Our concept of the structure and function of the normal and diseased brain has developed throughout the centuries. The first stage in the discovery of the brain stretched over three millennia, from the earliest descriptions by the Egyptians in the sixteenth century B.C. to the comprehensive anatomical treatise of Vesalius. The invention of the light microscope brought to the eye a previously invisible world, and heralded the beginnings of the systematic histological investigation of the immensely complex cellular networks of the brain. With the advent of electron microscopy, the organelles and connections of brain cells have been revealed, and the new era of molecular biology has begun. Neuropathology, which concerns itself with diseases of the brain, spinal cord, nerve and muscle, has enormously benefited from these developments to establish the morphological basis of diseases of the nervous system.

A review is presented of literature describing cardiovascular manifestations of anxiety until the end of the second World War. Clear observations of this important group of somatic anxiety symptoms have been made throughout history, although then, as now, the interpretation of these observations has varied according to the point of view and orientation of the writer. An understanding of the interrelationships between somatic and psychic symptoms of anxiety is particularly necessary now that certain specific symptomatic treatments are available.

The distribution of the immunoglobulin allotypic markers G1m(1), G1m(2), G1m(3), G3m(5) and Km(1) was determined in 168 hospitalized Caucasian chronic schizophrenic patients and compared with that in healthy controls. No association between Gm or Km phenotypes and chronic schizophrenia is apparent.

Adult coeliac patients taking a gluten-free diet for one year showed an increase of 33% in the concentrations in CSF of major monoamine metabolites (5-HIAA, HVA and MOPEG). Tryptophan in CSF rose by 10%. There was concomitant morphological improvement in the jejunal mucosa, and the results would seem to indicate that the reduced central monoamine metabolism in untreated adult coeliacs is not primarily genetically determined but is probably related to the poor intestinal absorption.

The case of a sixteen-year-old youth is presented on the basis of correspondence over the years 1806 to 1813. His initial breakdown was probably due to hebephrenic schizophrenia, but clinical detail is defective and the evidence is chiefly about the difficulties of recovery and rehabilitation. The case is discussed in relation to the treatment he received and against the background of provision for insanity and psychiatric methods and ideas in Ireland during the period.

Late nineteenth-century medico-psychological approaches to the mind–body problem are discussed in relation to psychiatry's theoretical constitution as a distinct ‘mind–body’ science and practice, and to John Hughlings Jackson's ‘doctrine of concomitance’. Psychiatric ‘explanations’ of the mind–body relation are interpreted as expressions of psychiatry's independent professional interests vis-à-vis neurology and general medicine.