Ancient medicine

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The history of medicine in ancient times can be divided into Egyptian medicine , medicine of Mesopotamia , medicine of Judaism , and medicine in ancient Greece and the Roman Empire . The medicine of ancient Greece can be seen as the cradle of European medicine: the medical writings of antiquity were translated into Arabic from the 8th century and formed the basis of Islamic medicine . From the 12th century, the writings of Islamic doctors - such as Avicenna or Rhazes - were again translated into Latin by European authors such as Gerhard von Cremona , and they continued to influence medical teaching well into the 17th century.

Egyptian medicine

The first evidence of refined ancient medicine comes from Egypt. Already around the year 2600 BC The Egyptians were able to make the first surgical knives out of copper, which could be used for minor operations such as circumcision. This practice common at the time was probably adopted by the Jews or Arabs. In the Smith Papyrus, a collection of texts on surgery, a copy of which has survived from around 1700 BC. The original version was probably written 1000 years earlier. It also describes the use of fine copper needles for sewing wounds and disinfection with honey. Doctors were mostly priests. An effective splint for a broken shin was found on a mummy from the 5th dynasty (approx. 2500 BC). Another list of medical findings can be found in the Ebers papyrus from 1550 BC. BC, but its content mainly consists of a list of magical beverages and spells.

Widespread diseases in Egypt were primarily the plague , conjunctivitis (which was mainly due to fine sand and dust and the lack of adequate hygiene and in many cases led to blindness ), hepatitis and worm diseases. Another problem was that the Egyptians' teeth became excessively worn due to sand in food and stone debris when grinding grain. The Egyptian doctors were already making (dental) prostheses, which they attached with gold bands.

The ancient Egyptian doctors also had anatomical knowledge. So they knew about the importance of the heart, but had no knowledge of the bloodstream. Since they recognized that a person without a heart was not capable of living, they took the heart as the seat of intelligence and soul. The heart was consequently the only organ that was not removed during the mummification. The anatomical knowledge of the Egyptians was based on this practice, since the body was opened for mummification and thus knowledge about the human body structure could be gained.

Imhotep , a scholar at the court of Pharaoh Djoser , enjoyed the greatest admiration as a doctor . Imhotep was said to be the foundation of Egyptian medicine in later times. He is also said to have further developed the technique of mummification by having the internal organs of the dead removed in order to store them in special vessels, the canopic jars. In the late Egyptian period, in the "New Kingdom", he was worshiped, among other things, as the god of healing and the Greeks recognized him as their god of healing, Asclepius, and called him Imuthes. However, the medical achievements ascribed to him have not been documented at the time and have probably grown over centuries in the creation of legends.

Medicine in Mesopotamia

Suppliants approaching a shrine, seeking health. Wellcome M0011143.jpg

The first surviving evidence of medicine from Sumer , incantations against animal bites and against diseases in humans and animals, originated around 2700 BC. A little later, doctors are mentioned for the first time and in 2100–2000 BC. In BC, the 3rd Dynasty of Ur , therapeutic instructions for poultices and medicines for internal and external use were created, which were already completely free of magic. Nevertheless, around 1800 BC Chr. Still treatments of doctors and conjurers carried out together. In the case of sacrificial displays , a seer took over the liver review and other divinatory procedures. As a result, detailed knowledge of the anatomy of sheep in particular was gained, but the inside of the human body remained blurred.

Illness was often interpreted as being possessed by demons and evil spirits, while epilepsy was seen as the work of a Utukku demon (see Alû ). Child mortality and childbed fever were traced back to Lamaštu . Numerous tablets with incantations and exorcistic rituals have come down to us from all epochs of cuneiform script culture.

Especially from the first millennium BC, a great number of medicinal therapies have come down to us, some of which were a thousand years old at the time of recording. Most come from the Assyrian capital, Aššur, and from the library of King Aššur-bāni-apli in Nineveh . Thousands of prescriptions have been preserved, which often also contain symptoms, the name of the disease and the indication of healing, as well as information on the manufacture of the remedies and the method of use. Medicinal drugs made from plants, animals, but also minerals were mixed with beer, wine, milk, oil or water. Some drugs were simply added to food or made into pills. Plasters and bandages, ointments based on sebum, butter and oil, tampons and suppositories, enemas, incense as well as steam baths and gargles were also known. There were extensive, clearly structured reference works for the appearance and effects of drugs. A surviving reference work on diagnosis, consisting of 40 clay tablets, contains several thousand entries.

