Multi Medici, multa funera: the negative stereotype of the physician in the 17th–18th century

Abstract

The article explores the negative stereotype of the physician in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the 17th and 18th c. Stories about physicians who consciously or unconsciously killed their patients were popular in satires and epigrams from the period in question but negative opinions can also be traced in other types of sources. Even though there are no surviving treatises by critics of the healing profession, many authors of medical books included polemics against such views in prefaces or essays on the role and position of the physician. Those who questioned physicians’ competences claimed that in order to enjoy good health it was enough to live in harmony with nature and that physicians’ interference could only be harmful. They also stressed that treatment was usually expensive and ineffective. Physicians who argued with such opinions, e.g. Sebastian Śleszkowski and Wawrzyniec Mitzler de Kolof, pointed out that they were voiced by people lacking proper education. The medical profession was not controlled in any way in the Commonwealth so it was sometimes practiced by dilettantes who would never have gained recognition in Western Europe. Physicians defending their profession also noted that Poles too frequently made use of the services of barbers, herbalists and Jews. There was a strong prejudice connected with the fact that physicians had to deal with “disgusting things”, including corpses. In the medical literature of the time one could find recipes including ingredients coming from human body, mostly for supposed medication for epilepsy. Medication containing human blood or bones could be found not only in home treatments which could have been derived from folk medicine, but also in renowned books translated from French. It is difficult to identify sources of negative opinions on physicians. Some impact might have been exerted by the view, strongly advocated in religious writings, that it is only God who can determine human fate. Undoubtedly, the shortage of trained physicians made people suffering from minor ailments (that is ailments with which medicine could deal in those times) turn to local specialists, i.e. barbers, Jews and herbalists. It was only a serious illness that led to consulting a professional physician, who was usually unable to help the patient at that stage. This might have been one of the sources of the belief that treatments offered by trained physicians were ineffective.