The Wonders of One’s Waters

This is a post about how we used wee when we were unwell. This sentence was unnecessary but is fun to say.

Before good quality anaesthetics and an understanding of bacteria, it would be sensible to avoid surgical procedures at any cost. You just didn’t do surgery unless it might save your life.

Surgery almost always meant death, mostly from blood loss and infection.

So for many years in Europe, physicians did not perform any procedure which would involve cutting the body open. The Hippocratic Oath even said “I will not use the knife, not even on sufferers from stone, but will leave that to such men as are engaged in this work.” (I.e. they would not even cut for kidney/bladder stones, which have an obvious cause and obvious cure and sounds like an easy procedure, because the likelihood is you’d cause more harm that it was worth.)

In the Medieval and Tudor period any surgical procedure would be done by Barber-Surgeons, who had essentially graduated from cutting hair, bloodletting and pulling rotten teeth in their high street barber shops, to amputating limbs, trepanning and other similar procedures. The survival rate was not great, and they would only perform procedures when the problem was extremely severe.

Barber Surgeons Pulling Teeth

(What’s going on in this picture? I (as a medieval woman) am having teeth pulled by two barber surgeons. Now when people pulled teeth, back in the day, sometimes they would see a little pink thing in the space where the tooth was: THE TOOTH WORM! I will cover this on my next post!)

So back to physicians. They needed to get an impression of what was going on inside you without cutting you open and therefore killing you. To do this they can look at what you look like, how you are acting and what comes out of your body.

The study of a patient’s urine (Uroscopy) became one of the primary methods for diagnosing a problem. The physician would ask you to bring a sample with you to any appointment so that he could examine the colour, consistency, smell and taste.

Yes. Taste.

via GIPHY

In one or two cases it is possible to diagnose by taste: essentially if it is sweet it may indicate diabetes. The “Mellitus” in “Diabetes Mellitus” refers to the honey taste of the urine. Yum. But mostly the tasting method really is not helpful.

So because of this very important method of diagnosis, the medieval physician is often identifiable in images because he is holding a uroscopy flask, and examining someone’s urine.

Wellcome Library, London. http://wellcomeimages.org Physician with urine flask, medieval manuscript; Bibliotheque nationale, Ms. 22, 534. Encyclopedie Francaise d’Urologie Pousson, A. & Desnos, E. Published: 1914 Copyrighted work available under Creative Commons Attribution only licence CC BY 4.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Who knows which of these patients this urine belongs to. I imagine it’s the embarrassed one hiding in the middle just peaking over the old man’s head.

In order to do Uroscopy well they had to use a Uroscopy flask, a round bottomed clear glass vessel, so they could thoroughly examine the colour and sediment, rather than struggle to see it properly in a ceramic pot.

Here is a 14^th Century Uroscopy Flask from Walbrook, City of London.

As you can see the glass would have been very clear, good quality and as colourless as possible. All the better to diagnose you with.

They would use a chart like this to compare the colour. Note the physician and Uroscopy flask.

Uroscopy Chart

Or this one!

As you can see there is a range of fairly normal colours, but then also blues, greens, greys and even a black! For very severely ill people presumably.

Diagnosing people from urine, although they got it a bit wrong back then, is still something we do today. It’s a pretty normal part of medical treatment which I expect we have all had many a time.

But as well as Uroscopy, in the medieval times people also practised Uromancy.

You may be able to work this out for yourself…

“Piss Prophets” or Uromancers used patient’s urine to divine the future of their lives, and more specifically their health. They had different methods, from examining the bubbles which settled against the edge of the glass or the sediments which formed at the bottom to again, tastes and smell.

This is not surprising: the understanding of medicine was so very limited, and the outcomes of people’s health was so incredibly unpredictable. If you imagine a world where approximately only 1/3 of people make it to 5 years old, you can imagine how you might grasp at any chance to predict the future of your health.

Aren’t you glad you live in the 21st Century?

Thanks for reading!

(What better way to finish a post than with a marginalia of man playing the bum trumpet?)

Hedgehogs!

After my last post on Medieval Animals, I was reminded about how great Hedgehogs are, and was prompted to do a brief history of hedgehogs. Sounds niche, and it is. Here I am just going to go into hedgehogs from a British/Western perspective, although I am aware that they feature in some countries’ mythologies.)

Hedgehogs are great! I love hedgehogs. Look at this little hoglet!

N’awwwwwwh!

