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The Making of Man-midwifery. Childbirth in England, 1660-1770 ADRIAN WILSON, 1995 London, UCL Press
256 pp., 1 85728 292 2, hb L40.00
This meticulously researched book constitutes a continuation of Adrian Wilson's previous work on 17th-century childbirth and stems from his "... profound sense of puzzlement and surprise at the 18th-century transformation of midwifery from a female sphere to a central part of male medicine" (p. 2). Wilson's central concern is to trace and explain the emergence of the English man-midwife in place of traditional (female) midwives in the birthing chambers of well-to-do women after about 1750.
The book is divided into four parts. Part I describes the traditional management of birth, noting that it was an event culturally defined by female solidarity and sociability. Midwives were in charge in the vast majority of normal births; male surgeons were called only in emergencies to difficult births to remove babies by craniotomy. Parts II and III go on to describe the early 18th-century emergence of new obstetric instruments and techniques and the careers, political allegiances, professional links, and publications of some of the men who used them, predominantly in...