Thanks. I have so many questions about some of these. Cut of the stone, king's evil, Planet, rising of the lights, teeth... I'm mostly curious what king's evil is in this context. Gonna go look
Edit: per the link it's scrofula.
“People called cancer the wolf, because it 'ate up' the person.” But this wasn't just a linguistic quirk. The idea was actually translated into practice. “Some doctors would even apply raw meat to a cancerous ulcer, so that the wolf could feast on that for a while instead of 'eating' the patient.
"Teeth" actually meant "a child who's still teething." As with "chrisomes and infants," so many little ones died that often they were categorized by age rather than a specific cause. Probably the only reason to specify "overlaid, and starved at nurse" would be to blame and punish the wet-nurse.
"Dying of planet" was a term used in the 17th and 18th centuries to describe a sudden and severe illness or paralysis that was attributed to astrology and the influence of malevolent planets. People who died from "planet" exhibited symptoms similar to strokes, heart attacks, and aneurysms.
At the time, people who picked up bodies for burial often knew little about the cause of death. Other causes of death listed in The Diseases, and Casualties this year being 1632 included "affrighted" and "made away themselves".
-Via Overview.
Not sure, but I'm guessing part of the reason to specify the difference between "infants" and "Chrisomes" (baptized babies) might be to say where they'd be buried/where their souls would go.
"And in other news, the death figures were released today. Once again, the leading cause of death is: being a baby. Over the last year, 2,268 infants died naturally of babyness."
You guys are all laughing about 'planet,' but I'll have you know my uncle died of a cerebral hemorrhage when Neptune hit him on the back of the head. And we all thought it was just a glancing blow, but two days later, he dropped dead right in the middle of the supermarket.
You won't laugh so hard when it happens to someone you care about.
Only 7 murders? The population of London was apparently about 400,000 back then so that's less than half the murder rate of present-day New York City (which is considered a relatively safe city). I don't think that can be right...
1632 London: 7 / 400,000 = 17.5 murders per million people
2023 New York: 312 / 8,258,000 = 37.8 murders per million people
a relatively safe city [...] 37.8 murders per million
Ignoring that in 1632 it might've been easier for murder to go undetected, here are the numbers of present day London. It's about 13.1 mpm, even lower than in 1632, about a third of present day New York.
New York's murder rate (and the overall murder rate in the USA) is shaped by a history of race relations which is quite different from London's. A white person in New York is much less likely (and conversely a black or Hispanic person is much more likely) to be murdered than the overall murder rate for the city might lead someone to think.
I'm especially dumbfounded as I thought that before there was an important police force and a mature legal system, murders were far more frequent than after.
At the same time, it's possible I'm imagining 1632 London to be more primitive than it really was.
Most that would die in the street would have an underlying condition, like ague or bleeding or even old age, since most people that starve would try to do something about it.
If you're sick you might not be able to. If you find a job or charity successfully you've averted the death. If you tried to steal and fail you'll get on the executed list, or if you got wounded but got away, you'll be on the bleeding list, or if you succeed then you dont die on the street.
I imagine those six would have the "died of unknown causes" phrase attached to them in modern times.
I saw this list on hidden killers of the Tudor home (even though this list is post-Tudor era). The specifically spoke about the 'teeth' part.
Basically what that mean was that a variety of tooth decay and oral issues pertaining to the teeth. This was an era that first saw a large consumption of sugar (which as you know LOVES to fuck with teeth) by wealthier people and coupled with a nonexistent oral hygiene practice and dentistry. Basically people's teeth would decay and cause gum disease or simply a shitload of pain that even the painful teeth pulling couldn't fully fix.
One thing that you must remember is that prior to widespread sugar availability most people's teeth were remarkably fine throughout life as people's diets didn't contain enough crap that will mess your teeth up. Of course this isn't to say that it was perfect. Braces would have been a good thing to have for many people and a simple toothbrush with half decent toothpaste would have been a very welcomed thing.
Yeah, these days we’d say “childhood ailments”. Or “death by antivaxx” as a lot of those ailments have a childhood shot associated with them these days.
I never thought to combine deaths by cancer and by wolves to save space or because they’re similar enough. I can’t comprehend why they thought it was a good idea either.
Thanks. That’s helpful. And because I had to know:
Among unfathomable “Diseases and Casualties,” Planet (or plannet) was “likely a shorthand for “planet-struck [because] Many medical practitioners believed the planets influenced health and sanity.” The label applied to any sudden illness or death, such as a heart attack or aneurysm, according to “15 Historic Diseases that Competed with Bubonic Plague.”
Dying of piles sounds awful. Like, it would have been nice to marathon Ye Olde Stranger Things or Squide Game without having your arse falling to pieces on your deathbed deathsofa.
Malaria, or a disease involving fever and shivering
43
Apoplex, and Meagrom
Stroke and severe headache, migraine
17
Bit with a mad dog
Rabies
1
Bleeding
Blood loss
3
Bloody flux, scowring and flux
Dysentery and cholera
348
Bruised, Issues, sores and ulcers
Bruising, open sores, either as a symptom of something else (hemorrhagic fever) or because they got infected
28
Burnt, and Scalded
Same
5
Burst, and Rupture
Probably an externally visible rupture
9
Cancer and Wolf
Cancer and Lupus
10
Canker
Mouth sores, maybe from herpes? Probably not the underlying cause of death
1
Childbed
Death following complications from childbirth
171
Chrisomes, and Infants
Babies less than 1 month old and Infants
2268
Cold, and Cough
Same (but probably a symptom of something worse)
55
Colick, Stone, and Strangury
Gallstones, kidney stones, and other intestinal and urinary blockages
56
Consumption
Tuberculosis
1797
Convulsion
Seizure, possibly caused by epilepsy
241
Cut of the Stone
Died during surgery to remove kidney / gallstones
5
Dead in the street, and starved
Exposure, hypothermia, starvation
6
Dropsie, and Swelling
Edema, fluid retention, possibly caused by heart failure
267
Drowned
Same
34
Executed, and prest to death
Executed is obvious, "prest to death" is accidental death while being tortured (via pressing) to force a confession
18
Falling sickness
Epilepsy, perhaps "petit mal" seizures vs "grand mal" which went under Convulsion
7
Fever
Same, interesting that it's distinct from Ague
1108
Fistula
Same, horrific, distinct from childbed -- I guess the women lived a bit longer?
