Wellcome uses cookies.

Read our policy
Wellcome Collection homepage
All
Stories
Images
Catalogue
Events

Stories

  • In pictures

How an animation educated the army

In a 1940s cartoon intended to persuade US troops to take malaria medication, the makers pitted a clodhopping soldier against a wily mosquito. If only Private SNAFU had followed the government’s advice.

  • In pictures

Drugs, space travel and the ‘age of promise’

Space-age wonder drug Terramycin promised utopia, but might instead have triggered one of the biggest threats to our future.

  • Article

Deadly doses and the hardest of hard drugs

The invention of the modern hypodermic syringe meant we could get high – or accidentally die – faster than before. Find out how this medical breakthrough was adapted for deadly uses.

  • Article

Tripping for spiritualism and science

Getting high in the name of religion or creativity has been practised for centuries. Now it seems hallucinogenics could help treat mental illnesses too.

All stories (19)

Images

  • Hydrangea quercifolia W.Bartram Hydrangeaceae. Oak-leaved hydrangea. Distribution: South-eastern United States. Beta-dichroine a quinazolinone also called febrifugine from the leaves of hydrangeas is 64-100 times more potent than quinine as an antimalarial in animals, but extremely toxic. A synthesised tolyl derivative, methaqualone (2-methyl-3-o-tolyl-4(3H)-quinazolinone), was found to be a mild hypnotic, and marketed in the sleeping tablet, Mandrax. Widely abused and quickly banned by most countries. Illegal manufacture continues and in South Africa methaqualone is the commonest drug of abuse, mixed with cannabis and smoked. Photographed in the Medicinal Garden of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
  • A compleat history of druggs divided into three classes, vegetable, animal and mineral : with their use in physick, chymistry, pharmacy, and several other arts, illustrated ... / written by Monsieur Pomet ; to which is added what is further observable on the same subject from Messrs. Lemery, and Tournefort ... Done into English from the originals [by Joseph Browne].
  • A compleat history of druggs divided into three classes, vegetable, animal and mineral : with their use in physick, chymistry, pharmacy, and several other arts, illustrated ... / written by Monsieur Pomet ; to which is added what is further observable on the same subject from Messrs. Lemery, and Tournefort ... Done into English from the originals [by Joseph Browne].
  • Thorley's horse and cattle spice is now creating such a sensation throughout the world, that all practical horse-keepers, flock-masters & cattle-feeders are pronouncing it the greatest discovery of the nineteenth century / Joseph Thorley.
  • Thorley's horse and cattle spice is now creating such a sensation throughout the world, that all practical horse-keepers, flock-masters & cattle-feeders are pronouncing it the greatest discovery of the nineteenth century / Joseph Thorley.
  • Ming herbal (painting): Adjutant bird(?)
  • Ming herbal (painting): Pigeons
  • Ming herbal (painting): Siberian white crane
  • Ming herbal (painting): Xichi (a water fowl)
  • Poultry powder.
All images (126)

Catalogue

All works (565)