Diseases exist as much as humanity, which means that at all times people needed the help of a knowledgeable specialist. Ancient medicine developed gradually and has come a long way, full of big mistakes and timid trials, sometimes based only on religion. Only a few from the mass of ancient people were able to wrest their consciousness from the clutches of ignorance and give humanity the great discoveries in the field of medicine, described in treatises, encyclopedias, papyri.
Ancient Egyptian Medicine
Ancient Egyptian medicine has become the cradle of knowledge for the doctors of Ancient Rome, Africa and the Middle East, but its origins lead to Mesopotamia, which already had its own medical practitioners in 4000 BC. Ancient medicine in Egypt combined religious beliefs and observation of the human body. Imgotep (2630-2611 BC) is considered the first doctor and founder, although Egyptologists have only recently proved the reality of his existence: for many centuries he was considered a fictional god. This man was a genius of his time, like Leonardo da Vinci in the Middle Ages. The Egyptians received basic knowledge about the structure of man through embalming the dead - even then they knew that the heart and brain are the most important organs.
All diseases in ancient Egyptian medicine were divided into two camps: natural and demonic (supernatural). The first category included diseases associated with injuries, poor nutrition and poor-quality water, intestinal parasites or adverse weather conditions. Careful attention was paid to body hygiene: according to the law, every person had to undergo a once every three month course of washing the digestive system (enemas, emetics and laxatives).
Supernatural reasons were considered obsession with evil spirits, demons and the intervention of gods: methods of exorcism among the lower layers of the population were in great demand and existed thanks to the priests. Various recipes with bitter herbs were also used - it was believed that this drives away spirits. There were about 700 ancient recipes in the arsenal of doctors, and almost all of them were of natural origin:
- vegetable: onions, dates and grapes, pomegranate, poppy, lotus;
- mineral: sulfur, clay, lead, nitrate and antimony;
- parts of animals: tails, ears, grated bones and tendons, glands, insects were sometimes used.
Even then, the healing properties of wormwood and castor oil, flaxseed and aloe were known.
The main sources for research on ancient medicine in Egypt are papyri, pyramid and sarcophagus inscriptions, mummies of people and animals. Until our time, several papyruses about medicine have survived in their original condition:
- The Brugsch Papyrus is the oldest pediatric manuscript. Includes a doctrine that tells about the health of children, women and methods of treating their diseases.
- Ebers Papyrus - talks about diseases of various organs, but it contains many examples of the use of prayers and conspiracies (more than 900 recipes for digestive diseases, respiratory and vascular systems, eye and ear diseases). This scientific work has long been considered the medical encyclopedia of ancient healers.
- Kahunsky papyrus - includes a treatise on gynecology and veterinary medicine, while, unlike other scrolls, it practically does not contain a religious connotation.
- Papyrus Smith - Imgotep is considered its author. It describes 48 clinical cases of traumatology. The information is different - from symptoms and research methods to treatment recommendations.
In ancient Egyptian medicine, the first scalpels and tweezers, uterine mirrors and catheters were used. This indicates the high level and professionalism of surgeons, even if they were inferior in skill to Indian doctors.
The main medicine of India
Ancient Indian medicine relied on two authoritative sources: the code of laws of Manu and the science of Ayurveda, which originates from the Vedas, the oldest sacred texts in Sanskrit. The most accurate and complete retelling on paper was written by the Indian physician Sushruta. It describes the causes of diseases (the imbalance of the three doshas and gunas that make up the human body), recommendations for the treatment of more than 150 ailments of various kinds, in addition, about 780 medicinal herbs and plants are described, information on their use is described.
During diagnosis, special attention was paid to the structure of a person: height and weight, age and character, place of residence, field of activity. Indian healers considered it their duty not to cure the disease, but to eradicate the causes of its occurrence, which puts them on top of the medical Olympus. At the same time, surgical knowledge was far from perfect, despite successful operations to remove gallstones, cesarean section and rhinoplasty (which was in demand due to one of the punishments - cutting off the nose and ears). About 200 surgical instruments were inherited by modern specialists from physicians from India.
Indian traditional medicine shared all the means by their effects on the body:
- emetic and laxatives;
- exciting and soothing;
- sweatshops;
- stimulating digestion;
- narcotic (used as an anesthetic in surgery).
The anatomical knowledge of the healers was not sufficiently developed, but the healers divided the human body into 500 muscles, 24 nerves, 300 bones and 40 leading vessels, which, in turn, were divided into 700 branches, 107 joint joints and more than 900 ligaments. A lot of attention was also paid to the mental state of patients - Ayurveda believed that most of all diseases come from malfunctioning of the nervous system. Such vast knowledge - as for the ancient medicine of India - made the healers of this country very popular outside its borders.
The development of medicine in ancient China
Medicine of the Ancient East originated in the fourth century BC, Huangdi Nei-ching is considered one of the first treatises on diseases, and Huangdi is the name of the founder of the Chinese direction in medicine. The Chinese, like the Indians, believed that a person consists of five primary elements, the imbalance of which leads to various diseases, this was described in great detail in Nei Ching, which Wang Bin wrote in the 8th century.
Zhang Zhong Jing is a Chinese doctor, author of the treatise “Shan Han Tzu Bin Lun”, which describes methods of treating various types of fevers, and Hua Tuo, a surgeon who began using stitches in abdominal operations and anesthesia with opium, aconite and hemp.
For the treatment of various diseases, doctors even then used camphor, garlic, ginger and lemongrass, from mineral rocks sulfur and mercury, magnesia and antimony were especially welcomed. But in the first place, of course, was ginseng - this root was idolized and many different preparations were made on its basis.
A special pride of Chinese physicians was the pulse diagnosis: the predominance of a rapid pulse indicated a too active nervous system, and a weak and intermittent, on the contrary, indicated its lack of activity. Chinese doctors distinguished more than 20 types of pulse. They came to the conclusion that each organ and each process in the body has its own expression in the pulse, and by changing the latter at several points, you can not only determine the human disease, but also predict its outcome. Wang Shu-He, who wrote The Treatise on the Pulse, described all this in great detail.
Also, China is home to acupuncture and acupuncture. Historical texts tell about the healers Bian-chio and Fu Wen, authors of treatises devoted to these methods. In their writings, they describe several hundred biologically active points on the human body, affecting which, any disease can be completely cured.
The only weak link in ancient Chinese medicine is surgery. In the Celestial Empire, methods of treating fractures were practically not used (the affected area was simply placed between two wooden planks), bloodletting and amputation of the limbs were not practiced.
Father of medicine
Hippocrates (Greek Ippokratis), an ancient Greek physician in the 17th generation, who lived in 460 BC and laid the foundation for the development of medicine in Ancient Rome, is considered to be such. The famous promise of doctors before taking office - the "Hippocratic oath" - is his brainchild. The father of the great doctor was Heraclides, also an outstanding scientist, and the mother of Fenareth was a midwife. Parents did everything so that at the age of twenty their son had the glory of a good doctor, and also received initiation into the priests, without which there could be no talk of good practice in medicine.
In search of various successful methods of treatment, Hippocrates traveled to many countries of the East, and when he returned home, he founded the first medical school, putting science and not religion at the forefront.
The creative heritage of this genius is so huge that the constant publisher of his works Charterius spent forty (!) Years on its printing. More than a hundred of his works are collected in a single “Hippocratic collection”, and his “Aphorisms” are still in great demand.
The most famous doctors of the old world
Many of the greatest doctors of ancient medicine brought something of their own to this science, giving their ancestors ideas for reflection, observation and research.
1. Dioscorides, an ancient Greek physician of the 50th century AD e., the author of the treatise "Medicinal substances", which was the leading textbook on pharmacology until the 16th century.
2. Claudius Galen is an ancient Roman natural scientist, the author of numerous works on medicinal plants, methods of their use and the manufacture of preparations from them. All water and alcohol infusions, decoctions and various extracts from plants are still called "galenic". It was he who began to conduct animal tests.
3. Harun al-Rashid is the Arab ruler who was the first to build a state hospital in Baghdad.
4. Paracelsus (1493-1541) - a Swiss doctor who is considered the founder of modern chemical medicine. He was critical of Galen and of ancient medicine as a whole, considering it ineffective.
5. Li Shizhen - an expert in the field of medicine of the Ancient East, a Chinese doctor of the 16th century, the author of "Fundamentals of Pharmacology." The work, consisting of 52 volumes, describes about 2,000 drugs, mainly of plant origin. The author strongly opposed the use of mercury-based tablets.
6. Abu Bakr Muhammad ar-Razi (865-925) - Persian scientist, natural scientist, he is considered the pioneer in the field of psychiatry and psychology. The authorship of this outstanding doctor belongs to the famous Al-Khawi, a comprehensive book on medicine that opens the world to the basics of ophthalmology, gynecology and obstetrics. Razi proved that temperature is the body’s reaction to the disease.
7. Avicenna (Ibn Sina) - the genius of his time. Originally from Uzbekistan, the author of the "Canon of Medicine" - an encyclopedia, according to which for several hundred years other doctors studied the art of medicine. He believed that any disease can be cured by proper nutrition and a moderate lifestyle.
8. Asklepiad Vifinsky - Greek physician who lived in the 1st century BC. The founder of physiotherapy (physical education, massage) and dietetics, urged contemporaries and descendants to maintain a balance between the health of the body and spirit. He took the first steps in molecular medicine, which at that time was something fantastic.
9. Sun Simyao - Chinese physician of the Tian Dynasty, who wrote a 30-volume work. “King of medicines” - this was the name of this genius who made a significant contribution to the development of medical affairs. He pointed out the importance of nutrition and the right combination of products. The invention of gunpowder is also his merit.
How and what was treated in antiquity
The medicine of the ancient world, in spite of all the genius of famous doctors, was quite frightening. However, judge for yourself. Here are just a few interesting facts about treatment methods:
1. The method of deterring and averting a disease was actively practiced in Ancient Babylon: to leave a person sick, they fed him and watered rare crap, spat on him and gave him cuffs. Such "treatment" often led to new diseases (which is not surprising).
2. In Egypt, under King Hammurabi, medicine was a rather dangerous affair, since one of the king’s laws promised death to the healer if his patient died on the operating table. Therefore, spells and prayers, which were described on 40 clay tablets, were more often used.
3. Egyptian priests left the patient to sleep in the temple, in a dream a deity should appear to him and announce the method of treatment, as well as the sin for which he was punished with an illness.
4. No less impressive was the surgery of Ancient Greece. Entire performances from operations were arranged here, in which a make-up doctor portrayed the god of medicine Asclepius. Sometimes in the process of action, patients died - rather from long high-pitched tirades than from the insufficient ability of a pit doctor.
5. The widespread "epileptic" disease was treated with dope, bleached, and wormwood.
6. In Egypt and Mesopotamia, holes were often drilled in the skull (sometimes even a few) to relieve the patient of a migraine caused by an evil spirit.
7. Tuberculosis was treated with drugs made from light foxes and snake meat soaked in opium.
8. Teria (a drink of 70 components) and a philosopher's stone were considered a panacea for all diseases.
Middle Ages: the decline of medicine
The most significant asset of medicine in the Middle Ages was the introduction of a compulsory medical license: this law was first adopted by the King of Sicily, Roger II, and later captured by England, forming in the 15th century the Guild of Surgeons and Hairdressers (who often made bloodletting sick) and France with the College of Saint Como. Doctrines about infectious diseases and public health methods began to clearly emerge and form. Guy de Cholliac, a village surgeon of the 14th century, actively promoted the prevention of charlatans in treating people, proposed new methods for working with fractures (traction using a load, using a sling bandage, suturing the edges of open wounds).
In the Middle Ages, constant hunger and poor harvest were common, which forced people to eat spoiled food, while the “cult of a clean body” was in disfavor. These two factors contributed to the development of infectious diseases: fever, plague and smallpox, tuberculosis and leprosy. An unbreakable faith in the healing properties of the “holy relics” and witchcraft (while the knowledge of modern physicians was denied completely) provoked an even greater development of diseases that they tried to treat with processions and sermons. Mortality was several times higher than the birth rate, and life expectancy rarely exceeded thirty years.
The influence of religion on medicine
In China and India, belief in gods did not particularly interfere with the development of the medical business: progress was based on natural observations of a person, the influence of plants on his condition, and methods of active analytical experiments were popular. In European countries, on the contrary, superstition, fear of God's anger, cut short all the attempts of scientists and doctors to save people from ignorance.
Church persecution, curses, and campaigns against heresy were of enormous proportions: any scientist who tried to speak out in favor of reason and against the divine will for healing was subjected to cruel torture and various forms of execution (auto-da-fe was widespread) - to intimidate ordinary people. The study of human anatomy was considered the deadly sin for which the execution relied.
Also a huge minus was the scholastic method of treatment and teaching in rare medical schools: all theses had to be unconditionally taken on faith, sometimes without solid ground, and the steady denial of the experience gained and the inability to apply logic in practice brought to naught many of the achievements of geniuses modernity.
Where were doctors trained in ancient times?
The first medical schools in China appeared only in the 6th century AD, before that the art of healing was transmitted only from teacher to student in oral form. A state-level school first opened in 1027, and Wang Wei-i was its lead teacher.
In India, the method of oral transmission from teacher to student was maintained until the 18th century, while the selection criteria were extremely stringent: the healer had to be an example of a healthy lifestyle and a high level of intelligence, to know perfectly the biology and chemistry, to navigate perfectly in medicinal plants and methods of preparation of potions, to be an example to follow. Cleanliness and neatness came first.
In ancient Egypt, priests taught in medicine in temples, while corporal punishment was often used for negligent students. In parallel with medicine, calligraphy and rhetoric were taught, and each student healer belonged to a special caste and temple, which in the future received a fee for treating the patient.
Mass training in medicine unfolded on a large scale in Ancient Greece and was divided into two branches:
1. Croton Medical School. Her main idea was the following thesis: health is a balance of opposites, and the disease should be treated with the opposite in essence (bitter - sweet, cold - warm). One of the students of this school was Acmeon, who opened the auditory canal and optic nerves to the world.
2. Cnidian school. Her basic knowledge was similar to the teachings of Ayurveda: the physical body consists of several elements, the imbalance of which leads to illness. This school continued to improve the achievements of Egyptian doctors, so the doctrine of the symptoms of the disease and diagnosis was formed. Eurifon, a student of this school, was a contemporary of Hippocrates.
Doctor's Oath
The oath was first recorded on paper in the 3rd century BC by Hippocrates, and before that it was passed orally from generation to generation for quite some time. It is believed that Asclepius was the first to say it.
The modern oath of Hippocrates is already far from the original: her words changed many times depending on time and nationality, the last time she was greatly distorted in 1848, when a new version of the speech was announced in Geneva. Almost half of the text was cut out:
- about the promise to never have abortions and castration procedures;
- under no circumstances do euthanasia;
- the promise to never have an intimate relationship with the patient;
- under no circumstances to drop their dignity, refraining from illegal actions;
- give part of their income for life to the teacher or school that trained the doctor in medical matters.
From these points it is clear how modern medicine has lowered the moral and ethical bar of a doctor as a highly spiritual person, leaving only the basic functions of helping the suffering.