Medicine, worldly society and sociability

[Autom. eng. transl.] Genevan, neo-Hippocratic, empiricist, Théodore Tronchin studied in London, then in Leiden with Herman Boerhaave. In 1756, he successfully inoculated the children of the Duke of Orléans, and subsequently became the most fashionable doctor in Paris and Western Europe. His very particular method of treating and inoculating the ladies of the Parisian aristocracy played a significant role in building his celebrity among the elites. Ladies invited him to join the “beau monde” in the salons, thus allowing his fame to spread throughout Europe. This chapter aims to examine the role played by ladies, in an aristocratic and courtier context, both from a medical point of view (as patients) and from the point of view of sociability (salonnieres), in the distinction social work of doctor Théodore Tronchin.