Throughout history, people have held some truly wild beliefs. While we might chuckle at the thought of witches being burned at the stake or fears of falling off the Earth, past medical and bodily beliefs could be even stranger. Get ready to be amazed by these ten unbelievable medical practices from yesteryear.
The Tapeworm Diet
Over a century ago, as society started pressuring women to be extremely thin, some turned to drastic measures. The medical industry, shockingly, offered diet pills containing tapeworms. The idea was simple: ingest a parasite that would eat away at your food, leading to weight loss. However, it didn’t take long to realize that tapeworms cause diarrhea, vitamin deficiencies, insomnia, and malnutrition.
Even though the sale of tapeworms is now banned in many places, reports still surface of people buying them online, desperate for a quick fix. Sadly, these individuals often end up seriously ill.
Bat Blood Cures Blindness
In ancient Egypt, eye infections were a common issue due to the tropical environment along the Nile. To combat this, Egyptians dripped bat blood into their eyes, believing that since bats flew at night, they possessed superior eyesight. They thought bat blood would magically restore vision.
We now know that bats have poor eyesight, relying primarily on echolocation. So, this cure was not only ineffective but also likely introduced more harmful bacteria into the eye.
Having Sex With Virgins Cures STDs
During the 1500s, syphilis became a widespread epidemic in Europe, spreading through sexual contact. Tragically, the prevailing belief was that having sex with a virgin could cure the disease. People believed virgins possessed powerful purity that could counteract the disease.
By the 1800s, infected individuals engaged in sexual relations with virgins, leading to further spread of syphilis. Mercury was also used as a treatment, with people bathing in it or applying mercury ointments, often resulting in fatal mercury poisoning. These methods, used well into the 20th century, caused tooth loss, nerve damage, and death without curing the disease.
Cannibalism Cures Everything
In Renaissance Europe, consuming cured human flesh was surprisingly common as a remedy for ailments like epilepsy, nausea, and the common cold. Royals and priests consumed human meat, rubbed human fat on their bodies, and even made marmalades with human blood. These treatments became nearly as popular as herbal medicines in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Inspired by the ancient Greeks and Romans, this practice was rooted in the belief that illnesses caused an imbalance in the body. Eating corresponding healthy body parts was thought to restore equilibrium. For example, powdered skull was used to treat headaches, and Romans drank the blood of fallen gladiators to capture their energy.
Women Had Roving Uteruses
The ancient Greeks believed women’s uteruses could travel around their bodies, attracted by good scents and repelled by bad ones. Overwork and sexual abstinence supposedly contributed to this movement, causing a range of physical and emotional ailments known as “hysteria.”
Symptoms included lethargy, headaches, vertigo, choking, suffocation, and heartburn. Treatments involved pleasant-smelling vaginal suppositories and smelling or swallowing something foul, sometimes even feces. Pregnancy was also suggested to anchor the uterus. It took over 2,000 years for this belief to fade, with hysteria still considered genuine until the mid-1900s, blamed on women’s “damaged brains.”
Penises Should Be Cultivated Like Houseplants
The “theory of humors” explained medical conditions based on the four elements: earth, air, water, and fire. Men were believed to have warm, dry bodies suitable for penis growth, while women were considered cold and wet like swamps, lacking the conditions for penis development.
Despite the Greeks recognizing that plants need warmth and moisture to grow, they ignored the importance of moisture in this context. The idea that vaginas are icy cold also seems a bit off, showing how flawed this theory was.
Spiderwebs Combat Malaria
Centuries ago, malaria had a high mortality rate with no known cure. Before quinine and modern medicines, people believed spiderwebs could treat the disease. They consumed spiderwebs tucked inside tablets, but this proved ineffective. To enhance the treatment, sick individuals also ate actual spiders in butter.
The Italians had a similar cure, carrying a spider enclosed in a walnut shell. Fortunately, with the introduction of quinine in the 1600s, these bizarre and ineffective treatments were abandoned.
Smoking Tobacco Cures Asthma And Cancer
When Europeans encountered tobacco in the Americas, they observed natives using it in religious and medical contexts. By the mid-1500s, mass consumption of tobacco began in Europe. It was quickly considered a sacred healing herb capable of curing all ailments, despite no evidence.
Doctor Nicolas Monardes claimed tobacco could cure 36 health problems, including cancer, and people believed smoking cured asthma. These beliefs lasted until the 1920s, with doctors only starting to notice health issues from smoking in the 1930s. Later, they realized that smoking caused and worsened asthma and cancer.
Elves Cause Illness
Forget Santa’s workshop; in medieval Europe, elves were seen as demonic beings in league with the devil, causing human sickness by shooting tiny arrows. Scandinavians believed in dark elves who caused diseases, while the English thought elves caused illness, and the Scottish believed elf-shot arrows caused internal pain in both humans and livestock.
Those afflicted by elf-shots were treated like demoniacs, using smoked herbs, prayers, and holy water to banish diseases caused by elves. It’s a far cry from the helpful, toymaking elves we imagine today!
The Healing Properties Of Dog Poop
During the Middle Ages, a common cure for a sore throat involved swallowing dog poop. People sought out white dog poop, crushed the dried feces into a powder, and mixed it with honey. Although the treatment’s effectiveness is unknown, the risks, including nausea, vomiting, abdominal pains, fever, and bloody diarrhea, far outweigh any potential benefits.
It’s astonishing to consider the lengths people went to, using such unhygienic and dangerous methods in the name of medicine!
These medical beliefs from the past highlight how much our understanding of the human body and disease has evolved. It’s a reminder to appreciate modern medicine and to be grateful we no longer have to rely on bat blood, cannibalism, or dog poop for our health.
What did you think of these crazy medical beliefs? Which one shocked you the most? Leave your comment below!
