John Bulwer (baptised 16 May 1606 – buried 16 October 1656[1]) was an English physician and early Baconian natural philosopher[2] who wrote five works exploring the Body and human communication, particularly by gesture.

John Bulwer was born in London in 1606 and continued to work and live in the city until his death in October 1656 when he was buried in St Giles in the Fields, Westminster.

[The hand] “speaks all languages, and as universal character of Reason is generally understood and known by all Nations, among the formal differences of their Tongue.

[17] Bulwer does mention fingerspelling describing how "the ancients did...order an alphabet upon the joints of their fingers...showing those letters by a distinct and grammatical succession", in addition to their use as mnemonic devices Bulwer suggest that manual alphabets could be "ordered to serve for privy ciphers for any secret intimation" (Chironomia, p149).

Upon the same ground, with the advantage of an historical exemplification, apparently proving, that a man borne deafe and dumbe, may be taught to heare the sound of words with his eie, & thence learne to speake with his tongue.

To persuade these "knowing men" of "the philosophical verity of this Art" (the education of the deaf) he sets out in this volume to explain the theory and empirical evidence for its possibility.

Some evidence comes from the account given by Sir Kenelm Digby of a meeting between the Prince of Wales and a deaf Spanish nobleman, Don Luis Velasco.

[19] Through observations that some deaf people can "hear" the vibrations produced by musical instruments by bone conduction through the teeth, Bulwer came to believe that the body had a commonwealth of senses, for instance the eye could be used to perceive speech by lip-reading.

Being an Essay to a new Method of observing the most important movings of the Muscles of the Head, as they are the neerest and Immediate Organs of the Voluntarie or Impetuous motions of the Mind.

Historically presented, in the mad and cruel Gallantry, foolish Bravery, ridiculous Beauty, filthy Fineness, and loathesome Loveliness of most Nations, fashioning & altering their Bodies from the Mould intended by Nature.

It is one of the first studies in comparative cultural anthropology[23] albeit with a strong tone of social commentary, "Almost every Nation having a particular whimzey as touching corporall fashions of their own invention" (page 5), Bulwer describes how people modify their bodies and clothes but later commentators have interpreted this ostensible apolitical work as a coded piece of political theory.

[24] A political commentary against the artificial (in Bulwer's eyes) regicidal State, and a call to the return to the "natural" form of governance with the King as the symbolic head of the body of England.

Although Bulwer does not make any direct reference to the political events in England his approach to the monstrous body echoes the themes of the polemical literature of the time, especially in its focus on the head.

He writes: Until now obeying the sacred impulse of the genius operating upon our intellectual complexion, while my mind was carrying me into new things, I executed works not of supererogation, but supplemental to the advancement of sciences.

[26] In addition there are two surviving unpublished manuscripts held at the British Library: 'Philocophus, or the Dumbe mans academie wherein is taught a new and admired art instructing them who are borne Deafe and Dumbe to heare the sound of words with theire eie and thence learne to speake with theire Tongue:' illustrated with engraved plates shewing the different portions of the hands.

This manuscript shows that Bulwer was the first person in England to acquire and translate Juan Pablo Bonet's Reducción de las letras y arte para enseñar a hablar a los mudos ("Summary of the letters and the art of teaching speech to the mute") because it contains images cut and pasted directly from Bonet's book as well as commentary on the methods described therein.