Royal Navy Medical Officers' journals at the National Archives"The journals include a variety of colourful tales of 18th and 19th century ship life, from drunken rum-related incidents, venereal disease, scurvy, shark bites and tarantulas, to lightning strikes, gun fights, mutiny, arrests and court martial - not to mention ship wrecks and even ( Read more... )

I'm searching YouTube clips of QI in attempt to demonstrate that a fact really was read out on the show that would surely be of interest here:

- Now, I already knew that until the 20th century the proprietry cure for syphilis contained huge quanitites of mercury. It wasn't clear whether it worked or not, but certainly what was true was that the cure ( Read more... )

Okay,
I do not confess to be educated on this matter. But someone mentioned that Jack had Syphilius and even though he doesn't drink a lot of rum in POTC3, could we also atribute some of his eyecolor to that of alcohol poisoning?

The Incompleat Chymist: Being an Essay on the Eighteenth-Century Chemist in his Laboratory, with a Dictionary of Obsolete Chemical Terms of the Period, recommended for all your Chemical and Alchemical needs. The dictionary (second half of the document) is more readable than the first half. Now you too can know what "cinnabar of antimony" is ( Read more... )

Molly Joyful’s List Of Useful Resources has been updated! Many new links for you, on all aspects of life in the 18th century, with focus on life at sea and British history and daily life ( Read more... )

From http://wordplayer.com/ I found one of PotC writers, Mr. Terry, his email. I decided to e-mail him about something that has confused me for quite a while; characters' eye colours.

( Dear Terry, )

"Notes from the Orlop"

is a wonderful blog integrated in the website of the Maine Maritime Museum, and it's truly a treasure trove for the researchers or simply curious among us! There are 34 entries so far, and each of them is well worth reading.

The latest entry, "Pretty Hair", sure kept me glued to the screen for a while. It's both informative ( Read more... )

Dear all

Molly Joyful’s List Of Useful Resources has been updated! Many new links for you, on all aspects of life in the 18th century. Some very interesting links this time: figure heads, the history of toilet paper, Nelson in a jar, Nelson in a barrel, actresses in the 18th century, how to avoid hanging by being pregnant, Royal Navy ghostbusters ( Read more... )

Bethleham Hospital (Bedlam) is the first thing that comes to my mind when thinking of the treatment of lunacy in the 18th century. Unfortunately, there wasn't much "treatment" involved until late in the century. Per wikipedia:

In the 18th century people used to go there to see the lunatics. For a penny one could peer into their cells, view the ( Read more... )

AKA "Groaning" chairs were used in birthing.

Here is a site with some pictures of period parturition chairs.

Alternatively, Webster's Online Dictionary defines groaning chairs as:

Groaning chair. The chair in which a woman is confined or sits afterwards to receive congratulations. Similarly "groaning cake" and "groaning cheese" are the cake and ( Read more... )