Chapter 14 Deaths in Hospitals and Care Institutions in Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century London

In: The Moment of Death in Early Modern Europe, c. 1450–1800
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Vanessa Harding
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Abstract

Early modern London was quite well provided with a number of institutions offering care to the end of life. These ranged from modest almshouses for a handful of local poor, through the city’s hospitals for the sick poor, to the large royal hospitals for naval and military pensioners founded in the later seventeenth century. Some aimed to cure and discharge, others promised to provide accommodation to the end of life. While only a comparatively small proportion – perhaps 5 per cent – of deaths in early modern London took place such institutions, they played a part in the overall landscape of death in the city. Records are rather sparse, and the poverty of many inmates means that there are few wills and probate records. Nevertheless, an account of the characteristics of these institutions and their practices around the end of life contributes to a bigger picture of the moment of death in early modern societies.

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The Moment of Death in Early Modern Europe, c. 1450–1800

Contested Ideals, Controversial Spaces, and Suspicious Objects

Series:  Intersections, Volume: 89
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