The Prague Convent-Hospitals of the Brothers of Mercy and the Sisters of Saint Elisabeth and Their care for Body and Soul in the first half of the 19th Century
Abstract
The paper presented the activities of two leading Prague monastic hospitals in the first half of the 19th century - the Brothers Hospitallers and the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth. The success of their medical treatment of a number of particularly infectious diseases was highly appreciated in this period.
The paper shed light on the ways in which the costs of medical care for the increasing number of patients were covered. The first part of the paper summarizes the recent findings on the development of hospital care (body diseases treatment) provided by both hospitals.
The second part of the paper covers the hitherto unresearched topic of the care for mentally ill priests, for whom a special department was established at the Brothers Hospitallers in 1783. A resources inquiry covering a period of more than half a century presents new empirical data on the early stage of this special department, which operated until 1915.
The presentation will offer a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the insane clergymen hospitalized here and will present the living conditions behind the walls of the convent. The available materials show that in several cases the priests hospitalized there were submitted principally to a disciplinary supervision by the consistories.
The establishment of the Priesterhaus thus fully corresponded and continued with the intentions of the State and the Church, which were related to Joseph's project of curing and disciplining citizens in the frame of the 'renfermement a l'autrichienne'. The mentally sick nuns did not benefit of a similar foundation, nevertheless the Prague Elizabethans also received and treated them in their hospital, albeit to a small extent.