Museum of the Weird and Withered

Taking a break

2009-12-31T22:53:00.001Z

As you probably have noticed, I haven't updated the Museum for a while. This is due to a combination of lack of time due to dealing with other things! And life.

At the moment, I don't really know if the Museum has a future, but who knows...

The human body is fantastic

2009-09-21T23:30:00.001+01:00

Sometimes the human body can baffle even science as to how it manages to pull through the most critical of scrapes. This page at Cracked.com depicts 7 fatal injuries that were not quite as fatal as they seemed - the people in question survived!

My personal favourite, if such a thing is tastefully possible, is the internal decapitation. If only Anne Boleyn knew this trick, then she could have lived a bit longer to annoy Henry VIII a bit further!

Autumn begins

2009-09-06T21:41:00.001+01:00

With the commencement of September comes a reopening of the Museum! Over summer, work has not been lax, so there are some lovely oddities for you to feast your ears on and treat your eyes to.

For the moment, I would like to announce the release of the 8th Gatehouse Gazette, with a wonderfully ghoulish front cover by Myke Amend, who has designed album covers for the steampunk bands Abney Park and Vernian Process. This reflects the theme for this edition - 'forbidden tales of fright and fervour'. ' Click on the image below to access the issue!

Summer hiatus

2009-08-05T11:09:00.002+01:00

As you can see from the lack of posts recently, I have taken a bit of a hiatus from curating the Museum. However, once summer is over, you can expect to see much more activity here!

As a point of interest, the dieselpunk blog The Flying Fortress has arisen from its hiatus, which you can access via the link provided!

Don't forget that the Museum will be returning in September!

Gatehouse Gazette - Issue 7 - Metropolis

2009-06-29T00:43:00.001+01:00

The latest edition of the Gatehouse Gazette is dedicated to the classic 1927 film and the concept of the metropolis, wandering through the cramped citadel we go. Here is a brief overview of what's in this issue:

In response to the discovery of lost Metropolis footage, issue #7 is dedicated to this 1927 classic of silent film and the metropolis in general.

Of course there is a review of the original Metropolis, by Mr Marcius Rauchfuß, as well as an article about the 2001 anime of the same name, by Mr Sigurjón Njálsson. For the latest about what is going on in that other fine city, the Old Smoke called Londontown, we introduce Brigadier Sir Arthur Weirdy-Beardy of The Steampunk Club, while Mr David Townsend is off to farther realms once again, traveling by the Indian Pacific from Perth to Sydney, Australia.

We are also extremely glad to present an exclusive preview of Mr Toby Frost’s upcoming Space Captain Smith novel, Wrath of the Lemming Men!

And it almost goes without saying that this issue features all the columns and features that you might have come to expect from us: Ms Hilde Heyvaert writes her “Steampunk Wardrobe” about ethnic steampunk; Mr Craig B. Daniel dedicates his “Liquor Cabinet” to a story about beer, and Mr Guy Dampier is back with a Quatermass review. More reviews come from Hilde (Unhallowed Necropolis), Mr Trubetskoy (The Court of the Air and Outcry) and Toby Frost (Gormenghast).

Click on the above image to download the latest issue!

Prodigies: Drawings of Anomalous Humans

2009-06-02T00:44:00.002+01:00

The idea of the 'freak show' has a placeholder throughout history as being both a ghastly spectacle and a lesson to be learned. This can be both morally and medically, for those with deformities and abnormalities were certain to be ostracised from normal society and could only find acceptance amongst those who sought to exploit them.

However, disease and deformity are curiosities in their own right - historically for people's own pleasure in the freak show, and also for various levels of study, be it scientific or artistic. James G. Mundie is an artist who specialises in drawing the portraits of such 'anomalous humans - monstrosities - freaks', keeping a gallery of drawings known as Prodigies: Drawings of Anomalous Humans. The website design appears to be inspired by old Victorian adverts and sideshow banners.

The featured picture here is entitled Portrait of an Amateur Pathologist, showing the eponymous pathologist with the skeletons of two conjoined foetuses, known as cephalothoracopagus. More from the artist's gallery can be accessed here.

Crooked House

2009-05-25T17:38:00.003+01:00

Not the Agatha Christie novel, but those who have read the Stephen King story Rose Red will find this piece of architectural confusion vaguely familiar.

