Heidi Hausse

Education

PhD, Princeton University

MA, Princeton University

BA, University of Notre Dame

About Me

Heidi Hausse joined the faculty at Auburn in fall 2018. Hausse is a historian of early modern Europe (c.1500-1700), with a particular interest in the intersections of culture, medicine, and technology. Her book, The Malleable Body: Surgeons, Artisans, and Amputees in Early Modern Germany (MUP, 2023), examines surgical treatises and artifacts of prostheses to uncover a transformation in the ways in which surgeons and artisans cut apart the human body through amputation and worked to artificially put it back together with mechanical limbs.

More recently, she has been collaborating with colleagues in Auburn’s Department of Mechanical Engineering to reengineer prosthetic technology from the Renaissance through 3D-printed models. Visit The Kassel Hand Project website to learn more.

Hausse received her PhD in history from Princeton University in 2016, and was a member of the Society of Fellows in the Humanities at Columbia University from 2016-2018. She was also the 2016-2017 Molina Fellow in the History of Medicine & Allied Sciences at the Huntington Library. Her research has been supported by the American Council of Learned Societies, the Consortium for History of Science, Technology and Medicine, and the Dr. Günther Findel-Stiftung Foundation.

At Auburn, Hausse teaches on everyday life, medicine and the body, and witchcraft in early modern Europe, as well as survey courses in world history and European history from the Renaissance to the French Revolution.

Research Interests

early modern Europe, history of medicine, history of the body, history of disability, history of technology, cultural history

Publications

Selected Publications

Heidi Hausse and Chad G. Rose, “3D-Printed Prostheses and Early Modern Iron Hands: A New Method to Investigate the Lived Experiences of Amputees in the Premodern World,” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 100:1 (Spring 2026): 46–79.

“Learning from Disaster: Surgical Mishaps and Pedagogy in the Age of Print.” In Learning to Cut: Surgical Training and Practice, 1450-1800. Edited by Maria Pia Donato, Elaine Leong, and Tillmann Taape, 223–242. UCL Press, 2026.

“Building the Foundations of a Surgical Armory: Johannes Scultetus in Ulm, c.1630–45.” In Beyond the Battlefield: Reconsidering Warfare in Early Modern Europe. Edited by Tryntje Helfferich and Howard Louthan, 42–64. Abingdon: Routledge, 2024.

The Malleable Body: Surgeons, Artisans and Amputees in Early Modern Germany. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2023.

“The Locksmith, the Surgeon, and the Mechanical Hand: Communicating Technical Knowledge in Early Modern Europe,” Technology and Culture 60:1 (2019): 34-64.

“Bones of Contention: The Decision to Amputate in Early Modern Germany,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 47:2 (2016): 327-350.

"European Theories and Local Therapies: Mordexi and Galenism in the East Indies, 1500-1700,” Journal of Early Modern History 18 (2014): 121-140.

Courses Taught

• HIST 1010: World History I
• HIST 2070: European History from the Renaissance to 1789
• HIST 3580/HONR 3007: Prosthetics–The History of Artificial Body Parts (Issues in the History of Medicine)
• HIST 3610: Private Lives and Public Places in Early Modern Europe
• HIST 4970 (Senior Seminar): Magic & Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe
• HIST 5300/6300: Early Modern Europe – Approaches to the Field
• HIST 7420: Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe