TLRH | The Perceived Relationship between Medicine and the Funeral Trade in 18th century England

Wednesday, 20 April 2022, 12:30 – 1:30pm ‘“When the pulse won’t
yield a fee” the perceived relationship between medicine and the
funeral trade in 18th century England’ a seminar by Dr Dan O’Brien
(Bath) as part of the Medical and Health Humanities Lunchtime
Seminar Series in association with the Trinity Long Room Hub.
Description During the long eighteenth century the management of
death was increasingly performed by a variety of different
specialists: doctors, lawyers, clergymen and undertakers. In the
popular culture of the period, the relationship between two of
these professions was a source of great comment and satire. Doctors
and undertakers were satirised because it was argued that they
wielded significant authority over the fate of the dying person.
Their shared interest in the condition of the dying person was
highlighted by depictions that reminded audiences of the
similarities which were shared by the professions such as
specialist terminology, unique tools and an intimate knowledge of
the human body. It is significant that some satirists interpreted
the shared motives of doctors and undertakers as a cause of
competition between the two parties. In these depictions, the
doctor’s ailing patient was snatched away by the undertaker, thus
depriving him of any more payment or the chance to take the body
for his own use. This paper considers how collaboration or
competition were presented in popular culture and what this tells
us about perceptions of professionals’ motives during and after
death. This approach will also allow us to discuss how satirists
perceived the consequences of professionals at the deathbed. Did
the comfort and reassurance offered by the professions outweigh the
apparent lack of agency over one’s final days and hours? Speaker
Bio Dr Dan O’Brien is a Visiting Research Fellow at the Centre for
Death and Society, University of Bath. His research focuses on the
undertaking trade and their products in eighteenth century England.
This has included a detailed analysis of the early trade in the
west of England, with a specific focus on the prosperous
settlements of Bath, Bristol and Salisbury. His research also seeks
to understand how the undertakers and their goods were perceived by
society, by analysing how death and dying were presented in the
popular culture of the period. The Trinity College Dublin Medical
and Health Humanities Initiative brings together researchers from a
wide range of disciplines including history, philosophy, sociology,
drama, health sciences, religion, cultural studies, arts,
literature and languages. Medical and health humanities seeks to
provide insights into the cultural and social contexts within which
diverse but interrelated concerns such as the human condition, the
individual experience of illness and suffering, and the way
medicine is (or was) practiced, might be understood. The Trinity
College Dublin Medical and Health Humanities initiative seeks to
cultivate a richer understanding of the interactions and synergies
between practices and discourses of wellness, health or medicine
and the arts, humanities or culture through interdisciplinary
research and education. Learn more at:
https://www.tcd.ie/trinitylongroomhub/