13
Flocks, and small Pox
Smallpox and other diseases causing pustules
531
French pox
Syphilis
12
Gangrene
Same
5
Gout
Gout, or inflammatory arthritis, not the underlying cause of death, but a clear symptom
4
Grief
Modern medicine would be more specific but...
11
Jaundies
Jaundice, liver disease
43
Jawfaln
Fallen jaw, lockjaw, tetanus
8
Impostume
Abcess, a symptom of an infection
74
Kil'd by several accidents
Trauma, I assume
46
King's Evil
Scrofula or Mycobacterial cervical lymphadenitis
38
Lethargie
Chronic fatigue, a symptom of something else
2
Livergrown
Swollen liver, possibly cirrhosis from drinking
87
Lunatique
Lunatic, mental illness -- curious about the actual cause of death though
5
Made away themselves
Suicide
15
Measles
Same
80
Murthered
Murdered
7
Over-laid and starved at nurse
A smothered baby, either accidentally or on purpose, starved from lack of milk
7
Palsie
Paralysis, Parkinson's, similar things
25
Piles
Hemorrhoids, not a cause of death, but a source of infections and an obvious symptom
1
Plague
same
8
Planet
Sudden death thought to be related to something astrological (planet alignment)
13
Pleurisie, and Spleen
Pleurisy (chest infection), apparently it can sometimes be caused by damage to the spleen?
36
Purples and spotted Feaver
Bruising and spotted fever (tick borne disease), distinct from bruising, listed earlier
38
Quinsie
Quinsy, Peritonsillar abscess, can cause many other things
7
Rising of the Lights
Fluid in the lungs, possibly caused by croup
98
Sciatica
Same, possibly caused by spinal disc herniation
1
Scurvey, and Itch
Ye Scurvy dogs! Ye been sailing with yer limes!
9
Suddenly
um...
62
Surfet
Surfeit, overeating, overdrinking, not fatal on its own, but perhaps blamed when it was the underlying reason
86
Swine Pox
Possibly a euphemism for "French Pox"?
6
Teeth
Probably children dying at an age when their permanent teeth were coming in. Similar to "Chrisomes" named for the cloth used when christening a child. Either that or serious tooth infections that led to complications.
470
Thrush, and Sore mouth
Thrush (Candidiasis) could make it hard to eat or drink, or lead to other infections
40
Tympany
Excess gas in the gastrointestinal tract making the belly like a drum, many potential underlying causes
13
Tissick
A wasting disease, often associated with a cough
34
Vomiting
Long term vomiting can cause dehydration, might also have been used for someone choking on vomit and dying from asphyxiation
I can speculate: Tumor or abscess pushing on the sciatic nerve? Horrible, unending back pain so they killed themselves? The cure being worse than the disease? I only know a bit about 17th century medicine, just that they lack a lot of medical technology and knowledge we take for granted. I mean they figured out hand washing in the 19th century.
Childbed for one, by washing hands before shoving them up in laboring women's vaginas.
Pressing to death by not torturing people
You can prevent a lot of Chrisomes and Teeth deaths (infants and toddlers and kindergartners) by routine vaccinations. Would prevent Jawfaln (tetanus) and Rising of the Lights (possibly whooping cough) as well.
Then of course there's basic safety standards and antibiotics.
That happened with our dogs. One of our dogs was crazy about the other, like she was his everything. She passed away, and he died in the middle of the night a few days later. They were both elderly, but he had seemed fine when we went to bed, other than being sad about losing his best friend.
It's the reason why so many misleading statistics claim a much shorter lifespan in the past. If you survived childhood, and there wasn't a plague around, or a war, you had good chances of reaching 60.
Life expectancy from birth is easily the most misleading statistic in the history of the social sciences because it is a measure of central tendency (aka an average, specifically, a median) of a property (age at death) that not only has no central tendency but actually has the opposite of a central tendency, with values concentrated at the low end (infant and child mortality) and the high end (old age deaths). In almost all societies ever measured, the life expectancy from birth age is usually the age at which a person is least likely to die.
To add to its misleading nature: demographers usually use the value to express the life chances of the just-born cohort (up to age 5). Since they obviously can't wait 70 or 80 years until half of that cohort has actually died, they instead use curve-fitting to estimate life expectancy based on infant and child mortality actually experienced by the cohort. People often say that life expectancy from birth is misleading because it's heavily impacted by infant and child mortality, but this is not quite correct - it's actually entirely determined by infant and child mortality.
It's interesting how there's a hint of science here, but so much non-science.
Like, trying to categorize things is a bit scientific. Trying to distinguish between similar but different things is a bit scientific. At the same time, so many of these causes of death are symptoms not causes. And, there are too many cases where they didn't bother to try to find a cause, like the "Planet" cases or "Suddenly". Also, almost all of the deaths are in children / infants, but in those cases they don't try to figure out the cause of death, they just note the age.