Rare Book Exhibit at the Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, University of Toronto
SPIRITUS VITALIS: MELANCHOLY AND HUMOURAL SCIENCE IN THE EARLY MODERN PERIOD
Drawing on a variety of materials from plays to herbals to religious volumes, this exhibition of rare books from the rare book collection of the Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies (U of T) offers an interdisciplinary overview of the concept of the humours - with a particular emphasis on the "horrible humour" of melancholy - in the early modern period. The four humours and their related fluids – sanguine (blood), choleric (yellow bile), phlegmatic (phlegm) and melancholic (black bile) – were believed during the period to inform and provide the foundation for a person’s character and wellness. The exhibit sheds light on one of the fundamental questions broached by scholars of this period, as it played out across print culture: who had the "right" or responsibility to diagnose melancholy and offer remedies or solutions?
[Thank you to Claire Carlin for passing this on]