History
Franz Anton Mesmer (1734-1815), an Austrian physician, is widely known as the 'Father of Hypnosis'. He believed that there was a quasi-magnetic fluid in the air we breathe and that the body’s' nerves somehow engrossed this fluid. As a doctor, his main concern was how to effectively treat his patients, and he believed that diseases were caused via a blockage of the circulation of this magnetic fluid in the blood and the nervous system. Curing disease would, in his view, involve correcting the circulation of this liquid.
At first, he used a magnet, and later his hand, which was passed over the diseased body in an attempt to clear the magnetic flow. The hand was believed to unblock the fluid by increasing its amount and flow as his hand passed over the affected area. The term 'animal magnetism' was born, and the procedure referred to as Mesmerism.
John Elliotson, who was an English physician of University College London, was sacked from the medical profession because he used demonstrations of animal magnetism.
It wasn't until 1843 that the terms 'hypnotism' and 'hypnosis' were invented by James Braid who was a Scottish doctor working in Manchester. He found that some subjects could go into a trance if they simply fixated their eyes on a bright object, like a silver watch. Which many these day associate hypnosis too |
