(Place) Bedlam, Insane Asylum

An insane asylum so notorious that its very name entered the English language as a word for chaos, mayhem, and confusion. That institution is London’s Bedlam.

The facility is built directly atop a sewer that frequently overflows. Two ominous statues watch over the entrance gate—one named “Melancholy” who appeared calm and the other named “Raving Madness” who was chained and angry. As evermore people were crowded into the facility, patient treatment took a turn for the sinister.

One such approach is rotational therapy. A patient is placed in a chair and suspended from the ceiling. The chair was then spun at the direction of a doctor, at more than 100 rotations a minute. The patient will vomit and experience extreme vertigo, but these are seen as healthy reactions with the potential for healing.

Patients are routinely beaten, starved, and dunked in ice cold baths.

Patients are also victim to bloodletting by leeches, cupping glass therapy, and the inducing of blisters. Indeed, many did not survive. Mass graves are on the property, dug exclusively for those who die under Bethlem’s care.

Most humiliating of all, is the that the facility opens its doors to the public. Wealthy Londoners pay money to roam the halls of Bedlam, taking in the zoo-like conditions and marveling at the psychosis around them.