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Assessing popular medicine in Welsh literature

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The National Library of Wales (Llyfrgell Genedlaethol Cymru) are currently assessing their medical and public health books within their Welsh Print Collection.  Welsh interest in medicine and the medical has a long pedigree dating back to the Physicians of Myddfai and beyond. Welsh works on medicine date back to William Salesbury’s 16th century treatise on herbs and herbal medicines, Llysieulyfr, not published until 1916, through to the profusion of books on popular medicine published in the 18th and 19th centuries and towards the present day.

The National Library are published a series of blogs about their finds, with the initial post focusing on late 18th and early 19th century popular medical literature, where there was a boom in the publication on the subject. The growth in the publication of books on the subject during this period was part of a boom in the publication of books on specialist subjects for the general reader that was fuelled by the emergence of a growing literate population, hungry for new knowledge of all kinds.

Williams’ Pharmacopoeia was a bilingual book that offered herbal remedies for a large range of maladies ranging from asthma and rheumatism to liver complaints, scurvy and consumptive fits, along with recipes and instructions for preparation of a good poultice, bitter wine, purging drinks and the ever-so-appetising syrup of turnips…

Read more here: http://www.llgc.org.uk/blog/?p=14599

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UK Medical Treasures: Erasmus Darwin’s Prescription book, Derbyshire Record Office

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These notebooks are a series of medical practice records, covering the 1740s to 1780s. Each entry deals with an individual patient, recording symptoms and treatment. It’s clear that there is more than one style of handwriting in the books, but we believe the later entries to be the work of Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802) who moved […]

via Treasure 48: Erasmus Darwin’s prescription notebooks — Derbyshire Record Office

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Upcoming History of Medicine events at the Festival of Creative Learning at The University of Edinburgh

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The Lothian Health Services Archive (LHSA) are holding two workshops as part of The Festival of Creative Learning at The University of Edinburgh (20th – 24th February).

On 20th and 22nd February, Samar Ziadat will be running workshops on ‘Making History’. Exploring the collections through a crafty zine-making sessions, we’ll be taking a closer look at the achievements of some notable but lesser-known women in our collections.

Sign up here:
Monday 20th February: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/making-history-a-feminist-cr…
Wednesday 22nd February: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/making-history-a-feminist-cr…

Also occurring during the festival, on 23rd and 24th February, Surgeons Hall will be hosting a history of medicine Wikipedia editathon. We’ll be working with librarians, archivists, academic colleagues and the University’s Wikimedian-in-Residence to improve the quality of articles about the history of medicine on Wikipedia.

Sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/history-of-medicine-wikipedi…

You don’t need to be a dab hand at zine-making or a Wikipeida expert to get involved with either of these – the Festival of Creative Learning is all about trying something new. You can find out more about the full programme on the Festival website: http://www.festivalofcreativelearning.ed.ac.uk

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Scientific Archivists Group 2017 Conference

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HARG members may be interested in attending this year’s Scientific Archivists Group (SAG) conference to be held on Thursday 27 April and Friday 28 April 2017 at The Midland Hotel, Manchester, UK.

The conference includes papers on data protection regulation, data migration from legacy systems, digital preservation and project management skills.

For the full agenda and to make your booking, please go to https://sagroup.eventhq.co.uk/sag-2017-conference. There is a significant discount available for early booking (up to 5th March) and the conference is open to non SAG members.

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New resource offers unique insight into life and death in Leeds

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Visualisations of the Leeds General Cemetery Burial Registers Index

A mine of information for genealogists has been made available online by the University of Leeds Library Special Collections. The burial registers of Leeds General Cemetery are now available for students and the public to access and use for research.

Containing entries relating to the 97,146 people buried at the cemetery, the 25 registers have been transcribed, digitised and made available through the Leeds General Cemetery Burial Registers Index:
https://library.leeds.ac.uk/special-collections-explore/Leeds%20General%20Cemetery%20Burial%20Registers%20Index

The registers record information such as name, age, gender, date of death and burial, cause of death, occupation, and parents’ details. It is possible to browse a full list of all the recorded causes of death and occupations and view charts of key statistics from the data.

Leeds General Cemetery opened in 1835 as a public burial ground. The University of Leeds acquired the company in 1956 and the final burial took place there in 1969, although ashes continued to be scattered there until 1992. Today the site is a public park, its name reverted to the original – St George’s Fields.

The digitisation and transcription project was undertaken as part of the Medical Collections Project, launched in November 2015. The project’s aim is to make medical-related collections more widely accessible, to encourage use, and inspire new research by creating online catalogues and digitising selected items. This includes improving the long-term preservation of this material by undertaking repackaging and conservation treatments where appropriate. The project is funded by a Wellcome Trust Research Resources Award, and runs until May 2018.

The University Library’s Special Collections hold the extensive records of the Leeds General Cemetery Company Ltd. Mainly consisting of business and administrative papers alongside the burial registers, the archive covers the lifetime of the company, with records dating from 1733 to 1992. A new catalogue for the Leeds General Cemetery Company Ltd Archive is also now available.