So it turns out people have always been interested in Hedgehogs. But not because of their unbearable cuteness. No. Because it’s strange for a little rodent mammals to be covered with spikes, which must be useful for something… right…?

“To prepare for winter, hedgehogs roll on fallen apples to stick them to their spines, then taking one or more in their mouths, carry the load to hollow trees.” Pliny the Elder, Natural History, 8, 56.

You know it is true, because Pliny the Elder said it, and Piny is never wrong. Except for when he decided not to run away from Mount Vesuvius back in 79 CE… (CE? AD? TMI? Why am I using BCE?)

Pliny said that in the 1^st Century CE, but clearly it was an enduring idea because in the 9^th Century, Isadore of Seville said:

“The hedgehog is covered with quills, which it stiffens when threatened, and rolling itself into a ball is thus protected on all sides. After it cuts a bunch of grapes off a vine it rolls over them so it can carry the grapes to its young on its quills.” Isadore of Seville, Etymologies, Book 12, 3:7

So, the belief in the collecting of fruit consists. And because sources like Pliny were read and believed basically for the whole of history, regardless of the fact that clearly no-one ever saw a hedgehog wearing a coat of tasty apples, the belief persisted! As demonstrated in these fab pictures.

A hedgehog: *thrilled* to be carrying fruit on its spines

Another hedgehog: has mixed feelings about carrying fruit

Ambitious hedgehog climbing a vine to find enough grapes to completely cover its whole body in grapes

Hedgehog successfully transporting grapes

(It seems like the idea of a hedgehog being an ideal vehicle for grapes (or cubes of pineapple and cheese) continues to this day! I had no idea my childhood birthday party treats had such historic inspiration.)

Alternatively, the whole fruit stealing is an allegory for the devil stealing man’s “spiritual fruit”. Anyway. Moving on.

As we move into the late medieval/early Tudor period, people started using the word Hedge-Hog or Hedge-Pig. Before the word hedgehog, they would mostly have been known as Urchins! And the word urchin continues to be used for several centuries to come. And because of the lovely old fashioned idea that for almost everything there was on land, there was an equivalent in the sea, the spiky round creatures which lived in the sea were called: Sea-Urchins.

Sea Urchin

As well as (/in stead of) the idea that hedgehogs could steal fruit, the idea that the hedgehog steals milk from cows, by drinking their milk at night and possibly drying out their udders, and steals eggs from hens, became widely believed. So fair enough, hedgehogs do eat eggs, but it’s unlikely they can milk cows.

The secondary sources I have found blame this idea for the high bounty on the hedgehog’s head in the Tudor Vermin Act.

In the 1532, the first Preservation of Grain Act, or “Vermin Act” was passed, mostly focussing on crows. The Vermin Act was essentially an act which encouraged the population to kill “vermin” for a price per head. In 1566 it was extended to cover the slaughter of a huge range of animals, for large sums of money, including the hedgehog.

This makes sense to a point, as this was a time when many many people were struggling to have enough to eat. Due to poor weather and poor harvests, many working-class people were on the bread line, and any animal who may have stolen food and increased food scarcity, was everybody’s enemy.

If you killed a hedgehog, according to the Vermin Act, depending on your parish, you could claim up to 4 pence! A huge sum for such an unassuming animal. And the slaughter of Britain’s wildlife under this and subsequent acts continued for until the 1820-30s in some places.

Lovegrove has estimated that that around half a million hedgehogs were killed for bounty in the 140 years between 1660 and 1800. It is surprising that they were not completely eliminated from some areas.

Some people apparently continued to believe that hedgehogs stole milk from cows, until the 20th century, although there are several sources ridiculing the idea. This was written in the 1800s:

They say they milk the cows and when they lye
Nibble their fleshy teats and make them dry
But they who’ve seen the small head like a hog
Rolled up to meet the savage of a dog
With mouth scarce big enough to hold a straw
Will ne’er believe what no none ever saw

From The Hedgehog, John Clare.

After centuries of improved scientific understanding, improving education, more accurate factual recording, and finally, Google, the general public now has a much better understanding of the behaviour of really any animal. It is ridiculous to us to discover what misconceptions our ancestors had, because we are so comparatively brilliantly informed. The difference is comical because it is incredible.

It is strange to think how differently hedgehogs (or, as I like to think of them, “land-urchins”) were regarded in history, and what a PR overhaul they have had since the Victorian period. Now a beloved little creature, children’s character, cartoon and even pet, they used to be firmly in the category of “vermin”, and people, including children, were encouraged and happy to kill on sight for money, due to their evil tendencies.

