Museo delle arti sanitarie

The Museum of sanitary arts (Museo delle arti sanitarie) is located inside the Ospedale degli Incurabili in Naples. It hosts several ancient medical instruments:

the doctor’s beak, used during pestilences by physicians in order to protect themselves;

a seventeenth century removable mannequin made up of papier-machè;

a dummy of Pulcinella (the typical Neapolitan mask) with an egg inside and rats outside, which is an allegory of the black death;

an old mechanical prosthesis;

a cup used by puerperant women;

surgical instruments used for lithotomy and anaesthesia;

a shaver with tortoiseshell handle;

several manuscripts, some of them were written by the famous surgeon and botanist Domenico Cirillo.

• Photos by Piergiorgio Turco (November 2011)

• Locate the item on this Google Map

Related items:

• Domenico Cotugno’s bust
• First Italian removable public toilet
• Homeopathy Historical Section
• Luciano Armanni’s portrait