Editing Laudanum (section)

=== 18th century ===
By the 18th century, the medicinal properties of opium and laudanum were well known, and the term "laudanum" came to refer to any combination of opium and alcohol.

In the 18th century several physicians published works about it, including [[John Jones (physician)|John Jones]], who wrote ''The Mysteries of Opium Revealed'' (1700), which was described by one commentator as "extraordinary and perfectly unintelligible".<ref>{{Cite DWB|title=JONES, JOHN (1645 - 1709), cleric |id=s-JONE-JOH-1645|access-date=2021-07-10}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book| vauthors = Hardy EG |url=https://archive.org/details/jesuscollege08hard|title=Jesus college|date=1899| location  =London | publisher = F.E. Robinson and co. |others=PIMS - University of Toronto}}</ref> The Scottish physician [[John Brown (physician, born 1735)|John Brown]], creator of the Brunonian system of medicine, recommended opium for what he termed asthenic conditions, but his system was discredited by the time of his death.<ref>{{Cite journal| vauthors = Lawrence C |date=1988|title=Cullen, Brown and the poverty of essentialism|journal=Medical History. Supplement|issue=8|pages=1–21|issn=0950-5571|pmc=2557347}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book| vauthors = Risse GB |title=New Medical Challenges during the Scottish Enlightenment|chapter-url=https://brill.com/view/book/9789004333000/B9789004333000-s007.xml|chapter=The Royal Medical Society versus Campbell Denovan: Brunonianism, the Press, and the Medical Establishment|date= January 2005 |pages=105–132|publisher=Brill|isbn=978-90-04-33300-0|language=en|doi=10.1163/9789004333000_007}}</ref> The most influential work was by [[George Young (surgeon, born 1692)|George Young]], who published a comprehensive medical text entitled ''Treatise on Opium (1753).''<ref>Young G. ''A treatise on opium, founded upon practical observations''. London: printed for A.Millar; 1753</ref> Young, an Edinburgh surgeon and physician, wrote this to counter an essay on opium by his contemporary [[Charles Alston (botanist)|Charles Alston]], professor of botany and materia medica at Edinburgh who had recommended the use of opium for a wide variety of conditions. Young countered this by emphasising the risks ''<nowiki/>'...that I may prevent such mischief as I can, I here give it as my sincere opinion... that opium is a poison by which great numbers are daily destroyed.''' Young gives a comprehensive account of the indications for the drug including its complications. He is critical about writers whose knowledge of the drug is based on chemical or animal experiments rather than clinical practice. The treatise is a detailed, balanced and valuable guide to prevailing knowledge and practice.<ref name="Davenport-Hines" /><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Macintyre|first=IM|date=2012|title=A Sceptic and an Empiric in Medicine: George Young (1692-1757) and the beginnings of the Scottish medical Enlightenment|journal=Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh|volume=42|issue=4|pages=352–360|doi=10.4997/JRCPE.2012.415|issn=2042-8189|pmid=23240124|doi-access=free}}</ref> As it gained popularity, opium, and after 1820, morphine, was mixed with a wide variety of agents, drugs and chemicals including mercury, hashish, cayenne pepper, ether, chloroform, belladonna, whiskey, wine and brandy."<ref name="Hodgson_2001" />{{rp|104}}

[[File:Whalley "Confessions of a laudanum drinker", 1866 Wellcome L0016409.jpg|thumb|''Confessions of a laudanum drinker'', [[The Lancet]], 1866]]During the late 18th and early 19th centuries, patients undergoing surgery were often administered laudanum and alcohol, and had their hands restrained and bodies held down while the operation was performed.<ref>{{Cite book | vauthors = Adkins L, Adkins R |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8UIURafSXQgC |title=Eavesdropping on Jane Austen's England: How our ancestors lived two centuries ago  |publisher=Little, Brown Book Group |year=2013 |isbn=978-1-4055-1364-7 |location=London |pages=312 |language=en}}</ref>