How old is dyslexia?

It’s a widely recognised condition today, but the first reports of dyslexia weren't made until the late 19th Century.


Asked by: Lydia Rae Stephenson, Staffordshire

Many sources will tell you that the first case was reported in 1896 by the English family doctor W. Pringle Morgan, who described a 14-year-old boy called Percy with “word blindness”. Morgan noted how, despite his intelligence, Percy struggled to read.

However, the first use of the term ‘dyslexia’ was actually by the German opthalmologist Rudolf Berlin in 1887, in his case report of a boy with problems learning to read and write.

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