Nyckelord
legends
miracles
medicine
legal liability
court records
Abstract
Out of one’s mind: Perceptions of madness in medieval Sweden, c. 1220–1500
This article analyses mental illness in medieval Sweden by using sources of various kinds – legal texts, medical receipts, and legends and miracles – to capture different views of madness. The term madness is used to emphasize that mental illness can only be captured as a marked category, when sources define someone as mad.
Medieval legislation restricted the rights of mad people to manage their own property, but equally the legal liability of mad criminals. Mad people were to be kept restrained and were associated with serious crimes such as homicide and arson. Yet legal practice shows mad people were more likely to commit theft than burn down buildings. Legends linked madness to anger and violence. In the sources, madness was used to other non-Christians, being associated with groups such as Jews and Romans. Medical recipes offered cures for a spectrum of mental health conditions, from bad memory to madness, showing they were seen as illnesses and not separated from physical ailments. Saint Erik’s miracles contain evidence that the mad were cared for by their family and friends. Madness, in these sources, was linked to self-harm, in particular suicide. The mad were restrained to keep them from harming others and themselves; however, they were not marginalised and remained integrated in the local community.
Most sources portray madness that occurred later in life and not as something that one was born with. However, there are variations and overlaps in the terminology, so it is not possible to distinguish intellectual impairments from mental health conditions in the sources studied. Like much recent scholarship, I find that medical and religious views were interconnected. Madness was regarded as an illness of the brain, as God’s punishment and the Devil’s doing. Varying views of mental health conditions are best captured with multiple, varied sources.