Kushi Sharma Week #10 - Wise Women, Witches, Midwives, and the Catholic Church: The History of Female Practitioners
By the early 19th century, indigenous peoples of Africa had perfected cesarean section surgery with an expected recovery for both mother and child while Europeans still only practiced it when women in labor were not expected to survive childbirth. In ancient Egypt, midwifery was a recognized female occupation: in apprenticeships, knowledge about birth control, pregnancy tests, induced delivery, contracting, and caring for the mother and newborn child was passed down through generations. Indigenous cultures around the world practiced traditions during birth involving herbal medicine and nature. In China, midwifery was practiced by female midwives through traditional Chinese medicine.
Midwifery is the oldest known profession in the world. It can be traced all the way back to the Paleolithic era, when pregnancy and childbirth was often undertaken in life-threatening situations. The herbal medicines developed by midwives and lay healers, the majority of which were female, were far more advanced and effective than the superstition that university trained “physicians” relied on. While they were bleeding people to balance their humors, witches were developing an extensive understanding of bones, muscles, herbs, and drugs. Modern pharmacology involves these herbal remedies; witches, wise women, midwives, lay healers - these were the people that developed the pain killers, digestive aids, inflammatory aids, etc, that are used today. They used ergot for the pain of labor, ergot derivatives are used today to hasten labor and recovery after childbirth. They used belladonna to inhibit uterine contractions to avoid miscarriages, belladonna is used today as an anti-spasmodic. They discovered and utilized digitalis, a drug used today to treat heart ailments. In 1527, Paracelsus, considered the “father of modern medicine,” burned his texts on pharmaceuticals, confessing that he had “learned from the Sorceress all he knew.”
And for this, the wise woman, the midwife, the lay healer, the witch, was executed — hanged, burned alive, beheaded, drowned. From the 13th to the 17th century, she was persecuted. She was an empiricist, she was the woman whose science was the magic of the times, she represented hope for change, she brought communities together. Her power threatened the Catholic Church, and, in the eyes of misogynists, the state and the increasingly secular profession of medicine. The witch hunts, exclusion of women from medical universities, the implementation of licensing laws, the campaign against midwifery, the various bans on midwifery, the invention of the field of nursing — all were an attempt to limit women’s power. Patients’ praises were taken as testimonials; women were charged for daring to practice, despite their obvious knowledge and competence.
This cooperation between the Church, state, and male medical professionals resulted in the white, male monopoly on medicine, which still affects healthcare today. Partly because so much knowledge was lost due to the persecution of learned women, studies on maternal health are sparse, there is a global shortage of 900,000 midwives, and the maternal mortality rate is high.
Hi Kushi! Your blog was a really interesting read, because it shows how far people will go in order to maintain power. People in power during the 13th to 17th century were mostly men, and because of this, issues that were considered “female concerns,” such as childbirth, were never discussed in medical and educational settings. Because of this, millions of women lost their lives in childbirth when they could have been saved if the practice of midwives was respected instead of shunned. I agree with your statement that medicine is still a largely male, and largely eurocentric field, adapting to the needs and concerns of people of European descent and neglecting everyone else. An example of this is how sunscreen has always been targetted towards people with fair skin because of the belief that people with darker skin had more melanin and therefore did not need any protection from the sun. While the statement is true to an extent, melanin is not enough to protect the skin from harmful UV rays. This is why the amount of people of African American descent with skin cancer is so high, despite people of European descent being more susceptible to sun burns. This is just one example of how modern medicine ignores how diverse the human population is. It is interesting to think about how intellectual and brilliant women were killed and ridiculed for something that should have been considered a strength, and how much knowledge we lost just because a few people felt that their power was being threatened.
ReplyDeleteHi Kushi! Considering our recent unit, and even social seminar on The Crucible, your blog topic brings a lot of insight to the topic of witches. While I had known about the Salem Witch Trials, I did not know that the history of witches spread so far as to the 13th century. Furthermore, I find it rather scary how diverse the title of witch was. It wasn't used to simply call out actual, or just accused devil worshipers, but was instead applied to any woman who dared challenge the social norms. It really makes one wonder one half of the entire population was so eager to oppress the other half of the population. From your writing, such women clearly made huge contributions to the field of medicine, yet I have never personally heard of them, and all history textbooks and curriculums don't seem to mention the massive contribution of women much as compared to the contributions of men. I think that it is rather sad that so many women were killed in such violent ways for simply daring to challenge social norms and advance medicine, a field that proves infinitely useful to humanity. Overall, I really loved how you wrote your blog. Your many links embedded through the text show that you did a lot of research, which is further outlined by the overall quality, and the straightforward fact-jammed nature of your writing. Furthermore, your usage of strings of words, such as "Wise women, witches, midwives," and "hanged, burned alive, drowned," provides a lot of depth and eloquence to your writing.
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