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Murder and the making of English CSI
Several years ago my colleague Neil Pemberton asked me when police started using tape to mark out and protect crime scenes. Though I had written extensively on the history of forensics I had no ready answer. As we talked it… Continue reading
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Bond villains and criminal anthropology
Amongst the Libary’s collection of fiction is a copy of Dr No, featuring the redoubtable secret agent, James Bond, created by the ex-Naval Intelligence Officer, Ian Fleming. Both the cinematic and literary worlds of Bond are inhabited by vividly imagined… Continue reading
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Executing magic: the healing power of criminal corpses in European popular culture
The next seminar in the 2015–16 History of Pre-Modern Medicine Seminar Series takes place on Tuesday 10th November. Speaker: Professor Owen Davies Executing magic: the healing power of criminal corpses in European popular culture Abstract: The use of criminal corpses in early modern healing… Continue reading
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History of Pre-Modern Medicine seminar series, 2015–16
The History of Pre-Modern Medicine seminar series returns this autumn. The 2015–16 series – organised by a group of historians of medicine based at London universities and hosted by the Wellcome Library – will commence with four seminars in the… Continue reading
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William Palmer: Prince of Poisoners
William Palmer was a surgeon “of superior degree of instruction”, whose profligate lifestyle led to his ungracious demise in the mid-19th century. Palmer was charged in 1856 with the “wilful poisoning”, with strychnine, of his ‘friend’ and horse-racing partner, John Parsons Cook (to whom he… Continue reading
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Strangulation, sex and death
An exciting new addition to our existing holdings of Spilsbury papers helps clarify the working methods and interests of this famous (or notorious) forensic pathologist. In July this year the Library was fortunate enough to be the winning bidder at… Continue reading
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Damaging the Body: Loss of Face – Vitriol Throwing in Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Britain
The last seminar in the current series Damaging the Body: Physical Harm and the Self, 1850 – 2010, will take place in the Wellcome Library next Wednesday evening. Details: Wednesday 2 May Dr Katherine Watson (Oxford Brookes University) Loss of Face: Vitriol… Continue reading
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Item of the Month, December 2010: The London Monster
On this day in 1790, this man, Rhynwick Williams, a young unemployed Welshman was convicted of three counts of assault and sentenced to six years in prison. This – seemingly – brought to an end a sequence of attacks on… Continue reading
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The crust of it!
This week is National Pie Week in Great Britain, celebrating the long history of pies and pasties in British cookery. Although the haggis and the Roast Beef of Old England occur more in song and story, food wrapped in pastry… Continue reading
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God’s face in the clouds
One hundred and eighty years ago, on 31st March 1829, a York tanner and preacher (and occasional artist) named Jonathan Martin was on trial for his life. Some eight weeks previously, on 1st February, Martin had hidden himself in York… Continue reading