As said last week, we would like to introduce to you the cases and materials our ELBOW research team is working with. Our first case study that we shared with you was about menstruation and a surgeon who treated the so-called ”obstructions” of menstruation using electricity. This case study belongs to materials our ELBOW researcher Annika Raapke is working with.

Now, it is time to share the second case study with you, studied by our ELBOW researcher Edna Huotari. It is a case study that involves beheaded bodies, electricity, and experiments that aimed at proving Galvanism correct.

Electrified bodies without heads 

This picture demonstrates how in 1802 the Italian physician Giovanni Aldini, nephew of Luigi Galvani (yes, that Galvani who invented galvanism), used electricity on the bodies of two Italian criminals, recently decapitated.

Aldini’s life’s work was to prove that his uncle was correct about Galvanism. Galvanism means the idea that animals (and humans) had an inherent electrical current.

He traveled around Europe to show in flashy shows the effects of Galvanism on the bodies of recently deceased criminals and all types of dead animals.

In his book published in 1804, he shared an experiment he ran with electricity and two ”beheaded” criminals.

I therefore took advantage of the opportunity of two criminals beheaded in Bologna, which the government granted to my curiosity on their physique. The youth of these tortured victims, their robust build, the greatest freshness of the animal parts, all this inspired me with the hope of obtaining useful results from the experiments that I had previously proposed.  – – I first saw strong contractions in all the muscles of the face, which were twisted so irregularly that they imitated the most awful of grimaces. The motion of the eyelids made them very wrinkled, although they were less sensitive in the human head than in that of the ox.

In the picture above, you can see how the heads and beheaded bodies were electrified in Aldini’s experiments.

The idea of galvanism, or “animal electricity”, was however proven to be wrong by another prestigious Italian physician, Alessandro Volta.

Source material:

Aldini, Giovanni: Essai theorique et experimental sur le galvanisme, avec une serie d’experiences faites en presence des commissaires de l’Institut national de France, et en divers amphitheatres anatomiques de Londres, par Jean Aldini… Avec planches. (Citation: p.69-70 citation, picture: plate 4). De l’imprimerie de Fournier fils, 1804.

The original quote:

Je profitai donc de l’occasion de deux criminels décapités à Bologne, que le gouvernement accorda à ma curiosité physique. La jeunesse de ces suppliciés, leur tempérament robuste, la plus grande fraîcheur des parties animales, tout cela m’inspira l’espoir de recueillir des ré sultats utiles des expériences que je m’étais auparavant proposées. – – Je vis d’abord de fortes contractions dans tous les muscles du visage, qui étaient contournés si irrégulièrement, qu’ils imitaient les plus affreuses grimaces. L’action des paupières fut très-marquée, quoique moins sensible dans la tête humaine que dans celle du bœuf.