From the book
The Anatomy of Melancholy
Robert Burton · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordConvulsion, convulsions, Crampes and cramps name bodily contractions or spasmodic disturbances.
- In the Anatomy of MelancholyThe anatomical catalogue locates the terms among nervous disorders, whereas the definition of melancholy excludes cramp and palsy as disorders belonging to outward sense and motion.
- In this editionThe modern column retains “convulsions” and “cramps” in the main classification.
- A place to readConvulsions in the synopsis of hypochondriacal bodily symptoms.
Meaning
Convulsion, convulsions, Crampes and cramps name bodily contractions or spasmodic disturbances. Burton lists cramp and convulsion separately among diseases of the nerves; the association does not make every occurrence interchangeable. Both words also pass into a forceful image of mental suffering, “the cramp and convulsion of the soul.” The physical and figurative uses need to be distinguished even when the latter draws its force from the former.
Use in the book
The anatomical catalogue locates the terms among nervous disorders, whereas the definition of melancholy excludes cramp and palsy as disorders belonging to outward sense and motion. That distinction concerns the function primarily affected, not an assertion that a melancholy patient cannot have convulsions. Indeed, convulsions occur in the synopsis of hypochondriacal symptoms and among the possible developments of long-standing melancholy. The prognostic account relates the danger to the ventricles and, in its continuation, to a cold cause or continued coldness.
The hypochondriacal example supplies a more particular causal story. Burton attributes to Melanchthon an account of sorrow drawing black blood from the spleen beneath the left ribs and causing “perilous hypochondriacall convulsions.” His marginal Latin, however, says hypochondriacos flatus, hypochondriacal wind. The editor’s comparison with Melanchthon confirms related bodily reasoning but does not settle Burton’s wording or edition. Consequently the English convulsions cannot be claimed as a word-for-word translation of that Latin. The later phrase præcordia sursum convelluntur, followed by “midriffe and bowels are pulled up,” gives a separate description of upward drawing in the upper body.
The same symptoms enter narratives with very different evidential standing. Cornelius Gemma reports convulsions so violent that three men cannot hold a young woman, within a story of extraordinary bodily discharges. The reported eyewitness is Gemma, not Burton. Cotta’s anecdote about cramp instead illustrates the danger of a physician’s suggestion: a woman allegedly acquires the disorder after he names it. These passages concern narrated strength and the attributed force of imagination; neither should be recast as an independently verified case history.
Burton’s metaphor can draw the soul close to the body or separate them. Calling melancholy the soul’s “cramp and convulsion” makes inward anguish imaginable as constriction and torment. In the consolation on adversity, by contrast, convulsions may torture the joints but cannot conquer the just person’s rectam mentem, upright mind. The latter is a claim about constancy despite bodily suffering, not invulnerability to pain. The contrast is rhetorically productive: the first passage magnifies distress, the second insists that bodily injury need not determine the moral condition.
Related entries
Animal faculties owns the account of sense and movement; Hypochondria the region beneath the ribs; Passion the range of bodily affection and emotional disturbance. Compare Palsy (Palsy) and Epilepsy and falling sickness (Epilepsy and falling sickness).
Explained vocabulary: Additional Terms.
Places to read
- Symptoms Particular to the Three Distinct Species. Section 3, Member 2 · paragraph 56Convulsions in the synopsis of hypochondriacal bodily symptoms.
- Subsection 3. Classification of Diseases of the Head · paragraph 14Cramp and convulsion as separately listed nervous disorders.
- Member 3 Subsection 1. The Definition of Melancholy Its Name and Distinctions · paragraph 9The functional distinction from the definition of melancholy.
- Subsection 2 A Digression on the Nature of Spirits Evil Angels or Devils and How They Cause Melancholy · paragraph 24Gemma’s extraordinary case narrative and its attributed eyewitness.
- Subsection 2. The Power of Imagination · paragraph 23Cotta’s story of a cramp induced by naming it.
- Subsection 4. Sorrow as a Cause of Melancholy · paragraph 18; note 2850; note 2851English convulsions versus marginal flatus; compare the accompanying note.
- Subsection 2 Symptoms of Windy Hypochondriacal Melancholy · paragraph 14Convelluntur in the account of upward drawing of the præcordia.
