A patient suffering from 'mania' during an episode.
In 1843, Sir Alexander Morison published The Physiognomy of Mental Diseases, a compilation of observations and sketches of mental patients.
The drawings were intended to demonstrate the effects of mental delusion on the faces and bodies of the patients. Similarly, in Paris in the late nineteenth century, Jean-Martin Charcot would photograph dozens of his patients at the Salpetriere Hospital. The aims of Morison and Charcot were akin: to illustrate, literally, how a mental patient was physically and physiognomically affected by his or her condition.
The original purpose of Morison’s drawings, done by artists under his direction and, presumably, in the presence of the patient, was to illustrate a series of lectures he gave in London in the 1820s. Morison introduces his text with the claim, “There is no class of diseases in which the study of Physiognomy [sic] is so necessary as that of Mental [sic] diseases.” (8)
Despite the skill of the artists, it is sometimes difficult to tell — as in the case of a young woman described as suffering from ‘mania’ — what the exact difference is between the before and after illustrations. Other illustrations, such as this, seem more like cartoons for a Dickens character than anything else.
The text and pictures together make a fascinating portrait of one facet of mental health medicine in early nineteenth century England as Morison includes some details of diagnosis and treatment with each patient’s portrait.
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