 

 

 

 

 

What are my sources?

 

The CE/AD Question

Why am I using CE and BCE?

At school you may have used BC, and AD to denote dates. BC is “Before Christ”, and AD is “Anno Domini”, or “In the year of the Lord”.

As you can probably imagine, this method of denoting dates is not really appropriate to everyone around the world, from different religions and cultural contexts. In the interests of inclusivity and plenty of other reasons BC and AD are now considered outdated, and the modern convention is to use CE: “Common Era” (or “Current Era” sometimes) , or BCE, “Before the Common(/Current) Era”.

Obviously people still use BC and AD, and it’s understood by everyone, but it’s no longer the standard convention academically. So there.

And because I feel like there should be a picture of something nice in everything I post. Here are some happy bees.

(Correction. I have been told by several people that these are happy hoverflies. Not happy bees. I can only apologise.)

Photo credit: Me. Go me.

Amazing Medieval Creatures of the World

This camel, like many medieval illustrations of animals, looks as if it has just committed an embarrassing social faux-pas.

Thanks to the difficulties of communication and travel in the past, most people didn’t have a very good understanding of what the rest of the world was like.

Imagine a world where everyone travels by foot, horse/donkey or boat, and the majority of people would only be able to afford to travel by foot as horses and boats were super expensive. Most people would live most of their lives in the same farming community, village, town or city.

If you lived in, let’s say, the 12-13th Century, even if you were unusual and actually literate (obviously most people would not be), and you somehow managed to find a source about world geography and animals, these sources would often not be first-hand accounts, and images would be drawn from descriptions given by sailors and traders. If you were not literate you would be working off rumours alone, and images which might be found in public places such as church murals.

This means people weren’t sure what was going on in the rest of the world. Some creatures are utterly fictitious, and some are misunderstandings or inaccurate images of real creatures. And people really believed in them.

Here are a selection of favourites, all pulling amazing medieval expressions:

This AMAZING Turtle

Amazing Medieval Turtle

This Turtle does not have much to explain. It is easy to imagine how a vague description could have ended up like this. It is clearly barely suppressing its rage.

The Bonnacon

This bonnacon hates itself.

How embarrassing it is to be a Bonnacon. Their horns are apparently too curly to be used as weapons, so it’s only weapon is that it can spray dung long distance, and that it’s dung will burn whatever it comes into contact with.

The Manticore

Manticores always have amazing facial expressions

Manticores have the head or face of a man, body of a lion and tail of a scorpion! Sometimes they shoot spikes from it. They are are red, and eat human flesh. Yum!

Nom nom nom human legs.

And on the subject of eating human flesh:

The Crocodile

A forlorn crocodile eating a man

Crocodiles (or Cockodrills) eat men, and weep whilst swallowing him:”ever after it laments him as long as it lives” (Guillaume le Clerc). Sometimes they look like dragons, sometimes they even look like chickens, cows or boars.

Crocodile finishing eating a man

The Crocodile, however, does not eat men and weep in peace, for it has an ENEMY!

The Hydrus

The Hydrus is SO embarrassed.

The Hydrus lives in the Nile (not to be confused with the Hydra) is the enemy of the dragon. “When it sees a crocodile sleeping with its mouth open, the hydrus first rolls in mud to make itself slippery, then enters the crocodile’s mouth and is swallowed. It then eats its way out of the crocodile’s belly, killing it.” 1. Some consider it to be an allegory of Christ and the forces of Hell.

A hydrus killing a crocodile. Yes. That is a crocodile. And he is really regretting everything right now.

This crocodile looks like a plucked chicken….

The Panther

The panther’s breath brings all the boys to the yard

The Panther is a beautiful, gentle, multicoloured animal, and when it roars it really sweet beautiful smelling breath attracts all the other animals to it, except for the dragon.

If you have breath that makes dragons hide in caves, it’s time to make changes.

The Dragon is the only animal who runs away from the roaring panther. When a dragon smells the panther’s breath, it is frightened. Although in the picture above it also looks like the panther might be REALLY boring.

The Elephant

Elephants used in war, and elephants in the wild

Elephants live for three hundred years and have no knees, so if you want to catch one just wait until it falls asleep leaning on a tree, and cut the tree down. Voila: helpless elephant yours for the taking.

Elephants are ALSO enemies of the dragon. In terms of the balance of humours in these animals, elephants are cold and wet, and dragons are hot and dry. Dragons can drink elephant blood to cool their intestines.

