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Bénédict Morel Edits
Did you know...

that Bénédict Morel was a French psychiatrist who helped develop the degeneration theory and dementia praecox disease concept in the mid 19th century?

Degeneration Theory
Morel is known for creating degeneration theory in the 1850's. He began to develop his theory while he was the director of the mental asylum at Saint-Yon in northern France. In 19th century France, there was an increase in crime, sickness, and mental disorders, which interested Morel. He was determined to identify the underlying causes of this increase. Morel’s Catholic and radical political background greatly shaped his process. Morel noticed that the patients in the mental asylum with mental retardation also had physical abnormalities like goiters. He was able to expand this idea when he noticed most people in the asylum had unusual physical characteristics. Morel’s degeneration theory was based on the idea that psychological disorders and other behavioral abnormalities were caused by an abnormal constitution. This also meant that he believed that there was a perfect type of human that degenerations altered. He believed that these abnormalities could be inherited and that there was a progressive worsening of the degeneration by generation. These traits were not specified pathologies, but rather an overall abnormality like a highly susceptible nervous system to disturbances from excessive toxins. The first generation started with neurosis, then, in the next generation, mental alienation. After the second generation, the mental alienation led to imbecility. Finally, the fourth generation was destined to be sterile.

In Morel’s theory, degeneration was synonymous with anything that was different from the natural or normal state. These abnormalities were caused by environmental influences like diet, disease, and moral depravities or traits that were passed from generation to generation like alcoholism and living in the slums. Due to the law of progressivity, these degenerations would get worse in each generation to produce more criminals and neurotics with worse degenerations. Overtime, the degenerations would progress until later generations (specifically the fourth generation) were so idiotic that they were essentially sterile and the abnormal family would die out. This theory explained why there was an increase in mental disorders and also allowed Morel to relate very different diseases as caused by previous generations because they had become more variable over time. Since there was an increase in mental disorders, Morel believed that society was approaching extinction of the imbeciles. He believed that the most degenerative illness was insanity. Morel was able to categorize degenerations into four main categories: hysteria, moral insanity, imbeciles, and idiots.

In 1857, Morel published his degeneration theory in Traité des dégénérescences physiques, intellectuelles et morales de l'espèce humaine et des causes qui produisent ces variétés maladives. In his work, he included images of twelve patients that demonstrated the physical, mental, and moral traits that were evidence of degeneration. Some of these characteristics included altered ear shape, asymmetrical faces, extra digits, and high-domed palates that had psychological representations as well. Morel’s work was well received. It connected psychiatric medicine to general medicine to provide a complete and well-researched cause for a large social problem. It became dominant because it grounded moral treatment, which was questionable in this time period, in science. Morel’s theory also allowed psychiatrists who were unable to help their patients explain why they had not been successful. Degeneration theory meant that there were some psychological disorders that were genetic and could not be cured by a psychiatrist. It also explained all psychological disorders. If a psychiatrist could not find a physical cause of the disease, they could blame it on the individual’s constitution. It quickly spread throughout Europe with key figures spreading the information and using it to explain criminal psychology, personality disorders, and nervous disorders. Wilhem Griesinger introduced Morel’s theory to Germany, Valentin Magnan helped his ideas spread in France, and Cesare Lambroso brought Morel’s theory to Italy. In the 1880’s, Morel’s degeneration theory was very important in French psychiatry and the majority of diagnostic certificates in French mental hospitals involved the words mental degeneracy.

Legacy
Morel is regarded as the father of dementia praecox and the degeneration theory. Both of these ideas helped understand mental illness as it was on the rise in 19th and 20th century France. Morel’s degeneration theory gained quick popularity across Europe, which allowed it to shape further scientific developments. It was used as the basis of body typology and disposition theories as well as Lombroso’s theory of anthropological criminology. His theory was highly ideological and provided a scientific rationale for the eugenics programs used by the Nazis. He is also known for generating research programs to understand the effects on paternal drinking on children. Morel’s degeneration theory is a key influence on Emile Zola’s Les Rougon-Macquart about the environmental influences of violence, prostitution, and other immoral activities on two branches of a family during the Industrial Revolution. In Britain, the degeneration theory bolstered the eugenics and Social Darwinism movement. Karl Pearson and Sidney Webb justified selective breeding and immigration in Britain by trying to prevent the degeneration of the British race. Not all theorists accepted Morel’s work. Sigmund Freud, Karl Jaspers, Adolf Meyer, and Oswald Bumke rejected his ideas. Overall, while Morel’s degeneration theory is considered outdated by modern psychiatrists, Morel is credited with creating the modern biological approach to understanding psychiatric disorders.

