Nostalgia and Scheuchzer and epidemic

Whereas the 17th century witnessed attempts at introducing many new medical conditions, among which was nostalgia, the 18th century was the time for systematizing understanding. Linneaus was the great exponent of systematic explanation of the natural world; others would do the same for physical and mental conditions. Before I get to attempts to do this, however, I would like to present a competing theory about the etiology of nostalgia by the 18th century Swiss physician J.J. Scheuchzer. Indeed, the OED first mentions nostalgia (1756) in connection with Scheuchzer's name: "At least it is thus Scheuchzer endeavours to vindicate the nostalgia, pathopatridalgia, or the heimweh, i.e., home-sickness, with which those of Bern are especially afflicted."

Indeed, Scheuchzer thought, like Hofer before him, that the disease afflicted the Swiss more than others but, instead of giving a psychological explanation for it (disordered imagination), he gave a mechanical explanation for nostalgia. Scheuchzer argued that since the Swiss live in mountains they inhale as well as ingest, through food, a refined air. When they descend to the valleys, the delicate fibers of the skin are compressed, blood is forced more rapidly into the heart and brain, circulation is slowed, and if the individual cannot resist these bad effects, anxiety and homesickness result. Thus, Scheuchzer recommends that removal of the person to mountain climate and administering of remedies such as saltpeter and wine would increase pressure in the body to counteract the external pressure.

As Rosen argues elegantly (p. 343), Scheuchzer probably came up with a mechanical or external/physical explanation for nostalgia in order to deflect criticisms that one reason for Swiss susceptibility to nostalgia was their cowardice in other lands. If nostalgia could be explained by a naturally occurring external phenomenon, the Swiss psyche could not be implicated.

Nostalgia and the Medical Dictionaries

By the middle of the 18th century, one of the premier German medical dictionaries (Onomatologia Medica) defined nostalgia as follows:

"a very specific disease which according to all previous experience is preeminently common among the Swiss, and arises chiefly from a passionate longing for their native land which develops slowly without being perceived. It not only leads the mind into foolish, odd and even bizarre eccentricities, but also impairs the individual's physical health. The individual's vitality, both as to colour and activity, declines, and little by little his health deteriorates leading to complaints and serious diseases, some affecting the body alone, others the mind as well, and can even degenerate into a kind of melancholy. As long as this strong impulse and desire cannot be satisfied, all medicaments and arguments are useless. Indeed, there are even cases where death has resulted when this most ardent desire could not be gratified" (Rosen, 343).

But since classification was all the rage, how does nostalgia fit in a systematic classification of diseases? Or, to put it more formally, where in medical nosology is nostalgia to be found? This opens the fascinating and little known field of classifications of medical disorders in the 18th century. The leading treatise on the subject was William Cullen's 1782 work Synopsis Nosologiae Methodicase, Exhibens Clariss. virorum Sauvagesii, Linnaei, Vogelii, Sagari, et Macbridii. Suffice it to say that each of the "biggies," Linnaeus, Vogel, Sauvage and Sagar, classified it somewhat differently from his peers. No matter, however; nostalgia was firmly and seeminly permanently fixed in the constellation of medical disorders.

Nostalgia and 18th Century War

Once clarity was established about the medical condition, writers were free to develop and refine the basic definition, given above. Some did detailed studies of Swiss geography, trying to show that the Swiss from the valleys suffered from it as frequently as Swiss from the mountains, thus calling into question Scheuchzer's conclusions about lack of mountain air being the reason for it. Others argued that nostalgia was a universal condition, provoked more by the common experience of forcible impressment into military service than by one's country of origin. Indeed, because of the great number of wars in the 18th century in which people were forcibly conscripted, the incidents of nostalgia on the battlefield were rampant. One French scholar, D.F.N. Gurebois, a surgeon in the army of Italy, published a thesis in 1803 in which he argued that there was an "epidemic" of nostalgia that broke out in the Army of the Rhine in the Year II (1793-94). Some French studies of nostalgia in the late 18th century concluded that recruits who had never been away from their native village, except to go to the nearby market town, were most susceptible to the affliction. Yet, it was also found that city dwellers could suffer from nostalgia when they were subject to rigorous discipline and hard tasks in the rural regions. It seemed as if nostalgia was one of the more debilitating of conditions among soldiers, then, as the 19th century dawned.

My final essay reviews 19th century regimens or treatments for nostalgia and then looks at how nostalgia was a problem among troops in the American Civil War.