Ways of Dying in 1665

[TheScarlettPimpernel]

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 - 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 )
Winde - 3 (Oh yeah. FARTED TO DEATH)

I realise I am a bit morbid

Gwyneth

Ooh, I'm like Gwyneth

When did we get moved to Classics?

Honey was used as an antiseptic in the middle ages and still is in the Middle East. Great healing properties.

You will be glad to know that this thread has had a practical application.DH was very poorly last night,with severe pains in his lower abdomen and back.In the early hours I managed to persuade him to go to A&E as I thought it was kidney stones.Well I was right and it was.[smug face] I helpfully reminded him that I had also diagnosed his appendicitis a few years back,when our GP said it was constipation.

I then entertained him whilst waiting,by telling him about Pepys and how he had his stone removed with no anaesthetic.He said that the pain was so bad that he could see why an op would be preferable.I'm sure he is very grateful to us all for helping pass the time.

I have heard tell it's the worst pain ever. Especially when you have to pass it.

Hope he's ok Mirage.

Honey IS an antiseptic. And apparently it is so nutrient rich you could live solely on it and water. The tragedy is we are losing our honey bees at a catastrophic rate :(

Nobody knows if Arthur and Katherine consummated their marriage. She swore they didn't because it was vital to the validity of her marriage to H8 that she married him a virgin.
Arthur told his menservants the morning after "last night I was in Spain", which was assumed to mean that they did the deed.
The curse on H8 was spoken by a nun caught up in the disollution. Basically if he married Anne Boleyn, dogs would lick his blood.

Just to be totally morbid, apparently Catherine Parr's coffin was opened in the 1800's (i think) and she was really well preserved. Not sure how?

Anyway, i know it'll never happen but i'd love for henry 8th, anne boleyn's and elizabeth 1st coffins to be opened just to have a look! i would love their skulls to be used to make up an image of them. you know, like on history cold case.

Love this thread!

and yes Henry 8th was a twat

Wouldn't they have expected blood on the sheets though if they had? Although from the sound of it, at that time Henry was more of a catch than Arthur, so I can't really blame her!

Ah, there were ways and means of faking blood on sheets.

Its less about him being a catch and more a case of self preservation. After Arthur died, Henry VII refused to return Katherine to Spain, refused to give back her dowry and allowed her to live in poverty. Its more likely she married Henry to improve her lot than for any other reason. (although he was probably a slightly better choice than his father, who was interested in marrying her before he died!

The vast majority of women don't bleed - excellent article about the vaginal corona formerly known as the hymen but I suppose at the time the belief that they did was widespread?

NanBullen - that's an interesting thought re the skulls.
I probably wouldn't be so bothered about Henry and Elizabeth because I think we have a fair idea what they looked like, but the portraits of Anne Boleyn are more stylised/not so good, and based on them I find it hard to picture her as a real person so I would love them to do her.

Ariel, yes one historical novelist, I think it's Norah Lofts, has her borrowing his pocket knife and cutting her heel to get some blood.

I read one where someone smuggled a tiny vial of chicken's blood into the bed

had a long discussion with dh about this thread. he is an absolut history geek and can remember all those dates that keep falling out of my head
the dark ages after the fall of the roman empire must have been really tough for all the knowledge being lost/not passed on (no time?) to future generations.
the greeks and romans with their life-like statues and grand buildings. then nothing (survived) for centuries, just look at the childlike illustrations of early books.

And also they used to stuff up some kind of small animal's bladder containing pig blood so it would go POP when prodded

Don't they do that with animal blood in Fanny Hill? Of course, there they're trying to convince the male partner of the woman's virginity, rather than both partners colluding so everyone else thinks they've had sex.

Well, I never knew that Tunip! I thought nowadays it was down to people wearing tampons etc.

I remember reading Henry VII wanted to marry her. If I remember correctly her mother sent him a letter strongly suggesting someone else didn't she?

And wasn't there some problem with merchants in the meantime? That Spanish merchants shouldn't pay high taxes in England and vice versa then it all went wrong. Not a nice place for a teenager to be stuck.

Mind you, she did well in the end didn't she? I though the English were much fonder of her than Anne Boleyn (who was probably a bit too like them ).

If you're having unwanted sex with someone who is too young for it, like in some of these dynastic marriages, the chances of them bleeding are clearly increased, though

I'm not sure what the average age of losing one's virginity would have been - I remember that in 16th c England most people didn't marry till their mid-twenties and it was only the very top and very bottom of the social scale that tended to marry young.

No, Catherine of Aragon didn't end well! She died alone at Kimbolton Castle, forbidden to see her only child, forbidden to write letters and abandoned by her husband!

Did i read on this thread or in a book that catherine of aragon may have been poisoned? she was thought to have died from some sort of tumour but then a recent autopsy found that it may have been poison I find that fascinating. We need to dig up more famous historical figures and autopsy them! gets carried away--

Or have i completely made that up?

I love this thread but it's veeerrry long, can't remember what i've read here and what i knew already iyswim! eejit

IT'S ^^up there somewhere. A black tumour on her heart, found when they embalmed her.

Forbidden to write letters?

He really was a stupid twat. Not that there is any doubt on the subject.

Or so they said anyway, about the black tumour...

The so-called Dark Ages were actually a time when much was being done to preserve knowledge (from this period we get the Book of Kells and other fabulous manuscripts, the founding of monasteries all ever western Europe, many by Irish missionary monks who spread writing and writing technology paper making, inks, quills, and Latin an international language makes the dissemination of knowledge of all kinds possible). What cropped up later didn't all just appear out of thin air.

H8 stupid EVIL twat.