Did you know?
Sarah (Crazy Sally) Mapp was an 18th century bone-setter in England. She is renowned for fixing decade old dislocations and her masculine characteristics.

Family:
Sarah Mapp was baptized in 1706 near Wiltshire, England. She was the daughter of John and Jenny Wallin. John Wallin was a bone-setter as well and when he was unable to conduct bone setting practices, Mapp carried on and dealt with the cases often even better than her father. She accordingly left him and established her own practice called ‘Cracked Sally - the One and Only Bone Setter’. Mapp's nickname 'Crazy Sally' came from her masculine personality and reputation for quarreling with her father and drinking. Mapp could often be found wandering the country in a drunken state and shouting obscenities, which also contributed to her nickname. Mapp's sister Lavinia Fenton had a considerably different life. Lavinia Fenton played Polly Peachum in The Beggar's Opera in 1728 and later married Charles Powlett, 3rd Duke of Bolton. 

Practice:
Bone-setting in the 18th century was often carried out by men, specifically farriers and blacksmiths because it required a lot of strength. Mapp's career started out when she was a young girl. She served as the announcer at her father's booth during local races and fairs. When Mapp started helping her father's patients when he couldn't see them, she often performed amazing feats and treated them better than her father could. Mapp went on to start her own practice and her fame spread. Around 1735, Mapp's fame for fixing decade old dislocations and fractures brought her to Epsom. Epsom was home to a large number of wealthy families and horse-racing, which provided Mapp with a lot of patients. Even though Mapp was known for her masculine and sloppy appearance, her work was always very clean and precise down to the rolling of her bandages. She had a limited knowledge of anatomy, but she had the strength and innate talent for putting dislocations back into place.

The racing community in Epsom appreciated Mapp's work and when they found out she might leave, the town offered Mapp 100 guineas yearly to reside there and set bones in 1736.  While living in Epsom, she traveled to London twice a week and saw patients at the Grecian Coffee House. Mapp traveled to London in style with an expensive coach and a team of four horses. She would collect the crutches of her cured patients and decorate her carriage with them. At the same time, Sir Hans Sloane was also prescribing and conducting his private practice out of the Grecian Coffee House. Mapp is credited with fixing a spinal deformity on Sloane's niece, which bolstered her fame in London.

Mapp consulted on and fixed multiple cases. Some of her most noteworthy cases are recorded in James Caulfied's Portraits, Memoirs, and Characters of Remarkable Persons where he recorded an account from October 21st 1736, "On Monday, Mrs. Mapp performed two extraordinary cures; one on a young lady of the Temple, who had several bones out from the knees to her toes, which she put in their proper places: and the other on a butcher, whose knee-pans were so misplaced that he walked with his knees knocking one against another. Yesterday she performed several other surprising cures; and about one set out for Epsom, and carried with her several crutches, which she calls trophies of honour." At one point, some surgeons tried to fool Mapp and show that she was not skilled by sending her a healthy patient who claimed he had a damaged wrist. This test angered Mapp and she dislocated the patients wrist and sent him back to the people who had tried to trick her.

Later Life:
Mapp was once mistaken for one of George II's mistresses while riding in her carriage by an angry mob. She is reported to have responded to the angry mob by yelling, "Damn your blood, don't you know me? I am Mrs. Mapp, the bone-setter." In August 1736, she married an abusive footman named Hill Mapp who absconded with 100 guineas of her savings. After initial confusion and anger, Mapp claimed that the money was worth losing to get rid of her husband. In 1737, Mapp died in Seven Dials and was buried by the parish there.

Legacy:
Originally, Mapp was well-loved wherever she worked because of her talents as a bone-setter. In Epsom, the racing community especially appreciated her contributions and named a mare Mrs. Mapp in honor of her. However, towards the end of her life, she started to fall out of fame and favor. In 1736, the established medical community started to try to eliminate the "quacks" operating in London, so Mapp moved to Pall Mall. The famous artist William Hogarth depicted her in his print The Company of Undertakers. Hogarth's print only pushed her further away from fame as he chose to draw her as very masculine and ugly. Hogarth's print was coupled with Sir Percival Pott's criticism of Mapp when he called her "an immortal drunken female savage". Both of these attacks on Mapp along with changing social attitudes led to her decline in popularity. This fall from fame caused Mapp to drink heavily and lose her customers. In 1737, Mapp died in Seven Dials and, due to her poverty, was buried by the parish. Even though she died in poverty and out of fame, she is still remembered and celebrated in song and a play called "The Husband's Relief". Sarah Mapp was only alive for thirty years, but she is still well recorded in history because of her character and the fact that she was a very successful female in what was typically considered a male field.