Bigg’s Artificial Leg with Dagger Toe

History

Henry Heather Bigg and (later) his son Henry Robert Heather Bigg were among the best makers of artificial limbs in nineteenth-century Britain. Though there is no record of an artificial leg with a dagger toe being created, Henry Heather Bigg did make an artificial hand fitted with a dagger for a furs collector working for the Hudson Bay Company. The device was produced upon request as the amputee wished to be able to defend himself against wild animals. For more on how prosthetic body parts were associated with weaponry in nineteenth-century culture, see chapter 3 of Ryan Sweet’s free 2022 book Prosthetic Body Parts in Nineteenth-Century Literature and Culture.