Books / Lived experience, memoir & fiction
The Anatomy of Melancholy
First published in Oxford in 1621 under the name Democritus Junior, Robert Burton’s The Anatomy of Melancholy surveys the causes, symptoms and proposed remedies of melancholy through medical, philosophical and literary sources.
Book details
Author of listed edition: Robert Burton
Edition: First published in 1621. The 2001 New York Review Books edition has ISBN 9780940322660.
Publisher: Henry Cripps (Oxford)
Edition year: 1621
Original title: The Anatomy of Melancholy, What it is: With all the Kinds, Causes, Symptomes, Prognostickes, and Several Cures of it
Language and origin: English (United Kingdom)
Form and genre: Cultural & Historical Critique
Level: Intermediate
Historical era: Pre-1919 · Asylum Reform & Early Psychoanalysis
Covers: Melancholy in early modern medicine and literature; The work’s three-part structure; Accounts of causes and proposed remedies; Counsel and comfort from friends
APA 7th reference: Burton, R. (1621). The anatomy of melancholy, what it is: With all the kindes, causes, symptomes, prognostickes, and severall cures of it. John Lichfield and James Short for Henry Cripps.
What it is
First published in 1621, Burton’s wide-ranging work brings together classical authorities, medical ideas, literary quotation and social observation. Its subject, melancholy, belongs to a historical framework and is not identical to a modern diagnosis.
What it covers
The work is organised into three partitions. It examines descriptions and causes of melancholy, proposed remedies, and love and religious melancholy.
Counsel and historical context
Among the remedies he discusses, Burton considers counsel and comfort from friends and the relief that can come from speaking about distress. These historical arguments are presented as part of the text, not as evidence that a particular treatment works.
Reader level and educational scope
This historical work contains early modern medical ideas and social assumptions. This entry is an introduction for readers, not clinical advice or a treatment recommendation.
Paired academic and clinical scholarship
Paired work: Melancholia and Depression: From Hippocratic Times to Modern Times (Stanley W. Jackson, 1986)
Reference: Jackson, S. W. (1986). Melancholia and depression: From Hippocratic times to modern times. Yale University Press.
A history of ideas about melancholia and depression from antiquity to the twentieth century.
Source-mapped claims and evidence notes
Claim 1: Burton discusses counsel and comfort from friends among his proposed remedies for melancholy. (See Partition 2, Section 2, Member 6 in the Project Gutenberg transcription.) [Source 3: Burton, R. The anatomy of melancholy. Project Gutenberg transcription.]
Sources and inspection notes
Supports: Publisher, date and ISBN of the 2001 edition.
Supports: Pending verification: Medical-historical analysis of Burton’s 1621 treatise within the history of melancholia and depression.
Burton, R. The anatomy of melancholy. Project Gutenberg transcription.
Supports: The text’s structure and discussion of counsel and comfort from friends.
Wellcome Collection. The anatomy of melancholy: 1621 catalogue record.
Supports: The 1621 Oxford publication and Henry Cripps imprint.