Transmitting Medical Exotica

Abstract

Snakestones, purported to naturally generate in the head of a snake, were reputed to be a cure for snakebites in the early modern world. Against the backdrop of European exoticism, which influenced the circulation of pharmaceutical and medical knowledge, snakestones became a subject of popular and scholarly interest during the late seventeenth century. Analyzing unpublished archival evidence, this paper considers the circumstances of the 1664 transmission of an individual snakestone specimen—sent from Louis Philiberto Vernatti, an employee of the Dutch East India Company in Batavia, Indonesia, to the Royal Society in London, England, which had a demonstrable interest in the East Indies. The correspondence with Vernatti highlights the value of “weak-tie” relationships to the Royal Society’s pursuit of knowledge and artifacts and also demonstrates the importance of weak-ties to the circulation of snakestones, in particular. Unlike other pharmaceutical exotica that was commonly conveyed via large-scale commercial networks, the trade in snakestones was characterized by small-scale transfer in the manner of kunstkammer materials.