There are times when I adore the internet. One good click leads to another and I find a gem of a blog via a gem of a blog. This morning was one of those occasions.
Tim Abbot (or Greenman Tim), on his truly unique and ridiculously readable blog Walking The Berkshires, recently posted that the “Cabinet of Curiosities” carnival he hosts will postponed indefinitely due to a concerning bout with serious illness. May he get well soon! As a gift to his readers he offered a link to another “cabinet of curiosities,” the blog Morbid Anatomy (a word of warning, though, before you click: Morbid Anatomy contains graphic medical images of the human body). The tagline of Morbid Anatomy is “surveying the interstices of art and medicine, death and culture.” The medical historian in me practically did cartwheels.
Now granted, some, or perhaps most of you do not get as thrilled as I do about 19th-century wax antatomical figures with severe physical malformations (I’m willing to bet I’m pretty much alone in this), but this site may also be helpful to the genealogist and family historian hoping to learn about the types of diseases our ancestors suffered and the variety of medical treatments available to them. There is much to learn about death on this blog as well.
It’s so worth a click, but leave any squeamishness at the door.
Thank you, Tim!
They that go down to the sea. 
In modern Western culture, we have isolated ourselves from death to the point that we are unable to deal with death. We’ve done ourselves a disservice by hiding the realities of death and dying.
And you aren’t alone in the interest in the wax figures. I find them fascinating!
By: mudhooks on May 20, 2009
at 8:49 am
Hooray! Another historical anatomy buff! Thanks for your comment…I feel a bit less like a scary person 🙂
By: downtothesea on May 25, 2009
at 2:52 pm