A very depressed-looking elephant trampling a dragon

There are millions of other animals I could go on to share with you, but hopefully this has given you an idea of both the silly faces they have, and the interesting nature of seeing the world through the eyes of our ancestors. I will probably do another post on some of the more human animals, or maybe just one of them specifically at another point.

If you want to look at more animals from Medieval illustrations, I would recommend The Medieval Bestiary which is where I found most of the images for this post.

If you enjoy thinking about funny ways we refer to animals, you may enjoy this little stream of thoughts from David Mitchell on the Camelopard (i.e. Giraffe). I love David Mitchell.

Thanks for reading!

Exposing your “Sheela-na-gig” at church

WARNING. This post is going to be full of AMAZING words. Oh and also medieval carved stone lady genitals.

Sheela-na-gig is fun to say AND fun to see. If you have never heard of one before, you are in for a treat! Just knowing that these are a thing makes the world and our medieval ancestors seem so much more light-hearted and amusing.

Ladies and Gentlemen: This, is a Sheela-na-gig.

Kilpeck Sheela-na-gig

Look at her little face! And her… Well yes.

This is probably the most famous sheela-na-gig. She is on Kilpeck Church near Hereford.

A sheela-na-gig is a carving of a woman displaying her oversized genitalia, sometimes by pulling her vulva open with her hands, and pulling a silly/uncomfortable face. Of course, if you were doing this you would also probably be pulling a silly/uncomfortable face.

A sheela-na-gig is a type of hunky-punk or grotesque. Hunky-punks (or grotesques) are essentially stone carvings on the outside of a church, which are not gargoyles because they do not act as a water spout attached to gutters etc. “Hunky-punks” are more fun to say, so I am going to use that term.

Want to see another one? Of course you do.

Sheela-na-gig from Oaksey

Same kind of idea, but differently ridiculous. This one is from the Parish Church of Oaksey, Wiltsure.

LLandrindod Wells sheela-na-gig

And another?

This one is from the Parish Church of Llandrinod Wells. It is exceptionally well preserved because it was found face down in the church yard, so it has not been exposed. Not in an “erosion” sense anyway.

Sheela-na-gigs appear on churches all over the Ireland, Britain, and in smaller numbers through the rest of Europe.

We always think of historical Christians being extremely private about nudity and sexuality. So why are there so many of these shameless exhibitionists all over our medieval churches?

 

It turns out that the reason we find them so strange is because of our post-Victorian understanding of “what is proper” and in fact there are plenty of other medieval hunky-punks which are equally irreverent.

Check out this testicle-licker, for example.

West Knoyle hunky-punk

But there are many other theories: they are symbols of fertility; they are meant to warn you away from lust (with their terrifying smiling cheeky faces); they are pagan Goddesses which the local people still wanted in their place of worship; they protect us from evil; they demonstrate the importance of motherhood; they counterpart the green man.

Sheela-na-gigs are often depicted by, or over, doorways. People often interpret this as a symbolic association of a woman protecting her “sacred opening”. Also, women’s genitals are often depicted as an archway or two archways in historical art, so it could be that a sheela-na-gig being over the arched doorway into the church functions as a sort of pun.

Whatever their significance, they make us rethink our assumptions about people in the past, and the very 2D understanding we have of their beliefs. We will probably never really have a better understanding of these hunky-punks (barring the invention of time travel), and maybe they really had very little significance at all, but they are still fun to look at and interesting to think about.

So anyway. That’s a sheela-na-gig. An irreverent, funny face-pulling statue flashing its massive gaping vulva at all the world, from church. It goes to show it’s really worth looking at the carvings and decorations on the buildings around us because you never know what you might see.

 

PS: not a sheela-na-gig, but also on Kilpeck Church there are lots of other fun hunky-punks. Look how cute this dog and hare are!

Kilpeck dog and hare

 

 

Sources

Want to find out more about sheela-na-gigs?

Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on Medieval Churches, James Jerman and Anthony Weir. (London 1993)

“The Sheela Na Gig, An Incongruous Sign of Sexual Purity?” Juliette Dor, Medieval Virginities, Ed. Ruth Evans, Sarah Salih, Anke Bernau, (Toronto 2003)

Apotropaia and Fecundity in Eurasian Myth and Iconography: Erotic Female Display Figures, Miriam Robbins Dexter and Victor H. Mair (Los Angeles)

http://www.sheelanagig.org/wordpress/

http://www.knowth.com/sheela-na-gig.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheela_na_gig

http://www.sheelanagig.org/wordpress/kilpeck/

Who is St Pancras?

