European Journeys
This project documents four journeys made by nineteenth-century psychiatrists of northern Europe in the years of relative peace between the Napoleonic Wars and the Crimean War. These journeys were a small part of the lively intellectual and cultural exchange that gave birth to psychiatry as a branch of modern Western medicine.
In particular, the journeys bear witness to
- the collegiate character of the emergent psychiatric profession,
- the growth of interest in the architecture and design of hospital buildings,
- an increasing sophistication in psychiatric diagnosis and treatment, and
- a growing discomfort with the confinement, restraint and abuse of patients, resulting in the widespread adoption of policies of moral management and non-restraint in European asylums.
3 other archives and museums of psychiatric history collaborated to European Journeys as one strand of a project entitled “Exploring the European Mind” supported by the Culture 2000 programme of the European Union. The partners were:
- Museum Dr Guislain in Ghent
- Het Dolhuys in Haarlem
- The Prinzhorn Collection of Psychiatric Art of the University of Heidelberg