The story begins in Connecticut, USA when heiress and widow Sarah Winchester consulted a spiritualist for advice following a depression brought on from the deaths of her only daughter in 1866, her father-in-law in 1880 and her husband, wealthy gun magnate William Winchester, in 1881. She had assumed that the Winchester family was cursed from the deaths that had occurred.

The medium she consulted was reputedly psychic and told Sarah Winchester that the family were indeed cursed—by the spirits of the people killed by the Winchester rifle. The medium apparently advised her to move west and build a new house for herself and the spirits.

The twist was that if Sarah Winchester was to ever halt construction on the house, she would also die.

Moving to California in 1884, Sarah Winchester purchased an 8-room farmhouse and started spending her $20 million inheritance on renovating and adding to the house. This work continued 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, every day of the year, for the next 38 years.

The house itself is a complete confusion of design or forethought: it has doors that open into walls, stairs that lead up to nowhere and end at the ceiling. It is predominantly of redwood frame, and boasts some 160 rooms, 40 of which are bedrooms. There are 47 fireplaces, 10,000 windowpanes and 17 chimneys. The motif of the number 13 is a running theme through most of the house; Sarah Winchester was fascinated with the number 13 as she felt it had some spiritual meaning to her.

The 1906 earthquake damaged the house: it was previously 7 storeys high but today is only 4. Nevertheless, Sarah Winchester died at the age of 83, and construction on the house was stopped. It is said to be haunted today, and is a popular tourist attraction, known as the Winchester Mystery House.

The story of her fear of the spirits of the dead is the most well-known for the reasoning behind the confused architecture. Perhaps Sarah Winchester truly feared the spirits of the dead—or maybe, she was rich enough to build her house how she wanted, and that is what she did.

(cross-posted at The Gatehouse)

Anatomy of the Beast

2009-05-15T10:32:00.001+01:00

The above image, Anatomy of the Beast, is by ~korintic. Done in inks and Adobe Photoshop, it gives a great yet ghoulish window into the old-style Victorian lecture theatre autopsies that used to be performed. Public autopsies are illegal in the UK under the 1984 Anatomy Act - being able to view an autopsy is restricted to medical schools. Notwithstanding, Professor Gunther von Hagens' primetime autopsy back in 2002 wasn't deemed to be breaking the law by the police - they just stood around the lecture theatre and watched.

However, I doubt today that if a creature such as the one in the picture above, such an autopsy would be made viewable by the public. I'd expect some sort of clapped-up Roswell alien affair, with shaky cam video recording. Although with the advent of HD-TV and Blu-Ray, technology must have moved on since then?

Battle of the Sexes

2009-05-14T12:41:00.001+01:00

What is this phenomenon that men seem to get when afflicted with a cold? 'Manflu' is the colloquial term, and yet there is no equivalent term for women (although some might argue that women constantly complain more - as I can attest to that, I can be a horrible complainer).

This article by the BBC suggests that the female sex hormones in the form of oestrogens may provide women with some sort of 'brake' on the inflammatory process by inhibiting an enzyme known as Caspase-12.

However, would men rid themselves of the manflu by getting treated with oestrogens? There's going to be some side-effects for sure - would you swap manflu for manboobs?

Smoking is good for the Motherland

2009-05-05T10:10:00.001+01:00

A brief post, but I believe this BBC News article on smoking in China says it all.

A temporary pause (but the Museum Gift Shop is still open)

2009-05-04T13:45:00.000+01:00

It's getting to that time of year where things get a mite busy, so new curios and exhibitions at the Museum will be sporadic until June so I can get the cleaners out to scrub up on some new oddities.

Fear not, the Museum Gift Shop is still open, but expect some lovely, weird historical and medical goodness when I get back into the swing of things!

Gatehouse Gazette - Issue 6 - Alternate History

2009-04-26T12:22:00.008+01:00

The latest edition of the Gatehouse Gazette has just been released! The theme for this issue was on alternate history - the what ifs and what could haves of a different timeline.

For this issue, I contributed two film reviews, one on the wonderfully dystopian Brazil and another on the mad science of Hammer's The Curse of Frankenstein to join the other articles of brilliance as we took a trip down different temporal paths.

