ABSTRACT
W ith the possible exception of the Stone House at Charing Cross, there was no known medieval institutional provision in England before the fifteenth century specifically for the mad, though some hospitals evidently admitted the temporarily insane along with other sick people.! Even when Bethlem started to specialize in looking after the insane, it contained very few patients. In 1598, there were only twenty inmates, and until the 1630S at least the Bridewell Governors tried hard to keep the numbers at about this level. This poses three questions: why were individuals admitted at all?; what characterized the selected few? and what did those admitting them expect to achieve by doing so? It also invites comparisons with provision elsewhere: was the English provision of institutional care for, and treatment of, the mad atypical for its time?
