Girdles: their origin and development, particularly with regard to their use as charms in medicine, marriage, and midwifery / [Walter J. Dilling].

  • Dilling, Walter J. (Walter James), 1886-1950.
Date:
1913-14
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Girdles: their origin and development, particularly with regard to their use as charms in medicine, marriage, and midwifery / [Walter J. Dilling]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    When Spanish women became pregnant for the first time they tied their girdles or shoe-latchets about one of the church bells and struck the bell thrice.1 hor the following unique instances, culled largely from the ancient literature of Denmark, I am extremely indebted to Dr. J. W. S. Johnsson, of Copenhagen, who very kindly offered to send me many instances of the girdle customs of his own country on hearing my paper on “Girdles” at the Seventeenth International Medical Congress. My sole regret is that space will not permit me to give all his valuable extracts. In Denmark, girdles made of human skin were employed, and Dr. Johnsson believes they were in use down to the eighteenth century. They were at one time official! “Straps of human skin (cingulo e corio huuiano) are to be found in apothecaries’ lists in 1672^ The price was 4 Sletdaler (16/-). They were used in diminishing the pains of parturition, most probably as an abdominal belt; it is known that they were used in the same way, but tanned, in Germany ; while in France, straps of serpent’s skin were used for a similar purpose, tied round the right thigh. The straps seem to have gone out of use very soon, as in the ‘Museum Regium,’ written by Holger Jacobaeus, 1696, they are to be found among the curiosities of the museum: ‘Calcei et sandalia ex cute humana. Parata quoque ex corio humana cingula hie conspiciuntur, qua feminis suffucatione uterina laborantibus vulgo circumligari solent.’ They still existed in the museum in 1834, when some of the curios were sold by auction.” These straps of human skin were obtained from condemned but still living criminals. On 3rd December, 1649, a murderer executed at Copenhagen was “gripped with glowing tongs before the castle, all corner-houses, and the new shops, later on he was broken on the wheel from his feet upwards, his tongue was cut off, straps were cut from his bod}r, his heart was taken out, and at last he was laid on five wheels.” The. executioners were in those days popular surgeons, and laws were introduced in order to restrict their powers. They were, however, ordered to supply the apothecaries and barbers with human fat and especially the midwives with straps cut from human skin to be used in confinements. Similar girdles were used in Germany, to bind the abdomen in difficult confinements, about the year 1693.2 Thus far nothing has been said with regard to girdles in 1 E. S. Hartlund, “Legend of Perseus,” 1895, vol. ii, p. 224. 2 K. Garde, “ Bbddel og Kirurg [executioner ami surgeon] Medicinsk- bistoriske Sruaaskriften,” No. 2, Copenhagen, 1912, p. 8 et seq.