Medieval Medicine E-Book

James J. Walsh

• Herausgeber: James J. Walsh
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

“Medieval Medicine” is the story of the medical sciences in the Middle Ages. The Middle Ages are usually assumed to begin with the deposition of Romulus Augustulus, 476, and end with the fall of Constantinople, 1453. In this little volume, then, we have to outline the history of human efforts to prevent and treat the ills of mankind for nearly one thousand years. Until recently, it has been the custom to believe that there was so little of genuine interest in anything like the scientific care of ailing human beings during these centuries, that even a volume of this kind might seem large for the tale of it. Now we know how much these men of the Middle Ages, for so long called the “Dark Ages,” were interested in every phase of human progress. They created a great art and literature, and above all a magnificent architecture. We have been cultivating the knowledge of these for several generations, and it would indeed be a surprise to find that the men who made such surpassing achievements in all the other lines of human effort should have failed only in medicine.As a matter of fact, we have found that the history of medicine and surgery, and of the medical education of the Middle Ages, are quite as interesting as all the other phases of their accomplishments. Hence the compression that has been necessary to bring a purview of all that we know with regard to Medieval Medicine within the compass of a brief book of this kind. The treatment has been necessarily fragmentary, and yet it is hoped that the details which are given here may prove suggestive for those who have sufficient interest in the subject to wish to follow it, and may provide an incentive for others to learn more of this magnificent chapter of the work of the medieval physicians.

Leseprobe

James J. Walsh

Medieval Medicine

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Table of contents

PREFACE

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

APPENDIX I

APPENDIX II

Footnotes:

PREFACE

“Medieval Medicine” is the story of the medical sciences in the Middle Ages. The Middle Ages are usually assumed to begin with the deposition of Romulus Augustulus, 476, and end with the fall of Constantinople, 1453. In this little volume, then, we have to outline the history of human efforts to prevent and treat the ills of mankind for nearly one thousand years. Until recently, it has been the custom to believe that there was so little of genuine interest in anything like the scientific care of ailing human beings during these centuries, that even a volume of this kind might seem large for the tale of it. Now we know how much these men of the Middle Ages, for so long called the “Dark Ages,” were interested in every phase of human progress. They created a great art and literature, and above all a magnificent architecture. We have been cultivating the knowledge of these for several generations, and it would indeed be a surprise to find that the men who made such surpassing achievements in all the other lines of human effort should have failed only in medicine.As a matter of fact, we have found that the history of medicine and surgery, and of the medical education of the Middle Ages, are quite as interesting as all the other phases of their accomplishments. Hence the compression that has been necessary to bring a purview of all that we know with regard to medieval medicine within the compass of a brief book of this kind. The treatment has been necessarily fragmentary, and yet it is hoped that the details which are given here may prove suggestive for those who have sufficient interest in the subject to wish to follow it, and may provide an incentive for others to learn more of this magnificent chapter of the work of the medieval physicians. “When we think of all the work, big with promise of the future, that went on in those centuries which modern writers in their ignorance used once to set apart and stigmatize as the ‘Dark Ages’; when we consider how the seeds of what is noblest in modern life were then painfully sown upon the soil which Imperial Rome had prepared; when we think of the various work of a Gregory, a Benedict, a Boniface, an Alfred, a Charlemagne, we feel that there is a sense in which the most brilliant achievements of pagan antiquity are dwarfed in comparison with these.”—Fiske: The Beginnings of New England, or the Puritan Theocracy in its Relations to Civil and Religious Liberty.

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORYTo understand the story of Medieval Medicine, the reader must recall briefly the course of Roman history. Rome, founded some eight centuries before Christ, was at first the home of a group of adventurers who, in the absence of women enough to supply wives for their warriors, went out and captured the maidens of a neighbouring Sabine town. The feud which broke out as a result was brought to an end by the women now become the wives of the Romans, and an alliance was made. Gradually Rome conquered the neighbouring cities, but was ever so much more interested in war and conquest than in the higher life. The Etruscan cities, which came under her domination, now reveal in their ruins art objects of exquisite beauty and the remains of a people of high artistic culture. When Rome conquered Carthage, Carthage was probably the most magnificent city in the world, and Rome was a very commonplace collection of houses. Culture did not come to Rome until after her conquest of Greece, when “captive Greece led her captor captive.”