Insane Epileptic Patient Eliza Whitfield, age 28 in 1889

Epilepsy always puzzled alienists (early psychiatrists) because of the strange behavior victims exhibited in contrast to the rationality they often also displayed between episodes. The American Journal of Insanity was full of articles about epilepsy, and continued to explore the topic after it became the American Journal of Psychiatry. One article in 1923 explored the question of psychotic symptoms in epilepsy.

The writers noted that patients were often described as having a “typical epileptic disposition.” An author they referenced described this disposition: “The whole life of the epileptic shows hatred. It bursts forth in all its brutality on the slightest provocation; the horrid the brutal, and all that is evil…”

It is no wonder that with this prejudice against them, many epileptics were confined to insane asylums based on their behavior during and after convulsions.

Admission Notes Showing Epilepsy, courtesy Gutenberg.org

An Epileptic Boy, courtesy Gutenberg.org

________________________________________________________________________