Recently I travelled to Brussels from St Pancras International. And in the run up to my travel I heard much about the mythical “St Pancreas”, from many people, including a member of station staff!

Just so everyone is clear:

A PANCREAS

ST PANCRAS

They are almost indistinguishable, but if you look closely there are a few differences.

A pancreas is part of your digestive system, producing various enzymes and also the hormone insulin. And St Pancras is… er…

I had no idea who St Pancras was, and neither do many other people. (Although my mum did well with “I think he’ll be a tragic Roman”. Well top marks my mum because….)

St Pancras was born in probably the late third century, in either Syria or Phrygia. Some sources say he was orphaned at a young age and brought to live in Rome with his uncle, Dionysius. In Rome both Pancras and his uncle converted to Christianity, just in time for Diocletian’s persecution of Christians in the early 4^th Century.

Some sources indicate there was some kind of ultimatum (sacrifice this animal to the Pagan gods or get your head chopped off), but most people just say he was killed during the persecution.

He was beheaded for his faith at 14 years old in CE 304, which is why he is often pictured with a sword- the instrument of his death. Oh, and he is also sometimes depicted TRAMPLING A SARACEN, due to his hatred of infidels. Le Sigh. Seriously historical people.

So next time you see St Pancras International, or tbh anything else named after him, you will a) know more than other people. Win. And b) be reminded of a teenager being beheaded for his faith. I am sorry.

BUT WAIT.

Look at this incredibly badass funerary arrangement!

This is the way that the relics of St Pancras are arranged and displayed in the church of St Nikolaus, Wil, Switzerland. Whether they are actually the bones of St Pancras is debatable, (as with all relics) as his relics were also apparently brought to England by St Augustine of Canterbury in the 6^th Century, and these bones did not arrive in Switzerland until the 1670s. But anyway that’s probably missing the point. If you want somewhere to pray for help with your catastrophic urinary incontinence, this is the place to be!

For some more pictures, and a bit more info about these relics, check out this site where this skelly was Skeleton of the Week! 

Have a good and interesting week folks!

 

What are my sources?

I could not work out what the primary sources are for St Pancras’ life. Sorry. So these are the sources I used.

http://www.british-history.ac.uk/old-new-london/vol5/pp324-340

https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2015-05-12

http://www.goodfuneralguide.co.uk/2011/10/meet-st-pancras/

http://www.christianiconography.info/pancras.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pancras_of_Rome

http://www.saintpancras.org/aboutus/default.htm

 

Gadzooks! A new blog!

Let joy be unconfined! A New Blog. Another one to join the millions probably created every day. But this one is special. This one is mine.

This blog is about talking about interesting things in a way that will entertain and inform. Or at least that is the aim. Who knows what will actually come about.

So to start us off, a very brief post.

Gadzooks! This might be a word most commonly associated with vintage Batman and very dated films and books. But have you ever wondered what it means?

“Gadzooks” is actually a contraction of the words “God’s Hooks”, most likely the nails that held Jesus upon the cross during the Crucifixion. Sometimes this is even shortened to just “‘Zooks!”

There are quite a few similar old oaths which sound amusing to modern ears. One of my favourite is “Zounds!” This is short for “God’s Wounds”. But then there is also the oaths “S’blood”: God’s blood, “S’foot”: God’s foot,  “S’light”: God’s light, “S’nails”: God’s nails and many many more.

These might sound a bit odd and unfamiliar, but I bet “s’truth!” rings a bell. The stereotypical Australian think to shout when confronted with one of their millions of dangerous creatures.

“S’truth” is, of course, God’s Truth. Although it has completely lost it’s meaning to almost everyone. Except you and I of course! [Insert feeling of superiority here.]

Another stereotypical Australian expression which might come in handy when confronted with some terrifying poisonous or toothy creature might be “Crikey!” This is probably just a corruption of the word Christ, just like “Egad” is just “Oh God” run together.

So basically next time you feel annoyed or surprised, how about avoiding one of those overused boring modern swear words, and go for something charmingly archaic. “Zooks! A snake!” or “Zounds! Aliens!”

So thanks for reading my first blog post. Well done for getting to the bottom. The next one will be even better (it has already been written so I know.)

On an unrelated note, today is Pancake Day! (or Shrove Tuesday who want to use the proper name). For some truly incredible pancake art, check out these guys! They are amazing.

Have a great week!