Here is a brief summary of what you can expect from this issue:

Because the Gatehouse Gazette welcomes all kinds of “Tinkering with Time,” we dedicate this issue to the business of alternate history.

Some of our familiar contributors ponder what could have been: Mr Rauchfuß, for example, imagines how much better things would have been had Emperor Friedrich III lived just a tad longer while Miss Ella Kremper warns just how much worse the world of Brazil seems compared to ours. Mr Trubetskoy wonders why the First World War is so often overlooked in alternate history but offers a review of a book that touches upon the subject, if only in passing.

You will also find plenty of the usual in this edition: Mr Daniel’s “Liquor Cabinet”; “Local Steampunk” in Antwerp this time; Miss Hilde Heyvaert’s “Steampunk Wardrobe” about the mad scientist look; and Ella’s “Hammer Horrors”. And we welcome a new columnist: Mr David Townsend, “Gentleman Traveler”!

Some old faces return to contribute once again: Mr Toby Frost, author of Space Captain Smith and its sequel God Emperor of Didcot, provides a review of the fourth Call of Duty video game and Mr Guy Dampier writes the first in a series of articles about the Quatermass franchise. Also, we welcome Mr Andii as guest author who writes about his band Ghostfire.

Lastly, the good Colonel and I sat down with Hilde for a long and pleasant chat about her clothes and costuming. (Quite worth the trip to Belgium—by airship, of course.) She previously interviewed two designers for our magazine so the least we could do was return the favor!

Click on the above image to download the latest issue. Or click here.

Anatomical Chronicles

2009-04-17T14:40:00.012+01:00

Stumbled across ~misfitmalice on DeviantART and found a very interesting and intricate gallery entitled Chroniques Anatomiques. This gallery contains anatomical images portrayed artistically in a detailed and macabre fashion by the artist, involving biomechanical additions and medical equipment. This gives it a fantastically macabre medicine appearance which would not be out of place in a tortured asylum.

Some of the images sourced are recognisable as being from the 1918 edition of Grey's Anatomy and also the anatomical sketches of Leonardo da Vinci. The image portrayed here is Chroniques Anatomiques V.VIII : Hypophysectomie and displays a hypophysectomy (surgical removal of the pituitary gland).

More from the Chroniciques Anatomiques can be seen here.

The Second Opinion

2009-04-15T19:55:00.008+01:00

In the Middle Ages, medicine was not exactly top-notch, especially in Europe. With treatments such as swallowing ground emeralds for the rich, to pouring the grease of a fox into your ear for earache, and the always popular leech to suck your problems away, it's not surprising that doctors were not very popular or successful in treating their patients. Arabic doctors had a bit more luck, on the other hand. Here are two comparative examples.

The Lumpy Leg

A knight presented with an infected lump on his leg - an abscess.

The Arabic doctor suggested dressing the abscess and preparing it for draining.

The European doctor suggested amputating the leg.

Now, depending on whether the knight's leg had started to turn into necrotic tissue, the Arabic doctor had the right sort of idea. Let's not jump to conclusions now.

Doctor, Doctor, My Brain Hurts

A man presented with a headache.

The Arabic doctor suggested a change of diet.

The European doctor cut open the man's head, removed his brain and rubbed it with salt.

The man died.

What's the moral of the tale?

Get a second opinion. And don't get sick in Medieval Europe.

Something's in the air

2009-04-12T19:22:00.020+01:00

It was common knowledge - the air outside was bad. Rich people would move to the countryside to escape it, because with people dying all around you, it's not necessarily the sort of thing you'd want to be associated with. Keep your windows and doors shut, or run for the hills?

With the Black Death sweeping over Western Europe in the 14th Century, people were dying left, right and centre. The feeling in the air wasn't good - figuratively and literally - morale was low, minorities such as foreigners, beggars and lepers were persecuted, religious fanaticism increased with the Flagellants seeing the Black Death as a punishment from God and thus all must repent. Plus, the miasma was the cause of the disease.

