickly.

oh goody, dreaming. How lovely of them

Oh, ouch, poor babies with the mercury.

Dropsy is retention of fluid. You get it these days with diabetes (there may be other causes though). Phillippa effectively drowned when the fluid got to her lungs.

not really understanding your post mrs potter?

people can still have dropsy today, i dont know what causes it but i think its a retention of fluid that affects the legs really badly.

fractals in nature - bloody marvellous things!

Dropsy was bloating due to some blockage or other, I think - although it could have been due to anything, including ascites - it's a symptom rather than a disease.

Mrs Potter - wtf, do fuck off. This is a very interesting thread for people with an interest.

MrsPotter, get lost. Love.

Thumbwitch apparently the US and USSR managed to aerosolize the botulinium toxin, which gives you botulism (you quickly become paralysed and die). The only treatments are so intensive, a mass outbreak would overwhelm any public health system. It's the one a lot of people worry about because the toxin is found easily in nature so terrorists could theoretically develop it.

We are so used to not worrying about things like plagues anymore but it's actually quite an historical aberration (one I hope continues!)

Ah that's right - I read in one of those links that plannets was later named apoplexy - Choux's link again:
"?Plannet? (or ?planet-struck? or ?apoplexy? in later bills) is sudden death believed to be caused by the influence of the planets (no, really). Usually ?planet-struck? people died from a ruptured aneurysm."

although I thought apoplexy was a stroke rather than an aneurysm specifically.

Enjoy ripping off David Baddiel sketches from yonks ago? Get a life, love.

Dropsy. Does anyone know what this is/was? Edward III's wife Queen Phillippa was described as being "dropsical".

i believe Samuel Peyps suffered from kidney stones and recorded his operation to have them removed, he was awake through out!

i also believe that some monks had begun to disecte (sp?) bodies at about the time of the dissolution and that in fact, the dissolution put the advance of medicine back many years.

fascinating thread!

Great subject.

Teeth - babies used to be given teething powder containing I think mercury. Symptoms of mercury poisoning include sore bleeding gums, so they'd be given more. They became toxic and died

Strangury is the pain of feeling like you constantly need to pee due to large bladder stone. Often then become septic and die, or get kidney failure or die of the surgery. I big problem then, no one sure why, something to do with the type of bread? Samuel Pepys had it.

No apoplexy?

Most people would have died from infection or trauma/accidents.

Hunterian museum great! Welcomeuseum also good. There's a good book I once read called death of kings where a pathologist analyses illnesses of all the kings/queens in a modern light. Fascinating.

And Divine Proportion. Remember that more da Vinci Code

Well, I don't know if it is in the venous system, but I know it is all over nature and if the venous system looks like leaf skeletons and trees, I would guess that is why. I was hoping someone more knowledgeable would know?

I find underlying patterns like that really fascinating so I would like to know more.

dreaming, what about botulinum? Apart from it being the active ingredient in Botox of course.

I totally didn't get the Fibonacci comment - I knew about the sequence of course but wasn't sure what the comment related to!

Fractals are the things that blow me away - love them.