I found it really exhaustive. Didn't just tell about being buried alive, but every instance to ever occur in the lit. My favorite parts were on Julian pastrana and the Hunterian museum
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A Cabinet of Medical Curiosities is proof there were whackos long before Facebook. Author Jan Bondeson cites Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine as an inspiration, but rather than taking the encyclopedic approach of that book concentrates on a few topics: spontaneous human combustion; bosom serpents; lousy disease; giants; premature burial; Mary Toft and her rabbits; maternal impressions; tailed people; anatomical specimens from the Hunterian Museum; and Julia Pastrana, the Ape Woman. His approach is neither simple listing or skeptical debunking (since most of the cases he discusses are self-debunking); instead he investigates the history of the phenomena.


For example, spontaneous human combustion was once as well accepted as, say, smallpox (and still is in some circles). Bondeson comes up with numerous cases besides the repeatedly cited “urban legend” ones, and notes some doctors were still expressing belief in SHC until the late 19th century. He does some informal statistics, noting that most reported victims are obese female alcoholics – but acknowledges that some were otherwise. (The alcoholic connection may have skewed the data; temperance movements were fond of describing SHC as an end result of imbibing, and were successful to extent that some drunks were very careful to pass out on their backs with their mouths open, so that flames would exhale harmlessly rather than exploding from within). Bondeson doesn’t commit himself firmly, but notes that the “wick effect” probably explains most SHC; drunken victim passed out while smoking or falls unconscious into an ignition source. Her clothes catch fire and begin to burn into the skin, melting and fueling from human body fat. The next day somebody discovers the remains. Bondeson provides a picture of one victim; it’s disturbing.


“Bosom serpents” (sometimes frogs or salamanders instead of reptiles) were believed to crawl into a victim’s mouth, or get imbibed as eggs in water. Once there they grew and caused no end of distress. The most popular treatment was to lure the serpent to the victim’s mouth, then grab it and kill it. Once again Bondeson cites numerous old sources that take this perfectly seriously; he also notes the bosom serpents have updated their act: in a case he personally investigated in a mental hospital, the patient not only had a snake in her gastrointestinal tract, it had somehow got ahold of a small computer and was playing video games in there. She allowed Bondeson to listen to the game noises with a stethoscope. There’s a 16th century woodcut of a patient vomiting various herptiles; it’s disturbing.


The “lousy disease” was a staple end for various tyrants, persecutors, etc.: they became infested with vermin that consumed them from within. The Biblical Herod Agrippa was a supposed example. Bondeson notes over time the affliction changed from unidentified vermin to specifically “lice”; tumors formed on the patients skin that emitted a stream of tiny insects when lanced. He describes a possible explanation here; there is a described species of mite, Harpyrhynchus tabescentium, which forms nodules under the skin of birds and which is sometimes fatal; the catch is at the time Bondeson was writing there were no specimens of the mite available and it was believed to be extinct. Some googling discloses the mites still seem to be around; most of the recent references are in German. There are few pictures available; they’re disturbing.


Like the lousy disease, giants are also Biblically attested; Goliath of Gath, Og of Bashan, and the unnamed giants of Genesis are the examples. Many medieval collectors had giant bones, which eventually turned out to be from something else. I’ve actually seen the infamous Cardiff Giant; it’s in a museum in Cooperstown, NY (not the Baseball Hall of Fame; wrong kind of Giant). It was disturbing.


Premature burial was an obsession from Victorian times; various sorts of coffins intended to prevent it were available, with devices connected to the deceased intended to alert the outside world if the funeral had been rushed; there were also “waiting mortuaries” where the body was left for a week or so to verify it was dead (none of these ever had a successful revival). Bondeson notes hysterical estimates of up to 1000 premature burials annually, and posits that exhumations finding that the body had moved after death were responsible. There are still stories now and then in the sensational literature, and Bondeson notes a “safety coffin” was still available in the 1970s; it included a food locker, oxygen supply, air tubes, chemical toilet, alarm bell, radio transmitter, and cassette player. That actually sounds more comfortable than my house, which is disturbing.


Mary Toft is a perfect example of why your first task in any investigation is refuting the null hypothesis. Mrs. Toft was a English farm women from the early 18th century who repeatedly gave birth to rabbits. She was inspected by various medical professionals, who argued over possible theories: Mrs. Toft was a witch; had had carnal knowledge of a male rabbit; had a female rabbit living in her reproductive tract; or was a sort of “wererabbit”. (Mrs. Toft’s own explanation – see “maternal impressions” below – was that she had had a strong yearning for rabbit stew during pregnancy). Even the delivery of skinned rabbits didn’t cause people to go for the obvious explanation; instead Mrs. Toft was postulated to have uterine contractions strong enough to flay a rabbit. Eventually, of course, Mrs. Toft turned out to have a secret pocket under her skirts and was buying rabbits from dealers (which I learned were called “warreners”). Contemporary pamphleteers had a field day ridiculing the medical profession; some of these are actually available still, I’ll have to check them out regardless of how disturbing they might be.