Miasma comes from the Greek word meaning pollution. The ideas that disease was caused by 'something in the air' is known as the miasma theory of disease. An example of this is the disease malaria, which means 'bad air' in Italian (mal aria). Miasma was considered to be a poisonous vapour that travelled through the air. It was composed of particles formed from decomposing matter (miasmata) and was easily identifiable by its foul, disgusting smell. It is easy to see how a link could form here - with dead bodies lining the streets, a bad smell in the air; it wouldn't take a rocket scientist to put two and two together to say that disease is caused by bad smells. Well, rocket scientists weren't exactly a dime-a-dozen in Medieval times so these links continued to proliferate. Plague doctors during this time would carry sweet-smelling plants and herbs in an attempt to ward away the bad air when they went to visit patients.

The concept of miasma came long before the Medieval period, although it was popularised during that era. It was in fact the Ancient Greeks who were the initial proponents of this theory - the father of modern medicine, Hippocrates suggested a link between the environment and illness, noting an association with places that were damp, dank and foul-smelling. Asclepius, the god of medicine, was said to treat 'pestilential air' with 'sweet-smelling airs'. Plato also had his own opinion, saying that bodies in states of putrefaction were sources of this smell, and Roman doctor Galen suggested that inhaling the breath of ill people with bad breath was a dangerous task indeed.

But how do you avoid air, itself ubiquitous in nature and all around us? It is natural to say that bad smells offend - they can even make people ill if they are too strong - but the cause of disease was confounded by the presence of bad smells. In the absence of any other possible reason, miasma was the one that continued. Even in the 19th Century, the prevailing theory was that disease was caused by unpleasant odours.

However, this time, the link was put forward concurrently with bad sanitation. This time, the disease was not that of the Black Death, but cholera. With filth being quite distasteful to the middle and upper classes, people began to equate bad smells as coming from filthy conditions, therefore, disease comes from bad sanitation. Again, it's perfectly possible to see the logic. Even Florence Nightingale campaigned for cleaner hospitals in her Fight against the Filth.

It took a plucky doctor by the name of John Snow to connect cholera and dirty water, and by removing the water pump handle at Broad Street, the deaths from cholera shot down. The Vibrio cholerae bacterium was then discovered in 1854, but it took thirty more years and the rediscovery of the bacterium for the miasma theory of disease to be displaced by a more familiar concept - the germ theory.

So, what is the difference between miasma and germs? Well, the germ theory has a stronger scientific basis behind it, rather than just being 'a bit nasty to the nose', which is what miasma proffered. Viruses and bacteria can indeed be transmitted via the airborne route, but it's not their smell that causes the illness. Hay fever can be exacerbated by pollen in the air, but pollen's not necessarily pongy. Smells can be produced by organisms by their metabolism (just ask a cow), but it is not necessarily the chemicals produced in an odour that causes an illness.

On the other hand, the filthy nature that miasma was so often associated with allowed a different problem to be solved - hospitals became cleaner and more sanitised, so surely a positive can be drawn from it.

Unfortunately, technology and time period were against us this time round, but don't assume that something suspicious in the air is going to put your body into overdrive. Just pull out the scented candles, spray some air freshener and visit your doctor for some advice.

Places of Interest - The Gatehouse

2009-04-12T16:45:00.018+01:00

As well as the Museum, I also contribute to The Gatehouse, a website run by Nick Ottens about the speculative fiction genres of steampunk and dieselpunk. The Gatehouse has a blog to which one may read more about such topics and more. Click on the link above to find more in this treasure-trove of information!

The following links are snippets of what I have written for The Gatehouse Blog that would also be of interest at the Museum:

Radium quackery
Crazy Victorian advertising

I also contribute to the Gatehouse's premier forum - The Smoking Lounge, where you can discuss as much as you want about concepts of a factual and fictional nature regarding these alternate worlds, sciences and technologies with a community of like-minded people, or just drop in for a chat. The Gatehouse Gazette is the Gatehouse's very own online publication and can be accessed via that link.

The Museum is open

2009-04-12T15:15:00.011+01:00

Welcome to the Museum of the Weird and Withered!

Inside you will find references to some of the most random, odd and strange things throughout history regarding science and medicine. The Museum examines the evolution of science and medicine throughout history and also speculates on its relevance today.

The Museum does not focus solely on factual science and medicine, but looks at works of fiction and more. It also touches upon subjects such as the occult and philosophy!

I hope you enjoy your visit, and feedback is very much appreciated!