lethal clothing

The Twelve Deaths of Christmas Twelve Christmas-themed deaths because it’s the hap-hapless-est time of the year!

A Cabinet of Cursed Curiosities A Cabinet of Cursed Curiosities such as Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s death-car, a deadly opal ring, and a drunkard’s chair.

Embalmed alive Horrific tales of ingestion of embalming fluid or premature embalming.

Death Masks Death and injury caused by Halloween masks and false-face pranks.

Weekend Compendium: 20 February 2016 brings you the week’s posts: the Witch of Leadville, eye-lash history, the ghost of a living woman, a discontented and destructive daemon, as well as creepy crawlies in hair and jungle.

Weekend Compendium: 16 January 2016

A shocking catalog of deaths by hair: mustache murder, dis-tress-ing suicides, hair-ball fatalities, cats and rats and poisonous hair dyes.

Remove Your Hoops: Lightning Freaks There were a number of superstitions about lightning: it was bad luck to burn wood from a lightning-struck tree, oak trees were more likely to be struck than beech, a toothpick from a tree struck by lightning would cure toothache. And certain things would “draw” lightning: Milk in a pail, moist hay, bayonets, a warm horse, an umbrella or fishing rod–and ladies’ hoop skirts.

Preview of coming attraction: The Victorian Book of the Dead, by Chris Woodyard, will be available in September. Here’s a blurb and a table of contents.