Ancient Greek medicine
Ancient Greek medicine was a compilation of theories and practices that were constantly expanding through new ideologies and trials. The Greek term for medicine was iatrikē (Greek:
Humorism (or the four humors) refers to blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black bile. Each of the four humors were linked to an organ, temper, season and element.[2] It was also theorized that sex played a role in medicine because some diseases and treatments were different for females than for males. Moreover, geographic location and social class affected the living conditions of the people and might subject them to different environmental issues such as mosquitoes, rats, and availability of clean drinking water. Diet was thought to be an issue as well and might be affected by a lack of access to adequate nourishment. Trauma, such as that suffered by gladiators, from dog bites or other injuries, played a role in theories relating to understanding anatomy and infections. Additionally, there was significant focus on the beliefs and mindset of the patient in the diagnosis and treatment theories. It was recognized that the mind played a role in healing, or that it might also be the sole basis for the illness.[3]
Ancient Greek medicine began to revolve around the theory of humors. The humoral theory states that good health comes from a perfect balance of the four humors: blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile. Consequently, poor health resulted from improper balance of the four humors.
The earliest known Greek medical school opened in
Asclepieia
Asclepius was espoused as the first physician, and myth placed him as the son of Apollo.
Temples dedicated to the healer-god Asclepius, known as
The Rod of Asclepius is a universal symbol for medicine to this day. However, it is frequently confused with Caduceus, which was a staff wielded by the god Hermes. The Rod of Asclepius embodies one snake with no wings whereas Caduceus is represented by two snakes and a pair of wings depicting the swiftness of Hermes.
Ancient Greek physicians
Ancient Greek physicians did not regard disease as being of supernatural origin, i.e., brought about from the dissatisfaction of the gods or demonic possession: "The Greeks developed a system of medicine based on an empirico-rational approach, such that they relied ever more on naturalistic observation, enhanced by practical trial and error experience, abandoning magical and religious justifications of human bodily dysfunction."[10] However, in some instances, the fault of the ailment was still placed on the patient and the role of the physician was to conciliate with the gods or exorcise the demon with prayers, spells, and sacrifices.
Women in Ancient Greek Medicine
Originally, in ancient Greece, women were not allowed to become doctors, however, there are some accounts of female doctors who practiced medicine. One such account was that of the female doctor Agnodice. The validity of Agnodice’s story has been debated by scholars but according to legend, Agnodice was a woman in ancient Greece who disguised herself as a man to study medicine and become a doctor. She did so by cutting her hair and changing into men’s clothing.[11]
While under the guise of practicing as a man, Agnodice was able to secure an apprenticeship under the then physician and gynecologist, Herophilus and learn the skills necessary to practice medicine herself. To provide comfort to her patients, it is believed that Agnodice would expose herself to female patients in order to prove that she was a woman. Eventually, she was discovered and put on trial for practicing medicine as a woman. Once again, she exposed herself to the court to prove the truth about her existence as a woman practicing medicine. The outcome was that she was found as violating the law, specifically against women being able to learn medicine. However, her female patients came to her defense and testified that she had helped them when no male doctor could. Agnodice was acquitted and soon after the law was changed in Athens. After her trial, all free-born women were then legally allowed to practice medicine.[12] After the ruling and change in law, Agnodice then went on to become a well-respected doctor in Athens by all.
While Agnodice is the most well-known female doctor in ancient Greece, there were likely others who practiced medicine. However, there is little information available about them. In general, women in ancient Greece were not allowed to receive an education, so it is unlikely that many women were able to become doctors. It is believed that there were some exceptions, for example, the daughters of wealthy families who could receive an education.[13]
In addition to Agnodice, there were female healers in ancient Greece who were not trained as formal doctors, but who had significant medical knowledge. These women used herbal remedies and other natural treatments to help their patients. They were often called upon to help with childbirth and other women's health issues, similar to current-day midwives and nurses. While they were not officially recognized as doctors during their time, they played a vital role in the healthcare system of ancient Greece.[13]
Overall, the role of women in medicine in ancient Greece was limited. However, there were some exceptions, such as Agnodice, who were able to break through the barriers and become respected doctors. While there is little information available about other female doctors in ancient Greece, it is likely that there were others who practiced medicine. Additionally, female healers played an important role in the healthcare system of ancient Greece, even if they were not officially recognized as doctors.
