- Article
- Article
Spiritual joy
Spiritual joy can be a source of strength. Like the optimistic Pollyanna, there’s a lot to be said for finding reasons to rejoice, even in adversity.
- In pictures
- In pictures
Bird-spotting from medieval to modern times
What use is ‘twitching’? Exploring materials created over 500 years shows that there’s more to birdwatching than meets the eye.
- In pictures
- In pictures
Putti of science
Chubby little winged boys known as putti frequently adorn scientific illustrations. Sometimes portrayed as reverent and sometimes cheeky, they guide our pursuit of knowledge.
- Article
- Article
Eels and feels
For Georgian Londoners, the allure of electric animals was both intellectual and sensual.
- Long read
- Long read
The ambivalence of air
Daisy Lafarge investigates the effects of air quality and pressure on body and mind, exploring air as cure, but one with contradictions.
- Article
- Article
The ancient doctors who refused payment
The NHS might only be 70 years old, but the idea of free healthcare goes back to Ancient Greece, when devout doctors provided their services without charge.
- Article
- Article
Living with early onset Parkinson’s
Ten years ago, three little words changed Pete Langman’s world.
- Article
- Article
In search of the ‘nature cure’
Under the competing pressures of modern life, many of us succumb to mental ill health. Samantha Walton explores why so-called ‘nature cures’ don’t help, and how the living world can actually help us.
- Article
- Article
Medics, migration and the NHS
In the 1960s the NHS became Britain’s biggest employer. So to help fill all those jobs, the government brought in thousands of workers from abroad.
- Article
- Article
Epidemic threats and racist legacies
Epidemiology is the systematic, data-driven study of health and disease in populations. But as historian Jacob Steere-Williams suggests, this most scientific of fields emerged in the 19th century imbued with a doctrine of Western imperialism – a legacy that continues to influence how we talk about disease.
- Article
- Article
Mapping the body
These intricate anatomical drawings show how Ayurveda practitioners have explored the human body and how it works.
- Article
- Article
A medieval guide to practical magic
With few sources of effective help available when treating an injured patient, the medieval physician could instead stage a healing ceremony using a practical how-to guide he carried with him.
- Article
- Article
Dazzling luxury
As the 20th century dawned, both elite and masses basked in the marvellous and unearthly glow of the new electric illumination.
- Article
- Article
Lovesickness and ‘The Love Thief’
An 11th-century poem of love, lust and possibly gruesome death still resonates today.
- Book extract
- Book extract
Ayurveda: Knowledge for long life
The story of medicine in India is rich and complex. Aarathi Prasad investigates how it came to be this way.
- Article
- Article
The soul in the stomach
A 17th-century physician’s controversial theory about the link between the emotions and the stomach reminds us that we shouldn’t ignore our ‘gut feelings’.
- Article
- Article
Why the world needs collectors
Those who collect play an important role as “facilitators of curiosity”, says Anna Faherty.
- Article
- Article
Is shoegaze the loneliest genre of music?
Christine Ro explores the connection between shyness and shoegaze.
- Article
- Article
The first seizure
Historian Aparna Nair had her first seizure when she was 11. Here she recalls that first time, and how other people’s reactions are sometimes the most disturbing part about having a seizure.
- Article
- Article
How to be poor and happy
Money, security, self-sufficiency and charitable giving have long been linked to happiness. But what if you’re working class?
- Article
- Article
On contagion
Reading descriptions of the way humans become infested by parasitic flatworms, Daisy Lafarge experienced painful physical symptoms. Perhaps the very creature she was studying had invaded her body.
- Book extract
- Book extract
You, a thousand years ago
Jack Hartnell argues that, if we were transported into the medieval past, we’d find ourselves somewhere different yet strangely familiar.
- Article
- Article
Getting under the skin
Before the invention of X-ray in 1895 there was really only one way to accurately study the human body, and that was to cut it open.
- Book extract
- Book extract
Renaissance women and their killer cosmetics
In this extract from ‘How to be a Renaissance Woman’, Jill Burke delves into a complex world of beauty products, poison and patriarchy – and reveals the impossible contradictions of femininity faced by 16th-century women.
- Article
- Article
What happy endings teach us in childhood
Kate Wilkinson explores why, in quest fiction, good must triumph over evil, and what that means both for childhood dreams and adult realities.