ESQUIROL - Des établissements des aliénés - 1... Lot n° 1040

ESQUIROL succeeds ROYER COLLARD on 27 November 1825, and continues the work of his master PINEL, emphasising the need to build establishments for the insane and not just to fit out what existed. He drew on the experience of his private practice at the Maison d'Ivry as shown in the "" of Doctors CONSTANS, LUNIER, and DUMESNIL in 1874 (5). "It was in his establishment in Ivry that ESQUIROL first realised his ideas on the construction of asylums by creating, under the title " ", the treatment quarter as he felt it should be applied to the residents of the well-to-do class ... ". The cornerstone of this programme is the "Memorandum presented to His Excellency the Minister of the Interior" in September 1818 (6), which deals with "the alienated in France and the means of improving the lot of these unfortunate people". As we have already pointed out at the beginning of this presentation, the term "'asylums'" appears for the first time on page 26, in the following context: "I would like these establishments to be given a specific name which does not offer any painful idea in mind, I would like them to be called asylums. Private dwellings would no longer be called lodges, cages, dungeons, but cells, etc... Those who know how much influence words have on the minds of men, will not be surprised that I attach importance to these little things. ESQUIROL, the designer of the institutionally therapeutic psychiatric architecture since he says on page 30 of his "memoir" "hospital for the insane is an instrument of healing", considers the implantation, the geographical distribution, the hierarchical organisation of the asylum. He particularly insists on the notion of isolation for several reasons: financial reasons, as land is cheaper in the countryside than in the city; hygienic reasons, as air and light have beneficial virtues. "asylums are to be built outside the cities, there will be savings both for the costs of the fir