Page from an eighteenth-century trade record. Photo used with kind permission of the Archiv der Hansestadt Lübeck.
Current Projects
Material Worlds: Materia Medica and the Global History of Early Modern Russian Medicine
This project considers the intersections of commodity and knowledge exchanges through the lens of medicaments. Focusing on the mid-sixteenth through to the mid-eighteenth centuries, it examines the transportation of drugs through trade networks that linked Moscow to Western Europe, Asia, and the Americas; the transformation of natural objects into medicines; and the translation of recipes, primarily between German, Latin and Russian. The first study of Russia’s involvement in the early modern drugs trade, this project establishes Muscovy as an integrated and active part of the early modern global world. It is supported by grants from both the Wellcome Trust, and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG).
This project considers the intersections of commodity and knowledge exchanges through the lens of medicaments. Focusing on the mid-sixteenth through to the mid-eighteenth centuries, it examines the transportation of drugs through trade networks that linked Moscow to Western Europe, Asia, and the Americas; the transformation of natural objects into medicines; and the translation of recipes, primarily between German, Latin and Russian. The first study of Russia’s involvement in the early modern drugs trade, this project establishes Muscovy as an integrated and active part of the early modern global world. It is supported by grants from both the Wellcome Trust, and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG).
War Wounds: Soldiers’ Bodies Between Firearms Technologies and Military Medicine in the Early Modern World
How do we treat gunshot wounds? This is a vital question today, both for military doctors and for healthcare professionals in those areas of the world where gun violence is also a reality for civilians. Understanding the problems of gunshot wounds in the past is tricky, as few sources deal with the lived reality of being shot, and being treated for being shot. Vital here are the official medical records of the Russian Empire. Early modern Russian state documents relating to the treatment of injured soldiers, especially those created by the official medical department known as the Apothecary Chancery, include close descriptions of the wounds inflicted by firearms, along with a statement of which firearm did the damage, and what the possibilities were for treatment. This project uses these records as a starting point to explore how early modern people dealt with firearms trauma.
28th October 1673, report of the Apothecary Chancery on the possible treatment of a Russian soldier:
“Shot by a musket into his Semyon’s right leg around the secret strings, it is not possible to treat this wound, as if we were to begin the treatment, that would lead to his death, and he Semyon is infirm and decrepit, and it is not possible for him to serve the Tsar.”
How do we treat gunshot wounds? This is a vital question today, both for military doctors and for healthcare professionals in those areas of the world where gun violence is also a reality for civilians. Understanding the problems of gunshot wounds in the past is tricky, as few sources deal with the lived reality of being shot, and being treated for being shot. Vital here are the official medical records of the Russian Empire. Early modern Russian state documents relating to the treatment of injured soldiers, especially those created by the official medical department known as the Apothecary Chancery, include close descriptions of the wounds inflicted by firearms, along with a statement of which firearm did the damage, and what the possibilities were for treatment. This project uses these records as a starting point to explore how early modern people dealt with firearms trauma.
28th October 1673, report of the Apothecary Chancery on the possible treatment of a Russian soldier:
“Shot by a musket into his Semyon’s right leg around the secret strings, it is not possible to treat this wound, as if we were to begin the treatment, that would lead to his death, and he Semyon is infirm and decrepit, and it is not possible for him to serve the Tsar.”