The Mad King: King Ferdinand VI of Spain may have suffered brain damage as history remembers him as ‘mad’ – Tatler

Posted: Published on May 14th, 2020

This post was added by Alex Diaz-Granados

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Game of Thrones famous Mad King plot drew inspiration from numerous historical sources no doubt, from France's King Charles VI to Englands King Henry VI. Yet one famously 'mad' monarch King Ferdinand VI of Spain's illness has been diagnosed altogether differently to what historians have often argued, with a leading neurologist claiming that he suffered from brain injury, rather than a psychiatric illness.

Santiago Fernndez, who works in a hospital in Oviedo in northern Spain, reconstructed the clinical history of the king between August 1758 and 1759, when his illness manifested itself. Ferdinand VIs disease was clinically characterised by behavioural disorganisation, loss of cognitive abilities and epileptic seizures, he said. It can be established with a high level of certainty that Ferdinand VI suffered from a rapidly progressive right frontal focal neurological disorder. He deduced that this would have been caused by a tumor or blow to the head.

Ferdinands behavior was said to have changed following the death of his beloved wife, Mara Brbara de Bragana, in 1758. While his refusal to wash and suicide attempts could perhaps be put down to his grief, it was his pretending to be a ghost, danicng in his underwear and biting that caused concern. Spanish historians now dub the period the year without a king due to his absence from public life. Yet his 13-year rule is remembered positively for being a peaceful one, as he had a policy of neutrality.

Andrs Piquer, the kings physician at the time, has been dubbed one of the founders of psychiatry, and was unusual in his kind treatment of his patient. He believed that the kings melancholic madness was caused by black bile. Melancholics must be treated with great gentleness and kindness, he wrote in his notes. Historians have previously categorised Ferdinands illness variously as Alzheimers, bipolar disorder or a major depressive disorder.

Our own King George III's doctors were not so kind (they described his illness as 'evil humours' and were bemused by his depression over the death of his daughter, Princess Amelia). He was held in a strait jacket and his skin was intentionally blistered to 'release toxins' by applying an arsenic solution, although he was said to have made a full recovery after these treatments, before relapse at the end of his life.

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The Mad King: King Ferdinand VI of Spain may have suffered brain damage as history remembers him as 'mad' - Tatler

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