Considers how the body was viewed by the medical profession from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment, and challenges established ideas in the field of medical history. Examines the provision of medical care in context and how it was shaped by the social, religious, political and cultural concerns of the age. Arranged thematically and with brief but scholarly introductions, the selection of documents includes contemporary sources, recent research in the field and classical writings. Written in an accessible style by an Open University lecturer. Companion volume to The Healing Arts: Health, Disease and Society in Europe 1500-1800. (view table of contents)

The problem of the poor grew in the early modern period as populations rose dramatically and created many extra pressures on the state. In Northern Europe, cities were going through a period of rapid growth and central and local administrations saw considerable expansion. This volume provides an outline of the developments in health care and poor relief in the economically important regions of Northern Europe in this period when urban poverty became a generally recognized problem for both magistracies and governments. With contributions from international scholars in the field, including Jonathan Israel, Paul Slack and Rosalind Mitchison, this volume draws on research into local conditions and maps general patterns of development.

Product Description: Throughout history governments have had to confront the problem of how to deal with the poorer parts of their population. During the medieval and early modern period this responsibility was largely borne by religious institutions, civic institutions and individual charity...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

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Product Description: The role of religion was of paramount importance in the change of attitudes and approaches to health care and charity which took place in the centuries following the Council of Trent. Health Care and Poor Relief in Counter-Reformation Europe, examines the effects of the Counter-Reformation on health care and poor relief in Southern Catholic Europe in the period between 1540 and 1700...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: Despite his fame Paracelsus remains an illusive character. As this volume points out it is somewhat of a paradox that the fascination with Paracelsus and his ideas has remained so widespread when it is born in mind that it is far from clear what exactly he contributed to medicine and natural philosophy...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: This volume is a synthesis of the research articles of one of Europe’s leading scholars of 16th-century exile communities. It will be invaluable to the growing number of historians interested in the religious, intellectual, social and economic impact of stranger communities on the rapidly changing nation that was Elizabethan and early Stuart England...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

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Product Description: This volume provides a history of the Scandinavian Reformation from its evangelical beginning in the 1520s to its institutionalization by the mid-seventeenth century, when Lutheran territorial churches were established in the Nordic countries...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)