Richard Blackmore and his Treatise on the English Spleen

Authors

  • Andrés Gattinoni National University of San Martín, National Scientific and Technical Research Council, San Martín, Argentina

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.35305/prohistoria.vi30.1171

Keywords:

Richard Blackmore, Spleen, Melancholy, Anatomy, Ancients and Moderns

Abstract

In 1725, poet and physician Sir Richard Blackmore published A Treatise of the Spleen and Vapours. That workwas dedicated to what he called the “English Spleen”, a mental and bodily disorder, historically linked with melancholy, which according to him had a universal and tyrannical dominion over the men and women of England. This article provides a critical edition of the preface of Blackmore’s treatise. The introduction offers a biographical sketch of the physician and contextualizes the document by placing it within two debates of the early 18th century in which Sir Richard was involved: the Quarrel between the Ancients and the Moderns and a lesser-known controversy on the physiological function of the spleen.

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Published

2018-12-02

How to Cite

Gattinoni, A. (2018). Richard Blackmore and his Treatise on the English Spleen. Prohistoria. Historia, políticas De La Historia, (30), 241–264. https://doi.org/10.35305/prohistoria.vi30.1171

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