Mental illness of today was typically thought of as supernatural phenomenon in ancient times. People often thought that sorcery, demons, or gods were punishing a person for their sin, explains Andrew Scull, one of the world’s foremost scholars of the history of madness.
Lacking a better understanding of its causes, mental illness — from melancholy to murderous rages — was blamed on gods and demons. There is no historical corroboration to understand this, yet there are stories that reflect the conflation of madness with supernatural intervention that was common.
Take the familiar story of the Greek hero Heracles (also known as Hercules). The goddess Hera, the wife of Zeus, hated Heracles because he was the son of Zeus by another (human) woman. Hera drove Heracles mad, causing him to murder his own children. From ancient times to the Middle Ages, to today, mental illness was often misunderstood.
Mental Illness in the Middle Ages
In Europe in the Middle Ages, people often saw mental illness as a spiritual malady. In A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century, historian Barbara Tuchman writes that while depression and anxiety were recognized as illnesses by this time, the symptoms of depression, such as despair, melancholy, and lethargy, were considered by the Church to be the sin of accidia, better known today as sloth. And, of course, during much of the Middle Ages, people with symptoms of mental illness were often accused of being witches.
Even as late as the 17th and even 18th century, says Scull, bishops and sometimes priests were sought out to cast demons from people. However, he points out that gradually, the “medical interpretation” became a dominant method.
By the 19th century, religious ideas and superstition about the cause of mental illnesses had not completely disappeared, but overwhelmingly, Scull says, these illnesses were seen in medical terms — and were starting to be called mental illness.
Read More: Modern Medicine Has Its Scientific Roots In The Middle Ages
Horrific Treatments for Mental Illness Through History
Treatments for mental illness had their own trajectory. In ancient times, when demons and vengeful gods were thought to be the cause, people would have priests and prayer treat mental illness. But as time progressed and medical causes were acknowledged, people advocated for medical cures.
The problem was, there were seldom any medical cures of the time. Often, the mentally ill were confined to mental hospitals or asylums.
The oldest and most famous of these in England was Bethlem Hospital (often called Bedlam for short). While the hospital was originally built in London in 1247, in 1574, Henry VIII confiscated the property and made Bethlem a civic institution. The Great Fire of London of 1666 destroyed the original building, but afterward, it was rebuilt.
“By the end of the 18th century, about 300 patients are crammed in there, being treated very little,” Scull says. “But to the extent they are treated, they’re treated with bleeding and purging.” Bloodletting as a remedy for mental illness didn’t die out until the 1850s.
Compared to some so-called treatments, bloodletting and purging are enlightened. Here’s how Scull describes one method of treatment (though he says these kinds of practices were often about discipline as much as treatment): Patients were strapped into a chair that dangled from a pendulum. The chair was spun around so violently that patients vomited, voided their bladders and bowels, and their hair stood on end.
Another “remedy” was putting the patient in an iron cage suspended over water, dropping the cage into the water by means of a pulley system, then pulling it back up, nearly drowning the patient.
“There are others I could mention,” Scull offers. But I think we'll agree that’s quite enough. Asylums were not the only place where the mentally ill faced horrors.
“The Nazis murdered, with — and I can’t emphasize this enough — the active collaboration of most German psychiatrists, perhaps a quarter million mental patients,” says Scull. “The technology of the gas chamber was developed to kill mental patients, and then that equipment was moved to the extermination camps and used in the ways we know. So among the very first victims of the Final Solution were the mentally ill.”
Read More: The Upsetting World of Primitive Brain Surgery
Modern Understanding of Mental Illness and Treatments
Today, we’re much more enlightened. Experts understand that mental illness is the result of the interaction of biochemical, social, and genetic factors. Mental conditions are not signs of demonic possession or failures of character, but are illnesses to be treated with compassion and care.
Still, our society's attitude and policy regarding mental illness could use some improvement. Many organizations labor tirelessly to reduce the stigma associated with mental illness, redress inequities in care, and address the social determinants of health that often are at the root of mental illness.
We have a lot of work to do to find effective treatments for mental illnesses and provide food and shelter for those whose illnesses make it impossible for them to function in society.
Read More: Ancient Medical Treatments Still Used Today
Article Sources
Our writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:
Professor of sociology at University of California San Diego. Andrew Scull
World History.org. Nebuchadnezzar II
King James Bible Online. Daniel 4:25
Britannica. The Madness of Heracles
American author and historian. Barbara Tuchman
Historic England. Mental illness in the 16th and 17th centuries
Londonfire.gov. The Great Fire of London
CDC. About Mental Health
Avery Hurt is a freelance science journalist. In addition to writing for Discover, she writes regularly for a variety of outlets, both print and online, including National Geographic, Science News Explores, Medscape, and WebMD. She’s the author of "Bullet With Your Name on It: What You Will Probably Die From and What You Can Do About It," Clerisy Press 2007, as well as several books for young readers. Avery got her start in journalism while attending university, writing for the school newspaper and editing the student non-fiction magazine. Though she writes about all areas of science, she is particularly interested in neuroscience, the science of consciousness, and AI–interests she developed while earning a degree in philosophy.
