The imposteress rabbit breeder : Mary Toft and eighteenth-century England / Karen Harvey.

  • Harvey, Karen, 1971-
Date:
2020
  • Books

About this work

Description

In October 1726, newspapers began reporting a remarkable event. In the town of Godalming in Surrey, a woman called Mary Toft had started to give birth to rabbits. Several leading doctors - some sent directly by King George I - travelled to examine the woman and she was moved to London to be closer to them. By December, she had been accused of fraud and taken into custody. Mary Toft's unusual deliveries caused a media sensation. Her rabbit births were a test case for doctors trying to further their knowledge about the processes of reproduction and pregnancy. The rabbit births prompted not just public curiosity and scientific investigation, but also a vicious backlash. Based on extensive new archival research, this book is the first in-depth re-telling of this extraordinary story. Karen Harvey situates the rabbit-births within the troubled community of Godalming and the women who remained close to Mary Toft as the case unfolded, exploring the motivations of the medics who examined her, considering why the case attracted the attention of the King and powerful men in government, and following the case through the criminal justice system. The case of Mary Toft exposes huge social and cultural changes in English history. Against the backdrop of an incendiary political culture, it was a time when traditional social hierarchies were shaken, relationships between men and women were redrawn, print culture acquired a new vibrancy and irreverence, and knowledge of the body was remade. But Mary Toft's story is not just a story about the past. In reconstructing Mary's physical, social and mental world, The Imposteress Rabbit Breeder allows us to reflect critically on our own ideas about pregnancy, reproduction, and the body through the lens of the past.

Publication/Creation

Oxford ; New York, NY : Oxford University Press, 2020.

Physical description

x, 211 pages : illustrations, map ; 23 cm

Edition

First edition.

Bibliographic information

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Contents

Machine generated contents note: pt. I Surrey -- 1.The Town: ̀peaceable neighbours who are willing to live quietly' -- The ̀chief inhabitants' -- Order and disorder in the town -- Social relations in the region -- Fish, rabbits, and protests -- 2.The Women: ̀they workt for me' -- Labouring women's lives -- The women close at hand -- Formidable women -- 3.The Births: ̀a Fact of which there was no Instance in Nature' -- What the men saw -- Ambiguous knowledge -- Observation and enquiry -- pt. II London -- 4.The Bagnio: ̀several persons of distinction -- Leicester-Fields and London -- The doctors -- Intimate power -- Officers of Justice -- 5.Confession: ̀I was loath She should touch me' -- Interrogation -- Toft's story -- The real deliveries -- Sinister women -- 6.Punishment: ̀an Abominable Cheat & Imposture -- Fear and loathing -- The Westminster Bridewell -- The face of a criminal -- Thwarted desires -- pt. III The Public -- 7.The Press: a ̀filthy story at best'
Note continued: Transforming news -- ̀In justice to the Publick' -- Roast beef, rabbits, and rabbets -- The bawdy Enlightenment -- 8.Body Politics: ̀the beautiful uniform Order' -- The rabbit woman and the King -- Allegorical politics -- Rustic beliefs, Palladian villas, and body politics -- Disenchantment -- 9.Afterlife: ̀The Imposteress Rabbett Breeder' -- Imagining Mary Toft -- Medical knowledge past and present -- Contemporary responses to the case -- Notes -- Picture Acknowledgements.

Languages

Where to find it

  • LocationStatus
    History of Medicine
    UO.AN.AA7
    Open shelves

Permanent link

Identifiers

ISBN

  • 9780198734888
  • 0198734883