Moving boundaries: civic surgeons and medical practice in the eighteenth-century Austrian Low Countries, 1700-1794

• Main Author: Van Bortel, Tine
• Published: University of Glasgow 2007
• Subjects: 610.9
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.487070

This dissertation sought to investigate civic surgeons and medical practice in the eighteenth-century Austrian Low Countries, the area we now know as Belgium and Luxemburg. This field of research has been neglected so far, and little literature has been written for this geographical area, which does not do its history any justice. During the eighteenth century, the Austrian Low Countries fell under the rule ofthe Austrian Habsburg monarchy, an area which was influenced by the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. This affected also the medical world. Both the national and local governments interfered increasingly into the affairs of the general public, including the practice of medicine. Stricter rules and controls were set in relation to the training and settlement requirements for surgeons. However, the individualism of the cities and provinces made central rule difficult and regulations still varied from city to city. The relative political, religious, and socio-economic stability enhanced the status of artisans, including surgeons. More surgeons managed to climb up the medical ladder, making them potential influential members of society. Accordingly, the professional medical boundaries between surgeons and physicians were more permeable than in some other places in Europe. The emancipation ofthe surgeons was the biggest change in the medical landscape ofthe eighteenth-century Austrian Low Countries. More surgeons undertook further study, skilled themselves, and researched into medical topics. Particularly midwifery seemed to have been ofgreat concern. Surgeons became actively involved in setting up and teaching practical and theoretical midwifery classes for midwives and surgeons. In their actual surgical practice, surgeons, unlike physicians, were confronted with grassroots medicine. Particularly in emergency cases, surgeons needed to be creative, sometimes crossing the boundaries oftheir medical profession in order to help a patient. This inventiveness and their empirical findings were often the basis of change In daily