Till Eulenspiegel's "Mass Cure": Illustration to the 17th prank

In the prankster's tale Till Eulenspiegel, first printed at the beginning of the 16th century, there are several references to hospitals and their intended healing function. In Nuremberg, Eulenspiegel made all 200 sick people of the Holy Ghost Hospital "healthy" again by threatening to burn the sickest patient with the aim of turning the ashes into medicine for everyone else. When he stood at the hospital gate on the appointed day with the hospital director, all the sick fled their beds and the hospital. Shortly after, the astonished hospital master paid Eulenspiegel a princely sum for the "mass cure." Once Eulenspiegel left the town, all the hospital's patients returned.

Illustration to the 17th prank, 1515, unknown artist, in: Ein kurtzweilig lesen von Dyl Ulenspiegel: gebore uß dem land zu Brunßwick ; wie er sein Leben vollbracht hatt ; XCVI seiner Geschichten; source: Universitätsbibliothek Gießen, http://geb.uni-giessen.de/geb/volltexte/2009/7216/.