When the fate of the king of Bavaria was placed into his hands, Bernhard von Gudden was a highly regarded figure in medical circles. Not only had the doctor perfected a machine that could cut human brains into fine slices for research purposes. But he had also made a name for himself in the area of psychiatry, which was still in its infancy at the time, with a pioneering proposition. Gudden argued that so-called "moral treatment," which often involved inflicting violence on mental health patients, wasn't perhaps the best curative regimen.
Still, the psychiatrist thoroughly botched his most famous case. The doctor, together with several colleagues, provided the following diagnosis: "He is teetering like a blind man without guidance on the verge of a precipice." The king in question was Ludwig II, the most famous of Bavaria's monarchs, both for his moniker of "Mad King Ludwig" and for the fact that he built several picturesque castles that still dot the southern German state today, including the famous Neuschwanstein at the foot of the Alps.
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