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      True Crime Books
      Hardcover Cranioklepty Book
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      ISBN: 1932961860

      ISBN13: 9781932961867

      Cranioklepty: Grave Robbing and the Search for Genius

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      Format: Hardcover

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      Book Overview

      The after-death stories of Franz Joseph Haydn, Ludwig Beethoven, Swedenborg, Sir Thomas Browne and many others have never before been told in such detail and vividness. Fully illustrated with some surprising images, this is a fascinating and authoritative history of ideas carried along on the guilty pleasures of an anthology of real-after-life gothic tales. Beginning dramatically with the opening of Haydn's grave in October 1820, cranioklepty takes us on an extraordinary history of a peculiar kind of obsession. The desire to own the skulls of the famous, for study, for sale, for public (and private) display, seems to be instinctual and irresistible in some people. The rise of phrenology at the beginning of the 19th century only fed that fascination with the belief that genius leaves its mark on the very shape of the head. This description may be from another edition of this product.

      Related Subjects

      Anatomy Biological Sciences Consciousness & Thought Historical Study & Educational Resources Historiography History History & Philosophy Modern (16th-21st Centuries) Philosophy Politics & Social Sciences

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      Rated 5 stars
      A Fascinating Page-Turner!

      By Thriftbooks.com User,

      This book is very hard to put down. The pages turn by themselves as the author weaves captivating (and occasionally gory) tales of grave robbing, phrenology, craniometry and the post-mortem lives of certain skulls - that is, the skulls of certain deceased people who were recognized as geniuses. These include Haydn, Beethoven, and Mozart among several others. It was hoped that the study of such skulls would help identify physical...

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      Rated 5 stars
      Skulduggery

      By Thriftbooks.com User,

      There is something simultaneously ghastly and funny about a human skull. A skull is an astonishing piece of sculpture, the most intricate of the bones in the body, but it always stands as a reminder that we are all mortal and mortality is temporary. It is mere happenstance that the skull of even the most disagreeable misanthropist seems to grin at us, but that classic spooky grin is just part of the reminder. There was...

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