HOW TO MURDER YOUR HUSBAND
A Brief History of Slow Poisoning
Dear Nevermorons,
For more than a year, I’ve been shouting from the rooftops that I think that David Graeber was murdered by his wife, Nika Dubrovsky.
For most of that time, the main response seems to have been a general incredulity, or at least a reluctance to take a position.
But now, it seems that people are finally taking the time to look into the mysterious circumstances of the great scholar’s death!
First, Tobin Owl wrote a whole piece in which he takes up the cause:
I then reposted his piece with a new introduction:
Next, the popular Substacker Tereza Corragio, who is also a Graeberite, had this to say in the comments:
I'm in 100% agreement that David's pancreatic necrosis was neither natural nor caused by 'Covid.' Your points are well researched and solidly argued.
If you don’t know who Tereza Corragio is, check her out. She’s smart as a whip.
So it seems like my hard work is paying off. I have convinced a number of highly intelligent and reasonable critical thinkers that the “people just die suddenly for no reason now” hypothesis doesn’t hold water.
The question then becomes: what is the simplest explanation for David Graeber’s death? We’re all fans of Ockham’s razor here.
I’m no homicide detective, but my contention is this: the most parsimonious explanation for David Graeber’s demise is that he was poisoned.
If anyone has a better explanation, I’m all ears.
I think that part of the reason that my theory didn’t take off sooner was because most people don’t know that much about poisoning these days, so I thought today I’d share a fun slice of history with you.
If you think that murdering your spouse is just for guys, you’re in for a surprise!
When it comes to offing spouses, women are no slouches!
The history you’re about to read will have wondering whether they’re just better at getting away with it!
I kid, I kid, but the fact of the matter is that poisoning has been a common method of murder since ancient times. And it continued to be a popular way of eliminating enemies until relatively recently.
The classic form of this used to be the ol’ “arsenic-in-the-coffee” trick, but eventually the world got wise to that one.
The search for a reliable method the detection of arsenic poisoning is, in fact, the reason that the scientific discipline of toxicology was invented. The scientist who solved this problem is now known as “the Father of Forensic Science”.
Arsenic poisoning declined in popularity after it became possible to test corpses for the presence of that toxin, although it is impossible to know how common it is these days.
When poisoning is suspected, a coroner will often order a toxicology report. In the case of David Graeber’s death, no such report seems to have ordered. Why?
I’ll leave that question for you to chew on, but I’m pleased to report that I’ve got something salaciously savoury for all y’all scurvy scandal-loving scuzzbuckets.
It’s a highly entertaining history of slow poisoning lifted from Charles Mackay’s 1841 masterpiece Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, which I really cannot recommend highly enough.
If you’re the sort of person that likes palace intrigue, vengeful wives, torture, and real-life wicked witches, you’re in for a treat.
Oh yeah, and young, beautiful girls being whipped half-naked through the streets of Rome.
Did I mention the young, beautiful girls being whipped half-naked through the streets of Rome?
Dang! How could I forget about the young, beautiful girls being whipped half-naked through the streets of Rome?
I gotta get back on the cod liver oil!
The selection you are about to shamefully savour is abridged for your reading pleasure.
for the Wild,
Crow Qu’appelle
A BRIEF HISTORY OF SLOW POISONING
by Charles Mackay, excerpted from Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds (1841)
The atrocious system of poisoning by poisons so slow in their operation as to make the victim appear, to ordinary observers, as if dying from a gradual decay of nature, has been practiced in all ages. Those who are curious about the matter may refer to Beckmann on secret poisons, in his History of Inventions, in which he has collected several instances of it from the Greek and Roman writers.
Early in the sixteenth century, the crime seems to have gradually increased, until in the seventeenth it spread over Europe like a pestilence. It was often exercised by pretended witches and sorcerers, and finally became a branch of education among all who laid any claim to magical and supernatural arts.
In the twenty-first year of Henry VIII, an act was passed rendering it high treason. Those found guilty of it were to be boiled to death.
But it was in Italy that poisoning was most prevalent. From a very early period, it seems to have been regarded in that country as a perfectly justifiable means of getting rid of an enemy. The Italians of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries poisoned their opponents with as little compunction as an Englishman of the present day brings an action at law against anyone who has done him an injury.
The writings of contemporary authors inform us that, when La Spara and La Tophania carried on their infernal trade, ladies placed poison bottles on their dressing tables as openly, and used them with as little scruple upon others, as modern dames use eau de Cologne or lavender water upon themselves. So powerful is the influence of fashion that it can even cause murder to be regarded as a venial peccadillo.
In time, poison-vending became a profitable trade…
In the year 1659, it was made known to Pope Alexander VII that great numbers of young women had avowed in the confessional that they had poisoned their husbands with slow poison. The Catholic clergy, who in general hold the secrets of the confessional so sacred, were shocked and alarmed at the extraordinary prevalence of the crime. Although they refrained from revealing the names of the penitents, they conceived themselves bound to apprise the head of the Church of the enormities that were practiced. It was also the subject of general conversation in Rome that young widows were unusually abundant. It was remarked too, that if any couple lived unhappily together, the husband soon took ill and died. The papal authorities, when once they began to inquire, soon learned that a society of young wives had been formed and met nightly, for some mysterious purpose, at the house of an old woman named Hieronyma Spara. This hag was a reputed witch and fortune-teller, and acted as president of the young viragos, several of whom, it was later ascertained, belonged to the first families of Rome.
In order to have positive evidence of the practices of this female conclave, a lady was employed by the government to seek an interview with them. She dressed herself out in the most magnificent style; and having been amply provided with money, she found but little difficulty, when she had stated her object, in procuring an audience with La Spara and her sisterhood. She pretended to be in extreme distress of mind on account of the infidelities and ill-treatment of her husband, and implored La Spara to furnish her with a few drops of the wonderful elixir, the efficacy of which in sending cruel husbands to "their last long sleep" was so much vaunted by the ladies of Rome. La Spara fell into the snare and sold her some of her "drops" at a price commensurate with the supposed wealth of the purchaser.
The liquor thus obtained was subjected to analysis, and found to be, as suspected, a slow poison; clear, tasteless, and limpid, like that spoken of by the Duke of Guise. Upon this evidence, the house was surrounded by the police, and La Spara and her companions were taken into custody. La Spara, described as a little, ugly old woman, was put to the torture but obstinately refused to confess her guilt. Another of the women, named La Gratiosa, had less firmness, and laid bare all the secrets of the infernal sisterhood. Taking a confession extorted by anguish on the rack at its true value (nothing at all), there is still sufficient evidence to warrant posterity in a belief in their guilt. They were found guilty and condemned, according to their degrees of culpability, to various punishments. La Spara, Gratiosa, and three young women, who had poisoned their husbands, were hanged together in Rome. Upwards of thirty women were whipped publicly through the streets, and several, whose high rank screened them from more degrading punishment, were banished from the country and fined heavily. A few months later, nine more women were hanged for poisoning, and another group, including many young and beautiful girls, were whipped half-naked through the streets of Rome.
This severity did not stop the practice. Jealous women and avaricious men, anxious to step into the inheritance of fathers, uncles, or brothers, resorted to poison. As it was quite free from taste, color, and smell, it was administered without exciting suspicion. The skilled vendors compounded it to different degrees of strength, so the poisoners had only to say whether they wanted their victims to die in a week, a month, or six months, and they were provided with the corresponding doses. The vendors were chiefly women, of whom the most celebrated was a hag named Tophania, who was accessory to the deaths of over six hundred persons. This woman appears to have been a dealer in poisons from her girlhood, first residing in Palermo and later in Naples. That entertaining traveler, Father Lebat, has given, in his Letters from Italy, many curious particulars relating to her. When he was in Civita Vecchia in 1719, the Viceroy of Naples discovered that poison was being extensively sold in the city, where it went by the name of aqueta, or little-water. On making further inquiries, he ascertained that Tophania (who was by this time near seventy years of age, and who seems to have begun her evil courses very soon after the execution of La Spara) sent large quantities of it to all parts of Italy in small vials, with the inscription, "Manna of St. Nicholas of Barri."
