ABSTRACT
The long survival of quack doctors presents a historical puzzle. If, as we have endlessly been told by doctors and historians alike, they were frauds, crooks and incompetents, why did the sick continue to draw upon their services? Gullibility and lack of other options are possible answers, but it seems much more plausible to suggest that irregulars commonly established personal therapeutic relations with their patients that gave at least psychological support to sufferers and often made good use of the placebo effect.
