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Original poster

Ways of Dying in 1665

840 replies

TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:36

So I'm just copying out a weekly Bill of Mortality from London, 1665 (don't ask!)

Look at some of the ways of dying - anyone care to hazard a guess at what some of them might be?!

Plague - 7165 (IN A WEEK!!!)
Childbed - 42 Sad - just goes to show, it's all very well bemoaning medicalised childbirth/interventions/CSs but look at the alternative
Grief - 3 (Not bloody surprising - wonder what the actual medical cause was?)
Griping in the Guts - 51!
Rising of the Lights - 11 (WTF was that then? In offal, are the lights the lungs, right?)
Kingsevil - 2 (Don't ask me how I know this, but I believe this to be scrofula)
Wormes - 15 (OH EM GEE, you could die of worms )
Impostume - 11 (what?!)
Frighted - 3 (three people scared to death in a week Shock)
Winde - 3 (Oh yeah. FARTED TO DEATH)

I realise I am a bit morbid Hmm

OP posts:
KateUnrulyBush · 04/02/2012 12:00

When calves get dysentry the farmer will refer to that as scours, or scouring, so that makes sense.

I'm having a duvet day to try and shake off a nasty cold but suddenly feeling quite lucky reading some of these...

MonsterBookOfTysons · 04/02/2012 11:59

He is fine now thanks, he is 3 years old :)
Nowadays it is minor surgery under ga. :)

Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:58

Oh gosh your poor wee DS Monster - is he well now??

And that does sound a feasible explanation.

OP posts:
Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:57

Ah, got it - my postcard is from September 1665, and the website is from January. Very interesting that the January one doesn't seem to list death by plague - yet by September, it was 7165 in A WEEK Shock

OP posts:
ScoutJemAndBoo · 04/02/2012 11:56

Yeah you can search by punishment, by sentence, by name, by crime, by town, is is hideously fascinating..

MonsterBookOfTysons · 04/02/2012 11:56

Stopping of the stomach could be pyloric stenosis, my ds had that and needed surgery at 3 weeks old as the pipe to his stomach was too small.
If he had been born back then he would of died.

Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:55

Har har at calling 1665 the Medieval period Grin [superior face]

OP posts:
TunipTheVegemal · 04/02/2012 11:55

chrisome is death of a newborn - it's the name of a baby's shroud

Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:55

Ooo Choux how interesting! I'm looking at a postcard which is a photocopy of the actual Bill itself, and they're different - no-one died of Purples in this one, for instance. Different week possibly, or different borough?

OP posts:
dreamingbohemian · 04/02/2012 11:54

Oh wow, that website is brilliant!

TunipTheVegemal · 04/02/2012 11:54

tissick is cough according to this.

choux · 04/02/2012 11:53

Someone else likes reading these too. I think there are some death causes listed on that page which haven't been mentioned here yet..

Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:53

Flatbelly Grin Grin

Maybe that's really how the great fire started.

Scout that Old Bailey website is AMAZING!

OP posts:
Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:52

Turnip I agree re. rising of the lights - if you've ever had asthma or a bad chest infection that is kind of what it feels like - as if your internals are kind of swelling and blocking your air passages.

Scouring/dysentery - having had dysentery, yar, that's quite convincing.

Here's more -

Tissick - spelt, of course, Tiffick Grin - any ideas?
Stopping of the stomach - is that constipation possibly?

OP posts:
flatbellyfella · 04/02/2012 11:50

Maybe the fart deaths were due to standing too close to an open fire IYSWIM

TunipTheVegemal · 04/02/2012 11:49

I would guess scouring was dysentery (your insides get all scoured out).

I'm more convinced on 'rising of the lights' as a portmanteau name for various obstructions of breathing than that it had anything to do with visual disturbances. It fits with the attitude that bits of your body had a tendency to go off wandering round where they weren't supposed to be, like hysteria being wandering womb.

Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:49

Dreaming I think it is, yes - that would explain the lack of hangings etc.

Unless that particular week (apparently the worst week for the Plague) there were no hangings?? Trials/hangings etc. might have been suspended

OP posts:
ScoutJemAndBoo · 04/02/2012 11:48

If you love macabre history and the fine detail of life as was - plus searching your own name! - this is the site for you!

www.oldbaileyonline.org/

Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:48

2tired I haven't! I keep meaning to get it but always seem to forget when in second hand bookshops Grin

Beyond that's really interesting....

OP posts:
dreamingbohemian · 04/02/2012 11:47

Actually, is it from just the City of London? I think they hung people outside the City so maybe they're not counted...

Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:47

It's interesting that 43 are listed with cause of dying as simply Aged.

5 dead of Abortive Sad

OP posts:
2tired2bewitty · 04/02/2012 11:47

Have you read 1066 and all that, OP?

BeyondTheLimitsOfAcceptability · 04/02/2012 11:46

A quick google tells me...

What is rising of the lights - "well, nobody really knows. Seems everybody has a theory, but no hard facts to back it up. Me, I have this pet theory that it's beri-beri. As you know, that manifests as water being retained in the lower body, with increasing pain as the water rises towards the abdomen. The patient usually dies when it reaches the heart. Deficiency disease. However, some say that "lights" was an old term for the lungs. This might indicate some sort of lung disease. Perhaps a pulmonary embolus. Yet, from the records, it would seem to have mostly hit women who were new mothers. That might indicate some sort of postpartum illness. Perhaps postpartum depression? An unusual cause of death - I'd favour the pulmonary embolus, myself." nanoakron suggests that "your 'rising of the lights' in london deaths in 1700 may well be eclampsia - a condition of high blood pressure in mothers associated with fits and flashing lights...you never know."

from here

Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:46

5 died of Scowring - that sounds like they've died of having been 'scowred' doesn't it??

OP posts:
Original poster
TheScarlettPimpernel · 04/02/2012 11:45

Yes Dreaming it was a bad plague year - and then the Great Fire did them a favour I think??

Nothing here on hangings and accidents, oddly

18 died of Chrisomes - anyone know what this is, preferably without Googling?!

OP posts: