Under The Knife, Episode 7 – Medieval Urine Wheels
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lf90Kop7Cz4?rel=0] In Episode 7 of Under The Knife, I discuss how a pot of pee used to be a crucial diagnostic tool in the past. Learn all about piss prophets and medieval urine wheels! If you enjoy the series, please consider becoming a patron of our project by clicking here. And don’t forget to subscribe […]
The Chimp & The Surgeon: A History of Heart Transplants
Today isn’t just Valentine’s Day. It’s also the end of Congenital Heart Defects Awareness Week. With that in mind, here’s a short piece on the history of heart transplants. When Boyd Rush, aged 68, was admitted to the University of Mississippi Medical Center on 23 January 1964, Dr James Hardy [below] was waiting for him. […]
Under The Knife, Episode 6 – Bodysnatchers vs Vampires
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYwbh0WyhCc?rel=0] In Episode 6 of Under The Knife, I take on an internet myth involving iron cages, old graveyards, and the undead. Check out our new video on the history of mortsafes in ‘Bodysnatchers vs Vampires’! If you enjoy the series, please consider becoming a patron of our project by clicking here. And don’t forget […]
Under The Knife, Episode 5 – Human Skin Books
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHKqBaAmzfU?rel=0] In Episode 5 of Under The Knife, I discuss the dark history behind anthropodermic bibliopegy, or binding books with human skin. Why was it done? And how exactly did tanners use human skin to create covers in the past? If you enjoy our series, please consider becoming a patron of our project by clicking […]
World’s Littlest Giant: The Curious Case of Adam Rainer
I often write about rare medical disorders, but there is one extraordinary case which is so strange, that there is only one documented instance of it in medical history. It involves a man who was both a dwarf as well as a giant over the course of his lifetime. Adam Rainer was born in Graz, Austria […]
Disturbing Disorders: FOP (Stone Man Syndrome)
In a letter dated 14 April 1736, the surgeon John Freke (picture below) wrote to the Royal Society regarding a highly unusual case involving a patient at St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London. A boy, who looked ‘about Fourteen Years old’, had come into the hospital to ask ‘what should be done to cure him of […]
Holding a Book Bound in Human Skin
It is hot and muggy in the upstairs gallery of Surgeons’ Hall in Edinburgh. I walk past shelves upon shelves of jars that contain 18th-century specimens suspended in liquid: an amputated arm here, a cancerous bowel there. Compared with the lower level of the museum, it is eerily quiet up here. This section is not […]
Death is All Around Us: The Plague Pits of London
If you walk down Victoria Street in London on a beautiful, sunny afternoon, you’ll find dozens of picnickers sitting in Christchurch Gardens. Some will be suited up in jackets and ties, clutching briefcases in one hand and local supermarket sandwiches in another. Others will be tourists taking a moment to rest their wary bones before […]
Under The Knife – Episode 1: The Clockwork Saw
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBINzHYUraw&w=853&h=480] In the first episode of Under The Knife, I discuss the clockwork saw–a 19th-century medical instrument which failed on a massive scale. Make sure you watch to the very end as we have a few little surprises in store for you! If you enjoy the video, please remember to subscribe to our YouTube Channel for […]
Ten Terrifying Knives from Medical History
I’m excited to announce that I’ve just finished filming the first episode of my new YouTube series, Under The Knife, and will be releasing it very soon (please subscribe to my channel for video updates). Unsurprisingly, that got me thinking about, well, knives. Here’s a list of some rather terrifying knives from our medical past. VALENTIN […]