The tomb of St. Nicholas of Barri was celebrated throughout Italy. A miraculous oil was said to ooze from it, which cured nearly all the maladies that flesh is heir to, provided the recipient made use of it with the due degree of faith. La Tophania artfully gave this name to her poison to elude the vigilance of the custom-house officers, who, in common with everybody else, had a pious respect for St. Nicholas de Barri and his wonderful oil.
The poison was similar to that manufactured by La Spara. Hahnemann, the physician and father of the homeopathic doctrine, writing upon this subject, says it was compounded of arsenical neutral salts, causing in the victim a gradual loss of appetite, faintness, gnawing pains in the stomach, loss of strength, and wasting of the lungs. The Abbé Gagliardi says that a few drops of it were generally poured into tea, chocolate, or soup, and its effects were slow and almost imperceptible. Garelli, physician to the Emperor of Austria, in a letter to Hoffmann, says it was crystallized arsenic, dissolved in a large quantity of water by decoction, with the addition (for some unexplained purpose) of the herb cymbalaria. The Neapolitans called it Aqua Tofana, and it became notorious all over Europe under the name Aqua Tophania.
Although this woman carried on her infamous trade so extensively, it was extremely difficult to meet with her. She lived in continual dread of discovery, constantly changing her name and residence, and, pretending to be a person of great godliness, resided in monasteries for months together. Whenever she was more than usually apprehensive of detection, she sought ecclesiastical protection. She was soon apprised of the search made for her by the Viceroy of Naples and, according to her practice, took refuge in a monastery. Either the search for her was not very rigid, or her measures were exceedingly well taken; for she contrived to elude the vigilance of the authorities for several years. What is still more extraordinary, showing the reach of her system, her trade was still carried on to as great an extent as before. Lebat informs us that she had such great sympathy for poor wives who hated their husbands and wanted to get rid of them, but could not afford to buy her wonderful aqua, that she made them presents of it.
She was not allowed, however, to play this game forever; she was at length discovered in a nunnery, and her retreat cut off. The viceroy made several representations to the superior to deliver her up, but without effect. The abbess, supported by the archbishop of the diocese, constantly refused. The public curiosity was consequently so much excited at the additional importance thrust upon the criminal, that thousands of people visited the nunnery in order to catch a glimpse of her.
The patience of the viceroy appears to have been exhausted by these delays. Being a man of sense and not a very zealous Catholic, he determined that even the Church should not shield such an atrocious criminal. Setting the privileges of the nunnery at defiance, he sent a troop of soldiers, who broke over the walls and carried her away, vi et armis. The archbishop, Cardinal Pignatelli, was highly indignant and threatened to excommunicate and lay the whole city under interdict. All the inferior clergy, animated by esprit de corps, took up the question and so worked upon the superstitious and bigoted people that they were ready to rise en masse to storm the viceroy's palace and rescue the prisoner.
These were serious difficulties, but the viceroy was not a man to be daunted. Indeed, he seems to have acted throughout with a rare union of astuteness, coolness, and energy. To avoid the consequences of the threatened excommunication, he placed a guard around the palace of the archbishop, judging that the latter would not be so foolish as to launch an anathema that would cause the city to be starved, himself included. The market-people would not have dared to come to the city with provisions while it remained under the ban. There would have been too much inconvenience to himself and his clerical brethren in such a measure; and, as the viceroy anticipated, the good cardinal reserved his thunders for some other occasion.
Still, there was the populace. To quiet their clamor and avert the impending insurrection, the agents of the government adroitly mingled with the people and spread a rumor that Tophania had poisoned all the wells and fountains of the city. This was enough. The popular feeling turned against her immediately. Those who, but a moment before, had looked upon her as a saint, now reviled her as a devil and were as eager for her punishment as they had been for her escape. Tophania was then put to the torture. She confessed to the long catalogue of her crimes and named all the persons who had employed her. She was shortly afterward strangled, and her corpse was thrown over the wall into the garden of the convent from which she had been taken. This appears to have been done to conciliate the clergy, by allowing them, at least, the burial of one who had taken refuge within their precincts.
After her death, the mania for poisoning seems to have abated; but we have yet to see what hold it took upon the French people at a somewhat earlier period.
TO BE CONTINUED… (Maybe…)
Do we know if David was vaccinated for Covid? Any tweets or pics of it?