In Babylonia the activity of doctors, but not conjurers, was regulated by law. They contained guidelines for remuneration after operations, but also sanctions against doctors who caused the death of a patient during the operation. The Codex Hammurapi from the 18th century BC BC (around 1700 BC), in addition to cuneiform texts on clay tablets and seals, the earliest source of Babylonian medicine, contains nine paragraphs (out of a total of 282) that deal with medical topics (especially surgery). The attending physician had to pay a fine if he injured one of the patient's eyes during operations in the skull area. Since in Mesopotamian or Babylonian medicine diseases were attributed to the work of gods and demons as well as to black magic, one of the main activities of the healer was to perform magical acts, in particular to find out which demon is the cause of the disease in question and which one To carry out or to cause summoning of the same.

One of the most important healing gods was Ištar . The black Šawuška was famous in Hanilgabat , a statue of this deity was even sent to Egypt by the Mittani kings Šuttarna II and Tušratta when Amenophis III. got sick.

Based, among other Mesopotamian and Egyptian medicine, the medical representatives were called in for medical treatment Hittite ruler, also found in the early 20th century cuneiform texts occupied showed Hittite medicine a certain independence.

Medicine in the Bible

The Old Testament contains health regulations that were written between the eighth and third centuries BC. In view of the monotheistic conception of the image of God or due to the “sole causation” of the God Yahweh, illness, especially that cannot be explained by old age or wounds, was regarded as a punishment from God and not (no longer) caused demonologically (only in the New Testament disease is again demonized returned). Clerics were more preoccupied with controlling health than with actual healing. Regulations concerning cleanliness, sanitary facilities and waste disposal corresponded in their intentions to today's standards.

The health regulations are written in the Leviticus in Leviticus . Orthodox Jews still follow these rules to this day.

Medicine in ancient Greece

What is particularly noteworthy about Greek medicine is the fact that it had moved away from the idea that illness was a divine punishment and was regarded as a science. Greek philosophy provided an important basis for medicine at that time. One believed in an omnipotent natural power. In addition, great emphasis was placed on harmony, which has similarities to oriental medicine .

The ancient Greeks attached great importance to the harmony of four complexions or constitution types. These were equated with the four elements. They also assigned the constitution types , after which four temperaments were later named, to different parts of the body and body juices. The four juices were blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile. Health is achieved when the four juices are in the right mix ratio ( temperamentum ) (see also humoral pathology ).

Healers were well-traveled, respected men who valued cleanliness. You already knew that psychological factors can have a major influence on the course and healing of illnesses. Temples dedicated to Asklepios , so-called Asklepieon, served as sanatoriums, which played an important role in the healing of mainly psychosomatic diseases. The patients could spend the night in them and expect the healing from Asclepius in their dreams. The staff of Asclepius, the so-called Aesculapian staff , around which a snake is wrapped, is a symbol of medicine to this day. The snake's ability to shed its skin symbolizes renewal, rebirth, and healing. From the schools of Asklepiad, the most famous of which were in Kos and Knidos, personalities such as Hippocrates of Kos emerged, who show the transition from superstitious and magical ideas to scientific medicine.

Hippocrates

The most important figure in Greek medicine is Hippocrates . He came from the medical school on the island of Kos . The Corpus Hippocraticum has survived from this period , a collection of over 60 medical writings under the name of Hippocrates, which were actually written by different, with one exception, unknown authors. Many of the diseases described herein are still common today, such as malaria and gonorrhea . The work also contained rules of conduct, such as dress code or regulations that regulated the life of the healer.

The Hippocratic Oath , one of the pillars of medical ethics , is also associated with Hippocrates, although it is believed not to date back to him. Those who take the oath promise to lead holy, pure lives and to serve the needs of patients throughout their lives.

The most famous center of the Hellenistic era was Alexandria . Herophilos and Erasistratos were the best-known representatives of this spiritual center, which continued to exist even after the fire in the great library. Herophilos was the first to measure the pulse and differentiate between paralysis of motor and sensory nerves . In doing so, he laid the foundation for neurophysiology . Erasistratos continued the work of his predecessor and recognized the heart as the most important part of the bloodstream .

Greek medicine influenced the history of European medicine for centuries.

Doctors in the Roman Empire

Prior to medicine in the Roman Empire, there was an Etruscan medicine in the Etruscan culture , which as a science was still closely linked to the religion of the Etruscan world .

Around 293 BC Rome suffered from an outbreak of the plague and had to seek help from Greek doctors, who then settled in Rome. As a result, the medicine of the Roman Empire was firmly in Greek hands for centuries. The most famous doctor was who, according to Pliny d. Ä. ( Nat. Hist. XXIX, 12 f.) 219 BC Archagathos of the Peloponnese, resident Greek, a surgeon ( vulnerarius ). But this was soon expelled from Rome because he is said to have cut (ie operated) too excessively. He was therefore given the nickname " carnifex ", which means something like "meat maker" (or executioner or tormentor). It took over 100 years for the next Greek doctor to be mentioned. Indeed, there is almost nothing more Greek than medicine in the ancient Roman world. Only about five percent of all Medici tombstones have non-Greek names.

As the first important physician who learned Greek medicine in the Roman Empire in the 1st century BC Asklepiades of Bithynia is considered to have settled down in the 3rd century BC .

The only known medical school in Rome founded by a Roman was the secta of the imperial personal physician Vettius Valens († 48 AD).

The Greek schools in Rome were based on the principles laid down by Hippocrates in the Corpus Hippocraticum . The doctors of Rome formed three layers on the basis of their work: those who had free independent private practices, the second group as family doctors in the service of rich families or the emperor, and doctors employed by the city as the third group. Women were also found among the Roman doctors, mainly in obstetrics and gynecology .

The pharmaceutical knowledge of the time was contained in the five volumes of the De Materia Medica by Dioscorides . This herbalism was used until the Renaissance .

The ancient Romans had a very advanced surgical knowledge, they used 200 different instruments. Doctors obtained their knowledge of anatomy mainly through dissection and vivisection of animals. Opening the body of a Roman citizen was forbidden. That is why military service could be attractive for a surgeon. There were many more opportunities to study the human body.

The Greek appreciation of purity was also evident in Rome. Good general health and high hygiene were major achievements of Roman medicine.

Main representatives

  • Asklepiades of Bithynia worked in Rome in the 1st century BC. He taught that diseases arise from the restriction of the movement of the atoms and therefore prescribed water therapy .
  • Marcus Terentius Varro , not a doctor, but polymath, said in his book " About agriculture " of small invisible creatures in humans through the respiratory and digestive tract invaded and there diseases caused what was forgotten until the Microbiology these Conjecture confirmed.
  • Aulus Cornelius Celsus wrote a medical text book entitled De Medicina consisting of eight volumes. Among other things, he described complex surgical operations, but his description of acute inflammation ( lat. Rubor, tumor, cum calore et dolore , dt. Red, painful, warm swelling), which is still used today, earned him the most recognition.
  • Galen (approx. 129–216 AD) was the best known Greek doctor and author of a summary that gives the best overview of the medical knowledge of antiquity. One of his most important discoveries was the role of blood in nourishing tissues and how nerves work. However, this part of his teachings was barely received, and he and his successors considered the Greek doctrine of the four temperaments so important that his revised theory of the four fluids became dogmatic for all of medieval medicine . Belief in the healing properties of bloodletting and similar practices cost numerous lives in later centuries.

The medical teachings associated with Hippocrates and Galen were in part still in use until the 19th century.

See also

literature

(sorted chronologically)

overview

Source texts

  • Walter Müri : The doctor in antiquity. Greek and Latin sources from Hippocrates to Galen with translation into German. 5th edition. Artemis Verlag, Munich / Zurich 1986.
  • Franz Köcher : Babylonian and Assyrian medicine in texts and studies. I – VI, Berlin 1963–1980 (abbreviated to BAM).
  • Jutta Kollesch , Diethard Nickel (ed.): Ancient healing art. Selected texts from the medical literature of the Greeks and Romans. Philipp Reclam jun., Leipzig 1979; 6th edition. Leipzig 1989, ISBN 3-379-00411-1 ; further edition z. B. Stuttgart 1994, ISBN 3-15-009305-8 .
  • Gerhard Fichtner : Corpus Galenicum (directory of the galenic and pseudogalenic scripts). Inst. For the history of medicine, Tübingen 1997.
  • Kai Brodersen : Galenos: The burned library (Peri Alypias, Greek and German) , Marix, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-7374-0962-9
  • Fuat Sezgin : History of Arabic literature Vol. III: Medicine - Pharmacy - Zoology - Veterinary medicine, EJ Brill Verlag, Leiden 1970