- Section 4 Member 1 Prognosis of Melancholy · paragraph 11Convulsions among threatened developments of melancholy.
- Section 4 Member 1 Prognosis of Melancholy · paragraph 12The conditional distinction between cold and hot outcomes.
- Section 4 Member 1 Prognosis of Melancholy · paragraph 21Cramp and convulsion transferred to inward anguish.
- Member 3 Against Poverty and Want and Other Such Adversities · paragraph 28Bodily torment contrasted with the unconquered upright mind.
In this edition
The modern column retains “convulsions” and “cramps” in the main classification. Its “cramping” for “griping” in the later symptom description is a translation choice, not an additional original occurrence of cramp. Likewise, the translation of præcordia as “the parts beneath the heart” and Burton’s own gloss “midriffe and bowels” remain separate; they should not be collapsed into a precise modern organ-name. Rectam mentem is glossed more freely by Burton as “his soule,” so the local claim concerns the integrity of the person’s inward life.
Convulsion; convulsions
Bodily contractions or spasmodic disturbances.
Original wording: “Crampes, Stupor, Convulsion, Tremor, Palsie”
Modern wording: “cramps, numbness, convulsions, tremor and paralysis”
Convulsion is one member of a five-item list. It corresponds locally to convulsions, not to the whole set of conditions. The subsequent prognostics discuss convulsions as a possible development rather than a synonym of melancholy. Further checked occurrences: the passage. Lookup: convulsion; convulsions.
Crampes; cramp
Cramp, a disorder of muscular contraction or movement.
Original wording: “so troubled with the cramp”
Modern wording: “troubled by cramp”
Cotta’s anecdote gives the word a special role: the physician’s naming of a feared disorder supposedly brings it about. Burton uses the report to demonstrate imagination’s force, not to define all cramp as suggestion-induced. Further checked occurrences: the passage; the passage. Lookup: cramp; cramps; crampes.
Related bodily-pain wording: “griping in their bowels” becomes “cramping in the bowels”. This describes the painful abdominal sensation in the symptom catalogue, rather than making every instance a formally named convulsion. Lookup: griping [abdominal pain]; cramping.
hypochondriacall convulsions
Convulsive disturbances assigned to the region beneath the ribs.
Original wording: “perilous hypochondriacall convulsions”
Modern wording: “dangerous hypochondriacal convulsions”
The English attributes them to black blood drawn from the spleen in sorrow. The marginal wording instead names wind. Hypochondriacall here indicates a bodily region and theory, not an unfounded worry about health. Lookup: hypochondriacal convulsions.
hypochondriacos flatus
Hypochondriacal wind.
Original wording: “hypochondriacos flatus facit”
Note translation: “this causes hypochondriacal wind”
Flatus means wind in the marginal account. It does not mean convulsions, despite the corresponding English body. Preserving the divergence prevents a misleading claim of exact Latin-English equivalence. Lookup: flatus; hypochondriacos.
præcordia sursum convelluntur
The parts beneath the heart are drawn upwards.
Original wording: “præcordia sursum convelluntur”
Modern wording: “the parts beneath the heart are drawn upwards”
Convelluntur is a passive verb of being drawn or pulled; sursum supplies upward direction. Burton follows the Latin with his own “midriffe and bowels” gloss. This phrasing describes a symptom within the historical account, not a modern anatomical finding. Lookup: convelluntur; sursum; præcordia.
the cramp and convulsion of the soul
An image of acute inward constriction and torment.
Original wording: “the cramp and convulsion of the soul”
Modern wording: “the soul’s cramp and convulsion”
The organs and nerves are no longer the immediate subject. The paired disease-words give mental anguish a bodily figure, within the paragraph’s progression to a hell on earth. Lookup: cramp of the soul; convulsion of the soul.
rectam mentem
An upright or soundly directed mind.
Original wording: “but not rectam mentem, his soule is free”
Modern wording: “an upright mind”
The object withheld from the power of bodily torment is the upright mind. Burton’s following soul-language is an explanatory expansion; the phrase does not promise freedom from physical suffering. Lookup: recta mens [dictionary access form]; upright mind.