This ceramic jar once held some of the most valuable creatures in medicine. For two thousand years, doctors believed that bleeding a patient could cure almost anything, and leeches were the preferred tool for it, right up until French pharmacies were importing forty million of them in a single year. This is the strange, occasionally absurd, and surprisingly modern story of the leech jar, from ancient Egypt to the FDA’s 2004 decision to approve the medicinal leech as an actual medical device.
Shop the styles/items featured in this video:
- Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything (book)
- Vintage-style blue and white ceramic apothecary jar (decor)
- The History of Medicine documentary collection
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