Questions of detail

  • Dietlinde Goltz: Studies on ancient oriental and Greek medicine: therapy, drug preparation, recipe structure. (Mathematical-scientific habilitation thesis Marburg an der Lahm 1969) Wiesbaden 1974 (= Sudhoffs archive. Supplement 16).
  • Karl Deichgräber : Hippocrates' De humoribus in the history of Greek medicine. Academy of Sciences and Literature, Mainz 1972; Steiner, Wiesbaden 1972.
  • Klaus-Dietrich Fischer : On the development of the medical status in the Roman Empire. In: Medizinhistorisches Journal 14, 1979, pp. 165-175.
  • Raymond Villey: Medicine in Rome: Galen. In: Illustrated History of Medicine. German adaptation by Richard Toellner et al., Special edition in six volumes, 1986, Volume I, pp. 394–423.
  • Bernhard D. Haage, Wolfgang Wegner: Medicine in the Greek and Roman antiquity. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte . De Gruyter, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , pp. 915-920.
  • Martha Haussperger : Mesopotamian medicine and its doctors from today's perspective. In: Journal of Assyriology and Near Eastern Archeology , 87/2 (1997), pp. 196-218.
  • Martha Haussperger: Did empirical medicine exist in the Near East before Hippocrates? In: Würzburger medical history reports 17, 1998, pp. 113–128.
  • Martha Haussperger: Treatment of diseases of the head in ancient Mesopotamia. Medical notes on the cuneiform text BAM 3. In: Würzburg medical historical reports. Volume 18, 1999, pp. 133-148.
  • Martha Haussperger: Mesopotamian medicine from a medical perspective (= DWV writings on the history of medicine . Volume 12). Deutscher Wissenschaftsverlag, Baden-Baden 2012, ISBN 978-3-86888-041-0 .
  • Martha Haussperger: A small compendium from ancient Babylonian times. In: Würzburg medical history reports. Volume 16, 1997, pp. 131-149 (commentary and translation on a text from Nippur ).
  • Arnd Krüger : history of movement therapy. In: Preventive Medicine. Springer Loseblatt Collection , Heidelberg 1999, 07.06, pp. 1–22.
  • Fridolf Kudlien : Medical education in classical antiquity. In: Charles Donald O'Malley (Ed.): The history of medical education. Berkeley 1970, pp. 3-37.
  • Ernst Künzl: Medical instruments from Sepulchral finds of the Roman Empire. Bonner Jahrbücher 182, 1982, pp. 1–132.
  • Stephanos Geroulanos , Rene Bridler: Trauma - wound development and wound care in ancient Greece. Philipp von Zabern, Mainz am Rhein 1994.
  • Heike Achner: Doctors in antiquity . Verlag Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2009, ISBN 978-3-8053-4058-8 .
  • Olaf Krause: The doctor and his instruments in the Roman Legion . Bernhard A. Greiner, Remshalden 2010, ISBN 978-3-86705-046-3 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Stefan Maul , Wolfhart Westendorf: First medical concepts between magic and reason. In: H. Schott (Ed.): The Chronicle of Medicine. Chronik-Verlag, Dortmund 1993. pp. 16-33.
  2. ^ Medicine in Mesopotamia. ( Memento from November 21, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) BabMed - Babylonian Medicine, Free University of Berlin .
  3. ↑ Wolfgang U. Eckart : History of Medicine. Springer, Berlin / Heidelberg / New York 1990; 3rd, revised edition, ibid 1998, p. 39.
  4. ↑ § 215-223.
  5. ↑ Martha Haussperger : Did empirical medicine exist in the Near East before Hippocrates? In: Würzburg medical history reports. Volume 17, 1998, pp. 113-128; here p. 125.
  6. ↑ Martha Haussperger: Mesopotamian Medicine. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , pp. 974-979; here: p. 974.
  7. ↑ Benedikt Ignatzek: Disease Demon . In: Werner E. Gerabek et al. (Ed.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. 2005, p. 803 f.
  8. ^ I. Wegner: Shape and cult of the Istar-Sawuska in Asia Minor. Old Orient Old Testament 36. Neukirchen-Vluyn 1981.
  9. ↑ Kamal Sabri Kolta, Ahmet Ünal: Hittite Medicine. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin and New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , pp. 586-590.
  10. ↑ C. Burde: Hittite medical texts. Wiesbaden 1974 (= Stud. Bogazköy-Texten , 19).
  11. ↑ Hermann-Josef Stipp : Bible. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , pp. 173-175.
  12. ^ Ferdinand Peter Moog: Etruscan Medicine. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 379 f.
  13. ^ Ferdinand Peter Moog: Archagathos. In: Werner E. Gerabek et al. (Ed.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte . 2005, p. 95 f.
  14. ↑ Jutta Kollesch , Diethard Nickel : Ancient healing art. Selected texts from the medical writings of the Greeks and Romans. Philipp Reclam jun., Leipzig 1979 (= Reclams Universal Library. Volume 771); 6th edition ibid 1989, ISBN 3-379-00411-1 , p. 9 f.
  15. ↑ Ferdinand Peter Moog: Vettius Valens - Imperial personal physician and the only Roman school founder. In: Würzburg medical history reports. Volume 20, 2001, pp. 18-35.
  16. ^ Ferdinand Peter Moog: Vettius Valens. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. 1 De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 1441 f.

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