The Hippocratic Corpus and Humorism
The
Ancient Greek physicians who followed humorism emphasized the importance of environment. Physicians believed patients would be subjected to various diseases based on the environment they resided. The local water supply and the direction the wind blew influenced the health of the local populace. Patients played an important role in their treatment. Stated in the treatise "Aphorisms", "[i]t is not enough for the physician to do what is necessary, but the patient and the attendant must do their part as well".[15] Patient compliance was rooted in their respect for the physician. According to the treatise "Prognostic", a physician was able to increase their reputation and respect through "prognosis", knowing the outcome of the disease. Physicians had an active role in the lives of patients, taking into consideration their residence. Distinguishing between fatal diseases and recoverable disease was important for patient trust and respect, positively influencing patient compliance.
With the growth of patient compliance in Greek medicine, consent became an important factor between the doctor and patient relationship. Presented with all the information concerning the patient's health, the patient makes the decision to accept treatment. Physician and patient responsibility is mentioned in the treatise "Epidemics", where it states, "there are three factors in the practice of medicine: the disease, the patient and the physician. The physician is the servant of science, and the patient must do what he can to fight the disease with the assistance of the physician".[16]
Aristotle's influence on Greek perception
Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle was the most influential scholar of the living world from antiquity. Aristotle's biological writings demonstrate great concern for empiricism, biological causation, and the diversity of life.[17] Aristotle did not experiment, however, holding that items display their real natures in their own environments, rather than controlled artificial ones. While in modern-day physics and chemistry this assumption has been found unhelpful, in zoology and ethology it remains the dominant practice, and Aristotle's work "retains real interest".[18] He made countless observations of nature, especially the habits and attributes of plants and animals in the world around him, which he devoted considerable attention to categorizing. In all, Aristotle classified 540 animal species, and dissected at least 50.
Aristotle believed that
He held that the level of a creature's perfection was reflected in its form, but not foreordained by that form. Yet another aspect of his biology divided souls into three groups: a vegetative soul, responsible for reproduction and growth; a sensitive soul, responsible for mobility and sensation; and a rational soul, capable of thought and reflection. He attributed only the first to plants, the first two to animals, and all three to humans.[21] Aristotle, in contrast to earlier philosophers, and like the Egyptians, placed the rational soul in the heart, rather than the brain.[22] Notable is Aristotle's division of sensation and thought, which generally went against previous philosophers, with the exception of Alcmaeon.[23]
Aristotle's successor at the
Herophilus, Erasistratus and ancient Greek anatomy
Nomenclature, methods and applications for the study of anatomy all date back to the Greeks.[25] After Theophrastus (d. 286 BC), the extent of original work produced was diminished. Though interest in Aristotle's ideas survived, they were generally taken unquestioningly.[26] It is not until the age of Alexandria under the Ptolemies that advances in biology can be again found. The first medical teacher at Alexandria was Herophilus of Chalcedon (the father of anatomy),[27] who differed from Aristotle, placing intelligence in the brain, and connected the nervous system to motion and sensation. Herophilus also distinguished between veins and arteries, noting that the latter had a pulse while the former do not. He did this using an experiment involving cutting certain veins and arteries in a pig's neck until the squealing stopped.[28] In the same vein, he developed a diagnostic technique which relied upon distinguishing different types of pulse.[29] He, and his contemporary, Erasistratus of Chios, researched the role of veins and nerves, mapping their courses across the body.
Erasistratus connected the increased complexity of the surface of the human brain compared to other animals to its superior intelligence. He sometimes employed experiments to further his research, at one time repeatedly weighing a caged bird and noting its weight loss between feeding times. Following his teacher's researches into pneumatics, he claimed that the human system of blood vessels was controlled by vacuums, drawing blood across the body. In Erasistratus' physiology, air enters the body, is then drawn by the lungs into the heart, where it is transformed into vital spirit, and is then pumped by the arteries throughout the body. Some of this vital spirit reaches the brain, where it is transformed into animal spirit, which is then distributed by the nerves.[30] Herophilus and Erasistratus performed their experiments upon criminals given to them by their Ptolemaic kings. They dissected these criminals alive, and "while they were still breathing they observed parts which nature had formerly concealed, and examined their position, colour, shape, size, arrangement, hardness, softness, smoothness, connection."[31]
Though a few ancient atomists such as Lucretius challenged the teleological viewpoint of Aristotelian ideas about life, teleology (and after the rise of Christianity, natural theology) would remain central to biological thought essentially until the 18th and 19th centuries. In the words of Ernst Mayr, "Nothing of any real consequence in biology after Lucretius and Galen until the Renaissance."[32] Aristotle's ideas of natural history and medicine survived, but they were generally taken unquestioningly.[33]
Galen
Aelius Galenus was a prominent Greek physician, surgeon and philosopher in the Roman Empire.[34][35][36] Arguably the most accomplished of all medical researchers of antiquity, Galen influenced the development of various scientific disciplines, including anatomy,[37] physiology, pathology,[38] pharmacology,[39] and neurology, as well as philosophy[40] and logic.
The son of
Galen's understanding of anatomy and
Galen saw himself as both a physician and a philosopher, as he wrote in his treatise entitled That the Best Physician is also a Philosopher.[47][48][49] Galen was very interested in the debate between the rationalist and empiricist medical sects,[50] and his use of direct observation, dissection and vivisection represents a complex middle ground between the extremes of those two viewpoints.[51][52][53]
Dioscorides
The first century AD Greek physician,
Herodicus
Herodicus (Greek: Ἡρóδιĸος) was a Greek physician of the 5th century BC, who is considered to be the father of sports medicine. The first use of therapeutic exercise for the treatment of disease and maintenance of health is credited to him, and he is believed to have been one of the tutors of Hippocrates. He also recommended good diet and massage using beneficial herbs and oils, and his theories are considered the foundation of sports medicine. He was specific in the manner that a massage should be given. He recommended that rubbing be initially slow and gentle, then subsequently faster, with the application of more pressure, which was to be followed by more gentle friction.[55]
Historical legacy
Through long contact with Greek culture, and their eventual conquest of Greece, the Romans adopted a favorable view of Hippocratic medicine.[56]
This acceptance led to the spread of Greek medical theories throughout the Roman Empire, and thus a large portion of the West. The most influential Roman scholar to continue and expand on the Hippocratic tradition was Galen (d. c. 207). Study of Hippocratic and Galenic texts, however, all but disappeared in the Latin West in the Early Middle Ages, following the collapse of the Western Empire, although the Hippocratic-Galenic tradition of Greek medicine continued to be studied and practiced in the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantium). After AD 750, Arab, Persian and Andalusi scholars translated Galen's and Dioscorides' works in particular. Thereafter the Hippocratic-Galenic medical tradition was assimilated and eventually expanded, with the most influential Muslim doctor-scholar being Avicenna. Beginning in the late eleventh century, the Hippocratic-Galenic tradition returned to the Latin West with a series of translations of the Classical texts, mainly from Arabic translations but occasionally from the original Greek. In the Renaissance, more translations of Galen and Hippocrates directly from the Greek were made from newly available Byzantine manuscripts.
Galen's influence was so great that even after Western Europeans started making dissections in the thirteenth century, scholars often assimilated findings into the Galenic model that otherwise might have thrown Galen's accuracy into doubt. Over time, however, Classical medical theory came to be superseded by increasing emphasis on scientific experimental methods in the 16th and 17th centuries. Nevertheless, the Hippocratic-Galenic practice of bloodletting was practiced into the 19th century, despite its empirical ineffectiveness and riskiness.
See also
- Ancient Egyptian medicine
- Byzantine medicine
- History of medicine
- Ibn Sina Academy of Medieval Medicine and Sciences
- Medical community of ancient Rome
- Medicine in ancient Rome
- On Ancient Medicine (Hippocratic Corpus)
- Unani
References
- ^ a b Cartwright, Mark (2013). "Greek Medicine". World History Encyclopedia. UK. Retrieved November 9, 2013.
{{cite encyclopedia}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - ^ a b "Ancient Greek medicine: Influences and practice". www.medicalnewstoday.com. 2018-11-09. Retrieved 2021-04-08.
- ISBN 1-883937-75-2.
- ^
- "medicinaantiqua.org.uk". www.medicinaantiqua.org.uk. Archived from the original on 2008-02-15. Retrieved 2008-03-08.
- "The Father of Modern Medicine: Hippocrates". 2008-02-28. Archived from the original on 2008-02-28. Retrieved 2012-04-21.
- Grammaticos PC, Diamantis A (2008). "Useful known and unknown views of the father of modern medicine, Hippocrates and his teacher Democritus". Hellenic Journal of Nuclear Medicine. 11 (1): 2–4. PMID 18392218.
- The father of modern medicine: the first research of the physical factor of tetanus Archived 18 November 2011 at the Wayback Machine, European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases
- "Hippocrates". World History Encyclopedia. Archived from the original on 16 July 2021.
- ^ Atlas of Anatomy, ed. Giunti Editorial Group, Taj Books LTD 2002, p. 9
- ^ "Alcmaeon". Britannica.
- ^ Heinrich von Staden, Herophilus: The Art of Medicine in Early Alexandria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 1-26.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-19-974869-3.
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- ^ JSTOR 4351609.
- ^ Vivian Nutton'Ancient Medicine'(Routledge 2004)
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- ^ Mason, A History of the Sciences pp 41
- ^ Annas, Classical Greek Philosophy pp 247
- ^ Mayr, The Growth of Biological Thought, pp 84-90, 135; Mason, A History of the Sciences, p 41-44
- ^ Mayr, The Growth of Biological Thought, pp 201-202; see also: Lovejoy, The Great Chain of Being
- ^ Aristotle, De Anima II 3
- ^ Mason, A History of the Sciences pp 45
- ^ Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy Vol. 1 pp. 348
- ^ Mayr, The Growth of Biological Thought, pp 90-91; Mason, A History of the Sciences, p 46
- ^ Singer, Charles (1957). A Short History of Anatomy & Physiology from Greeks to Harvey. NEw York: Dover Publications Inc. p. 5.
- ^ Annas, Classical Greek Philosophy pp 252
- ^ Elizabeth H. Oakes, Encyclopedia of World Scientists, p 321
- ^ Mason, A History of the Sciences pp 56
- ^ Barnes, Hellenistic Philosophy and Science pp 383
- ^ Mason, A History of the Sciences, p 57
- ^ Barnes, Hellenistic Philosophy and Science, pp 383-384
- ^ Mayr, The Growth of Biological Thought, pp 90-94; quotation from p 91
- ^ Annas, Classical Greek Philosophy, p 252
- ISBN 0-472-08568-9
- ISBN 0-521-32085-2
- S2CID 35645790.
- PMC 1081972.
- ^ Arthur John Brock (translator), Introduction. Galen. On the Natural Faculties. Edinburgh 1916
- ^ Galen on pharmacology
- ^ Galen on the brain
- ^ Andreas Vesalius (1543). De humani corporis fabrica, Libri VII (in Latin). Basel, Switzerland: Johannes Oporinus. Retrieved 7 August 2010.
- ^ O'Malley, C., Andreas Vesalius of Brussels, 1514–1564, Berkeley: University of California Press
- ^ Siraisi, Nancy G., (1991) Girolamo Cardano and the Art of Medical Narrative, Journal of the History of Ideas. pp. 587–88.
- ISBN 0-398-00793-4. Retrieved 7 August 2010.
- ^ Furley, D, and J. Wilkie, 1984, Galen On Respiration and the Arteries, Princeton University Press, and Bylebyl, J (ed), 1979, William Harvey and His Age, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press[page needed]
- ISBN 978-3-639-08294-4.[page needed]
- ^ Claudii Galeni Pergameni (1992). Odysseas Hatzopoulos (ed.). "That the best physician is also a philosopher" with a Modern Greek Translation. Athens, Greece: Odysseas Hatzopoulos & Company: Kaktos Editions.
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- ^ Frede, M. and R. Walzer, 1985, Three Treatises on the Nature of Science, Indianapolis: Hacket.[page needed]
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- ^ Early American Manual Therapy (Version 5.0) - Chapter 1 History and Development of Mechanical Vibration Therapy Archived 2005-03-09 at the Wayback Machine, Accessed: October 6, 2008. "In the 5th century Herodicus advocated exercise the treatment of disease and compelled his patients to have their bodies rubbed, he being a firm believer in the efficacy of massage. Joseph Schreiber, M. D., author of "Treatment of Massage and Exercise," translated by Walter Mendelson, M. D., of New York, claims that Herodicus first laid down principles for rational, mechanical methods of treatment. HERODICUS, 484 B. C., was one of the first to refer to the manner of giving massage. He said friction should be gentle and slow at first, then rapid in combination with pressure, which was to be followed by gentle friction. Other advocates were Plato, Socrates, and Hippocrates, who said "rubbing can bind a joint that is too loose, and loosen a joint that is too rigid. Hard rubbing binds, soft rubbing loosens, much rubbing causes parts to waste, moderate rubbing makes them grow." This is the earliest definite information relative to the effect of variations in the application of massage. These maxims should be remembered by those who use mechanical vibration for they well define its general therapeutic application. Hipppocrates also suggested the direction in which to apply massage the art of rubbing up, thereby assisting mechanical and physical processes, aiding circulation, relieving stasis and consequently quickening metabolic processes."
- ^ Heinrich von Staden, "Liminal Perils: Early Roman Receptions of Greek Medicine", in Tradition, Transmission, Transformation, ed. F. Jamil Ragep and Sally P. Ragep with Steven Livesey (Leiden: Brill, 1996), pp. 369-418.
Bibliography
- Connor, J. T. H. An English Language Bibliography of Classical Greek Medicine
Further reading
- Annas, Julia. Classical Greek Philosophy. In Boardman, John; Griffin, Jasper; Murray, Oswyn (ed.) The Oxford History of the Classical World. ISBN 0-19-872112-9
- Barnes, Jonathan. Hellenistic Philosophy and Science. In Boardman, John; Griffin, Jasper; Murray, Oswyn (ed.) The Oxford History of the Classical World. ISBN 0-19-872112-9
- Cohn-Haft, Louis. The Public Physicians of Ancient Greece, Northampton, Massachusetts, 1956.
- Guido, Majno. The Healing Hand: Man and Wound in the Ancient World, Harvard University Press, 1975.
- ISBN 0-521-29420-7
- Jones, W. H. S. Philosophy and Medicine in Ancient Greece, Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1946.
- Lennox, James (2006-02-15). "Aristotle's Biology". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
- Longrigg, James. Greek Rational Medicine: Philosophy and Medicine from Alcmæon to the Alexandrians, Routledge, 1993.
- ISBN 0-674-36153-9
- Mason, Stephen F. A History of the Sciences. Collier Books: New York, 1956.
- ISBN 0-674-36445-7
- Guido Majno. The Healing Hand: Man and Wound in the Ancient World. Routledge, 2004
- ISBN 978-0-521-23646-1]
- Longrigg, James. Greek Medicine From the Heroic to the Hellenistic Age. New York, NY, 1998. ISBN 0-415-92087-6
External links
- Ancient Greek Medicine in medicinenet.com Archived 2013-03-28 at the Wayback Machine
- Greek Medicine by the History of Medicine Division of the National Library of Medicine.
- greekmedicine.net
- Greek and Roman Medicine: An Introductory Bibliography for Graduate Students in Classics at Ancient Medicine compiled by Lee T. Pearcy