HOSPITAL is derived from the Latin hospitalis (adj.), and this again from the noun hospes, a host or guest. The place in which a guest was received was in Latin hotpitium (hence the French, hospice}, but in course of Lime the adjective became used as a noun, and the words hospitalis, hospitals, and hospitalia were adopted in the same sense as hospitium, by dropping the nouns doimts, cubic ulum, or cubicula. In this sense Vitruvius uses hospitalia to mean the chambers where guests were received. The English word hospital (often reduced to spital) comes from the old French hospital, now hôpital, of which Littré snys that it was remade from the Latin many centuries ago, although originally hospitalis had given rise quite regularly to hostel, now hôtel. The three words, Jwpital, hospice, and hotel, although from the same source, are used now in very different meanings, the first being usually re stricted to establishments for temporary occupation by the sick and hurt, for the purposes of medical and surgical treatment ; the second (hospice) to places for permanent occupation by the poor, the infirm, the incurable, or the in sane ; and the last (hôtel) to dwellings, either public or private, for ordinary occupation. To the last, however, there is one exception, viz., when the term hôtel- Dieu (that is, hotel de Dieu) is applied to the chief hospital or infirm ary of a town or city. In English we have no equivalent to hospice, so that the word hospital has been, and is still, used in the double sense, viz., as a place for medical treatment, and also as a retreat or almshouse for the poor, the infirm, &c. On the other hand the word infirmary, which originally meant a place or room set apart in an establish ment (such as a monastery) for the reception of the sick members, and also for those who were through age or infir mity incapacitated from work, is not infrequently employed in the same sense as hospital, namely, as a separate estab lishment for the treatment of the sick. Although in ancient times there may have been places for the reception of strangers and travellers, it seems at least doubtful if there was anything of the nature of a charitable institution for the reception of the sick, such as existed after the introduction of Christianity. The Bethesda of Scripture (Aramaic, from W, a house, and ^?PO, charity) was probably no more than a collection of mere sheds built round the pool to whose waters miraculous healing powers were attributed. Among the Greeks there seems little evidence of the existence of estab lishments for the sick ; evwv, described by Plato as a place of shelter for travellers, is also explained as a vocro- Ko/jalov, or hospital, by Suidas ; but that lexicographer is a late writer (10th or 11th century a.d.), and the wordi/oo-o- Kofjiflov itself does not appear to be earlier in use than the 4th century a.d. The word is used by St Jerome in the 4th century, and in the Code of Justinian in the 6th, from which it is possible Suidas may have got his definition, although fevoSo^etoi/ is distinctly used by Justinian as a shelter for travellers, as indeed its name implies. Even for sick and wounded soldiers but little provision seems to have been made, although we do not know much of the valetudinarium, which appears to have existed in a Roman camp. That the Romans had a medical staff has been shown by the monuments discovered in Great Britain, and the subject has been carefully examined by the late Sir James Simpson (Transactions of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, Edinburgh Monthly Journal of Medicine, &c.). Among the earliest hospitals on record are that said to have besn founded by Valens in Coesarea 370–80 a.d., and the one built at Rome by Fabiola, a Roman lady and friend of St Jerome, although like most others of that and even later times both were probably almshouses as well. The origin of our present hospitals must, however, be boked for in the monastic arrangements for the care of the sick and indigent. Every monastery had its infirmaria, managed by an infirmarius, in which not only were sick and convalescents treated, but also the aged, the blind, the weak, &c., were housed.[1] In course of time separate build ings were erected for the purpose, and special revenues, augmented from time to time by benefactions, appropriated for their maintenance. In numerous instances, however, the hospitals were converted into benefices by the priests, and the scandal had to be dealt with by the authority of gen eral councils, which, like that of Vienne, forbade the prac tice. About the earliest distinct record of the building of a hospital in England is in the life of Lanfranc, arch bishop of Canterbury, who in 1080 founded two, one for leprosy and one for ordinary diseases. The former is re ferred to in the Vie de St Thomas le Martyr, a work of the 12th century. The establishments for the sick remained in the hands of the clergy until the Reformation, when some of the monasteries and church property were appropriated and set apart for the use of the sick. Of those the most noted instances were St Bartholomew’s in Smithfield, St Thomas’s in the Borough, Bethlehem or Bedlam, Bride well, and Christ’s Hospital, which were long known as the "Five Royal Hospitals." St Bartholomew’s was a priory, founded by Rahere, a minstrel, in 1102, and the ancient hospital chapel is still the parish church of St Bartholomew the Less. It was handed over to the citizens of London as a hospital in 1547; it escaped the fire of 1666, and was rebuilt in 1729. St Thomas’s was founded by Rich ard, prior of Bermondsey, in 1213, surrendered in 1538, and purchased by the mayor and citizens of London in 1551, and opened for 260 sick. It was incorporated in 1553, rebuilt in 1693, added to in 1732, removed tempo rarily to Surrey Gardens in 1862, and finally transferred to Lambeth, its present site, in 1871. Bethlehem (or Bedlam) was a priory, founded by Simon Fitzmary, in 1247. In 1547 it was handed over by Henry VIII. for the reception of lunatics. It was rebuilt in 1676, and wings were added in 1733. The present building was constructed in 1810. Bridewell and Christ s Hospital early ceased to be receptacles for the sick. (For further information regarding charitable institutions see England, vol. viii. p. 253.) But the great movement in hospital building took place in the 18th century, and the following table from Dr Steele’s paper, " On the mortality of Hospitals " (Howard prize essay for 1876), gives a list of the chief institutions founded during that period:—}}
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London. Date of Foun dation. Provincial. Date of Foun dation. Irish. I SiJ Westminster 1719 1723 1733 1740 1745 1749 1750 1752 1746 1745 1747 York 1710 1716 1719 1735 1736 1736 1739 1743 1745 1745 1751 1753 1755 1767 17G9 1770 1771 1771 1776 1778 Dublin. Jervis Street 1726 1733 1734 1756 1774 1745 1754 1755 1720- 1722 1759 1797 Salisbury Cambridge Bristol St George s London Mercer s Edinburgh Jleath Special Hospitals. TheBiitishLying-^ in ) House of Industry 1 Special (Dublin). The Rotunda ) Lvin^-in | The" Lurk Aberdeen Northampton .... Exeter Worcester Newcastle Manchester City of London > Lying-in ) Queen Charlotte s) Lying-in f Small-pox Lock, female male The Westmore-) land Lock ) Cork .. Stafford Oxford Leicester Norwich Dumfries Hereford Limerick Belfast 17SO 1782 1793 1794 1795 Nottingham Canterbury Stafford . 17 J7
- ↑ Liber ordinis Sancli Vidoris Parisiensis, MS. cap. 40. See Ducange s Glossary, s.v. " Infirmaria."
