The Archaeology of Lunatic Asylums

This project initially grew out of a series of questions sparked by a consideration of the plans for the Adelaide Lunatic Asylum in South Australia which l found while doing research on the Destitute Asylum of Adelaide. My research on the Destitute Asylum revealed that the rooms and spaces provided within the asylum compound were determined by a range of factors; the most important being the role of the institution and the nature of the people to be housed there. The Adelaide Destitute Asylum had been based on the English workhouse in its allocation of spaces and rooms, and followed similar principles of work and the separation of family members along gender lines (Piddock 1996 and 2001). Using this work, and the lunatic asylum plans as a basis, a set of initial questions were developed: