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Lot 4

MEDICAL HOAX
[TOFT, MARY. C.1701-1763.]
The Doctors in Labour; or a New Whim Wham from Guildford. [London: George Vertue, 1727].

3 – 4 November 2021, 13:00 PDT
Los Angeles

US$1,000 - US$1,500

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MEDICAL HOAX

[TOFT, MARY. C.1701-1763.] The Doctors in Labour; or a New Whim Wham from Guildford. [London: George Vertue, 1727].
Satirical broadside, hand-colored engraved print, 365 x 264 mm, with 12 illustrations in panes, each with engraved caption text. Slight browning and soiling, old tape adhesive marks at margins.

Mary Toft was a woman from Surrey who claimed after a miscarriage that she had given birth to parts of rabbits, having supposedly become pregnant after being startled by a rabbit. A local doctor was taken in by her claim and summoned the King's household physician, who also took her claims seriously, but he notoriety she obtained from the hoax led to her eventual confession, and imprisonment for fraud, as well as public humiliation for the doctors involved.

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