The belief that something a pregnant woman saw or experienced could be transmitted to the unborn child was the “maternal impression” theory; for example, if she saw a crippled man the child would be born crippled; if she had an unfulfilled taste for strawberries the child would have a red birthmark, etc. Bondeson notes that some husbands went to great effort to prevent events of this sort, ensuring that their pregnant wives were only exposed to pleasant impressions. Nevertheless, accidents happened; when a lady with a white husband gave birth to a black child, medical professionals testified it was because there was a painting of a black man in her bedroom. I can think of another explanation, as disturbing as it might be.


It was firmly believed that tailed people lived in many remote parts of the world; Bondeson provides numerous examples of such claims. He notes there are some actual explanations; a hairy nevus near the base of the spine can be large enough to vaguely resemble a tail, and (although it never contains vertebrae) there are cases where the caudal filament fails to resorb; he provides a picture of a newborn baby with a three-inch caudal filament tail. It’s disturbing.


The Hunterian Museum was founded by pioneer anatomist. Its prime specimens included the Irish Giant, Charles Byrne, who was seven feet ten inches tall. There are various conflicting stories about how Byrne’s skeleton ended up in Hunter’s museum; the more sensational ones involve recovery by divers after burial at sea but it seems like more conventional grave robbing was more likely. The Two-Headed Boy of Bengal was acquired by an East India Company agent after his death by cobra bite at age four. The heads are joined at the top, with the second at right angles to the first. The parasitic head could move its eye independently although they didn’t respond to light. Alas, the little Bengali boy’s name isn’t known. The last museum exhibit Bondeson discusses is the Sicilian Fairy, Caroline Crachami. Miss Crachami was 19 ½ inches tall and weighed five pounds when she was measured in 1824 (the maternal impression theory figures here as well; supposedly Miss Crachami’s mother was frightened by a monkey when she was five months pregnant). Bondeson notes Caroline Crachami was eventually explained as osteodysplastic primordial dwarfism, but also notes people with this condition are usually profoundly mentally and physically disabled while visitors to Caroline Crachami testified she conversed intelligently on a variety of subjects and could walk without assistance; Bondeson therefore suggests her condition, whatever it was, was unique. Her skeleton is on display next to Charles Byrne’s; the juxtaposition is disturbing.


Bondeson’s final case is Julia Pastrana, a Mexican Indian with profuse hair and a “simian” face. Although her life story is sad and interesting enough – her showman manager legally married her and she and her baby died in childbirth – her postmortem adventures make up most of the story. She and her baby were embalmed and passed around as sideshow exhibits in various carnivals and circuses from her death in 1860 until they were stolen from a fairground in 1979. It was thought the remains had been destroyed, but in 1990 they turned up in a hospital museum in Oslo, Norway. They are still there, but not on exhibit and only available for qualified scientific study. Bondeson has actually seen them; he speculates she had an extremely rare genetic disease, congenital hypertrichosis and gingival hyperplasia; Bondeson notes that the disease has varying degrees of penetration and Julia Pastrana’s is the most severe case known. Numerous pictures of Julia and her corpse are available, all pretty disturbing.


Well illustrated and referenced; written for an intelligent lay person. The historical research is extremely well done; Bondeson has uncovered many obscure references. He expresses pity for his subjects; nevertheless the book will appeal to the morbidly curious. And to the disturbed. ( )

It was an interesting book, and much different than I thought it would be. Most of the chapters focus on a single issue (spontaneous human combustion, maternal impressions, the lousing disease) and look at cases dating anywhere from 500-100 or so years ago, discussing the various medical hypotheses used to explain the conditions. My favorites were the chapters on spontaneous combustion (apparently it was thought for awhile that it was the result of drinking too much, and people would sleep with their mouths open after drinking to let the fire out) and "bosom serpents," or creatures that one vomited up (which was thought to be a legitimate ailment, cured when the subject was given horse urine, which, as the author states, I'm sure prevented any further cries for attention in that way).

The only thing about it I didn't like, actually, were the last two chapters. One is on three people who found themselves in the Hunter collection. The discussion of Hunter as a surgical pioneer was quite interesting, but I was less interested in the subjects themselves (an extremely diminutive 9-year-old "fairy", a very tall man, and the skull of a child born with a parasitic twin head coming out of the top of its head). That sort of set the book into the realm of the "freak show," which was apparently the way all three of these individuals made their living in life.

The last chapter is on Julia Pastrana, which was extremely interesting if only because he goes into great detail about her body being mummified and exhibited for more than 100 years after her death. She was a woman born with some severe cranial and facial deformations as well as a disorder which gave her a lot of body hair, so she looked very simian, and again, she made her living this way. Her "husband" made his living this way as well, and continued to do so long after her death. After she was (remarkably well) preserved, she was dressed and bejeweled and exhibited with her son by her husband, then sold off again and again over the years.

I would have preferred the book stick to eccentric medical ailments which have since been explained by modern science since I wasn't quite comfortable with the last two chapters. Of course, Julia Pastrana is right there on the front of the book, so I knew it was coming, but still. ( )