angualupin:sixth-light:cityoflondonlibraries:janeymac-ie:maple-clef:cityoflondonlibraries:@Guildhall

angualupin:sixth-light:cityoflondonlibraries:janeymac-ie:maple-clef:cityoflondonlibraries:@Guildhalllib: Did you know that in Sept 1665, the plague killed 7165 people in a week? Find out more in our free exhibition! [x]I want to know about the person killed by a fall from the Belfrey at Allhallows the Great. What better time than during the plague to committe murduh most foule, that’s what I say. My faves: Fright, Lethargy and “rising of the light” (latter sounds quite… Vampiric)Lights refers to some internal organ, kidneys maybe?(I know this from a song about a woman getting stopped by a civic guard:Where’s your lights miss? Said heFor an answer said she:They’re next to me liver where you’ll never be!)“Rising of the lights” was mostly likely croup (lights being the lungs). Croup (or laryngotracheobronchitis) is a respiratory condition that is usually triggered by an acute viral infection of the upper airway. The infection leads to swelling inside the throat, which interferes with normal breathing and produces the classical symptoms of a “barking” cough, stridor, and hoarseness. [x]But now I’m imagining a cranky vampire with a really bad cough…My favourite is “suddenly”, for its glorious lack of actual explanation. So descriptive and so mysterious at the same time.Ooooo, I love these. We used to go over them in our epidemiology classes for fun.Some translations:ague: malaria, or any recurring fever that looks like malariachrisomes is the death of a child before christening, i.e. neonatal deaths, which could be from any number of causes (premature birth, congenital deformities, infection)consumption: tuberculosisconvulsion: obvious, but doesn’t necessarily mean any of the conditions we associate with seizures today. heart attacks and some infections can also cause convulsions.dropsy: any kind of swelling, but most likely systemic edema such as that caused by congestive heart failurefrighted was probably heart attacks (similarly, suddenly was probably either a heart attack or a stroke; something where the person just dropped dead)grief and lethargy could both be complications of depression (although ‘suicide’ was usually listed separately), but were probably often an unidentified lingering illness that slowly sapped the strengthgripping in the guts and scouring: dysentery or any other diarrheagic diseaseimposthume: a cutaneous infection such as an abscess leading to sepsis (gangrene was usually listed separately)king’s evil: scrofula, which is a complication of tuberculosis characterized by swelling of the lymph glands in the neck.palsy: muscle weakness or tremors, so probably the result of a stroke or a neurodegenerative disease such as Parkinson’s.rickets and scurvy are both vitamin deficiencies, which may or may not have been the proximate cause of death.spleen: actually meant anger, so probably heart trouble.stone: ooooo, probably a bladder stone. it was well-known that the kidney, bladder, and gallbladder could all collect stones, but bladder stones were most likely to kill.strangury: difficulty urinating, which most likely was due to a bladder stone or prostate troubles. for both strangury and bladder stones, proximate causes of death could be a burst aneurysm due to high blood pressure caused by the inability to urinate, or could be due to a urinary tract infection that turned into sepsis.surfeit: I’ve never been entirely sure. generally tended to mean someone had ‘overindulged’ in something, but since that tended to be in the eye of the beholder, what actually killed them, who knows.teeth: infection of the teeth, gums, or jaw, probably. a lack of dentistry kills!timpany: everything I’ve ever read says this means ‘excessive flatulence’, so I really have no clue. winde would also be in this category. a gastrointestinal infection, maybe?tissick: a dry cough, which could be due to tuberculosis or any number of lung infections, or even asthma.This list doesn’t include one of my favorites, laid to nurse, which means an infant accidentally smothered to death while co-sleeping.It should be remembered that ‘causes of death’ were visible symptoms the person exhibited around the time of their death, so may not have been the actual cause of death. ‘Palsy’, for example, is common in the elderly, so the actual cause of death could have been anything that wasn’t itself obvious (like straight-up old age). -- source link

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