In the days before Prozac, there were all sorts of cures for depression

In 1621, an eight-hundred page tome called The Anatomy of Melancholy by Oxford scholar Robert Burton, which offered advice on curing misery, became a huge hit, which suggests very strongly that this was a depressing time to be alive in England.

Here we reproduce a few of Burton’s cures. Wouldn’t it be great if some of them were prescribed on the NHS? Particularly the bath filled with sweet-smelling flowers, though that would be easy enough to recreate at home:

BREAD of pure wheat, well-bak’d.

Water clear from the fountain.

Wine and drink not too strong.

Fish that live in gravelly waters, as pike, perch, trout, sea-fish, solid, white etc

Borage, bugloss, balm, succory, endive, violets in broth, not raw etc

Raisins of the sun, apples corrected for wind, oranges etc parsnips, potatoes etc

Exercise of body and mind, but moderate, as hawking, hunting, riding, shooting, bowling, fishing, fowling, walking in fair fields, galleries, tennis, bar.

Exercise of mind as chess, cards, tables etc to see plays, masks etc

Music of all sorts aptly applied.

Mirth and merry company.

Oils of camomile, violets, roses etc

Liquid, as potions, juleps, syrups, wine of hellebore, bugloss etc

Good air.

Sleep more than ordinary.

Blood-letting, is there be need, or that he blood be corrupt, in the arm, forehead etc, or with cupping glasses.

Baths of sweet water, in which were sod mallows, violets, roses, water-lilies, borage flowers, ramsheads etc

Compounds of poppy, nymphea, lettuce, roses, purslane, henbane, mandrake, nightshade, opium etc

Against terrible dreams; not to sup late, or eat peas, cabbage, venison, meats of heavy digestion, use balm, heartstongue etc

This article first appeared on idler.co.uk in 2014.

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