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What common condition can be treated with cow dung? How do crushed
oystershells ease heartburn? Can eels cure deafness? And how do you
stop a stubborn case of the hiccups? If someone was struck down by
illness or injury in the late eighteenth century, the chances are
that they would have referred to William Buchan's Domestic Medicine
- with the result that they might have found themselves drinking a
broth made from sheep brain or administering drops of urine in
their ears. The book's author, a Scottish physician, published his
self-help manual in 1769 specifically for the benefit of people who
were unable readily to access or afford medical assistance. Copies
could be found in coffee-houses, in apothecary shops and private
households, and in 1789 Fletcher Christian and his fellow mutineers
took the sensible precaution of grabbing the copy from HMS Bounty
before they fled to Pitcairn Island. Much of Dr Buchan's advice on
how to live a healthy life and avoid disease is still sound and
relevant today, such as eating a varied and healthy diet, breathing
plenty of fresh air, and taking exercise. Many of his prescriptions
are amusing when viewed in retrospect, such as his fondness for
powdered Spanish fly and genital trusses. Other recommendations -
bleeding a woman experiencing a difficult childbirth or
administering mercury to treat numerous ailments - were downright
dangerous. This edited selection of entries from one of the first
medical self-help manuals gives a fascinating insight into popular
treatments of the eighteenth century, derived both from folklore
and the emerging medical science of the day.
Taking the view that medicine is as much the art of avoiding ill
health as it is the cure of disease, physician William Buchan
(1729-1805) published this home health guide in 1769. The first
part is devoted to preventing ailments through proper diet and
exercise, while the second part helps families diagnose and treat
maladies ranging from coughs and hiccups to jaundice and gout.
Buchan showed particular concern for the health of women and
children, whom he believed were often misunderstood and neglected.
He condemned corsets and restrictive infant swaddling, discouraged
'high living' and indolence, and blamed the high child-mortality
rate on upper-class ignorance of child-rearing wisdom. His book
became the most popular health guide prior to the twentieth
century, with over a hundred editions by 1871. This reissue is of
the first edition. Its diagnoses of physical (and cultural)
ailments will illuminate eighteenth-century concerns for modern
readers.
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