Could Joachim Meyer have been saved?
Exploring another letter about Meyer's death
In December 1570, Joachim Meyer was hired as a court fencing master by Duke Johann Albrecht of Mecklenburg, traveling to his castle in Schwerin to take up his post in January 1571. This trip would prove his doom, as he quickly fell ill and died in late February. His death has been swathed in mystery for a long while, with only a few correspondences between Strasbourg and Meyer’s brother in law providing details on what occurred. However, there is one additional account of Meyer’s death in a letter written by Heinrich Husanus, a legal scholar who served as Duke Johann Albrecht’s chancellor. An excerpt from this letter is contained in an 1898 biography of Husanus, where it was first noted by Kevin Maurer. With the help of the State Archive of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, we were able to receive scans of the original letter, which provides new insights into Joachim’s illness.
The letter is quite long and deals with multiple topics, so we are including only the relevant section translated below. A transcription and translation of the entire letter (LHAS, 2.12-1/23 no 278) is available in our Meyer Translations Document.
The Letter
Illustrious highborn Prince! First, my subservient dutiful service with diligence is Your Princely Grace's, Gracious Lord.
As I arrived here again yesterday, I learned that approximately one strike after noon, Your Princely Grace's fechtmeister of Strasbourg had died - and Doctor Brucaeus (who traveled back to Rostock today) informed me that early on, one would have been able to help him, if a physician had been employed in a timely manner. Since phrenesis and other acute illnesses are not to be trifled with, and much delay does not help.
For this reason, he thought it necessary that Your Princely Grace should have his own physician present at the court, [Latin:] to address such diseases, which allow no delay or respite, and are now frequent.
[...]
Dated February 24th, 1571.
Key Takeaways and New Info:
Meyer’s death date was actually February 23rd, 1571 at about 1 PM, not the 24th, which was the date of the letter itself. This latter date has often been understood to represent Joachim’s death date, and will need revision in various wikis.
Meyer had medical care by way of Dr. Heinrich Brucaeus, who seems to have been called from his post in Rostock after Joachim got sick. Dr. Brucaeus served as rector and professor of medicine and astronomy at Rostock, and left again after Joachim had passed away. It was the need to call Dr. Brucaeus from at least a day’s journey or more that Husanus cites as a key cause of his demise, as Rostock is approximately 80 km away when traveling overland.
Meyer died of “phrenesis,” likely the diagnosis passed along to Husanus from Brucaeus. I first consulted a modern neurologist who was aware of “phrenitis”, an 1800s term for meningitis. It turned out that “phrenesis” and “phrenitis” were formerly used as synonyms, with both terms encompassing a range of physical and psychological manifestations of illness.1 An understanding of phrenesis as an inflammation of the brain or its membranes seems to have been the most relevant. If a telephone-esque diagnosis from a 16th century doctor can be trusted, then it is likely that Meyer died from an infection that would have been difficult to survive without the use of antibiotics. A medical intervention would've involved bloodletting, with an 1850 article in German encyclopedia Meyers Konversations-Lexikon still listing it as a primary treatment, in addition to cold compresses around the head and 'the appropriate inner medicine'.
Joachim’s father likely died due to a 1563 plague outbreak in Basel, an event that possibly also claimed the lives of many of his younger siblings. An extension of this wave of plague affected Mecklenburg as well. Historical records show that the medical college at Rostock was completely wiped out in 1565, with 7 professors and 46 students dead and 9000 people dying in the wider area.2 This plague-related devastation led to a general lack of doctors in the region, and may have directly contributed to Joachim not getting timely treatment and thus dying (if we assume that any such intervention would’ve been beneficial rather than detrimental to Meyer).
Coupled with the accounts from his other death-related letters, we can get a better picture of what happened to the poor fechtmeister. Traveling far in the dead of winter, coming down with a horrible illness, a doctor called too late to save him, leaving behind a family already likely decimated by illness and a barrel full of water-soaked books, Joachim Meyer’s end was decidedly bleak.
Thank Yous
Thank you to Dr. Antje Koolman at the State Archive of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern for your help in sending the scans of the letter and correcting my reference number for the record. Additional thanks to Kevin Maurer for helping me review the Husanus biography that led to finding the original letters, Dr. Marc Wasserman for his neurologic consultation, and as always, massive thanks to Miriam for her help in correcting my transcription and translating the letter (as well as providing numerous insights and related documents as she always does, ever expanding my education and views on historical research).
See the chapter on "Phrenitis in the Modern and Early-Modern Worlds", in: Thumiger, C. Phrenitis and the Pathology of the Mind in Western Medical Thought: (Fifth Century BCE to Twentieth Century CE), 315–59. Cambridge University Press, 2023.
Spengler, L. "Bruchstücke Aus Der Geschichte Der Medicin in Mecklenburg." Janus. Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Literatur der Medicin 3, no. 1 (1848): 696–697.