Section 02
Bad Air
Miasma theory held that disease travelled in foul air. It was wrong about the mechanism and right about the remedy, and for seventy years it made hospitals long, tall, daylit and open to the weather.
Miasma
For most of the nineteenth century, disease was believed to travel in foul air — and because the theory was wrong for the right reasons, the buildings it produced often worked.
The open window
Cross-ventilation as a medical instrument, with the window as the prescription.
Light as treatment
Sunlight was believed to be actively curative, which put wards on particular orientations.