For several days I’ve been researching lunatic asylums and the laws that governed them. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to discover the angle that I want to discuss in this blog.
So I will admit defeat, for the moment, and leave you with a couple of depictions of asylums instead.
The Madhouse by Francisco de Goya (1746-1828). Photo via Wikimedia Commons
Woodcut from Lee’s Pictorial Weekly Budget Police News – close up of “Horrors of Kew Asylum” 1876. Photo via Wikimedia Commons
French psychiatrist Philippe Pinel (1745-1826) releasing lunatics from their chains at the Salpêtrière asylum in Paris in 1795 by Tony Robert-Fleury (1837-1911). Photo via Wikimedia Commons