Ancient Greek and

Roman Medicine

By Aynan Muse

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Ancient Greek and Roman Medicine

Ancient Greek and Roman medicines of the ancient world were more advanced than pre-historic medicines, but not as advanced as modern day medicines. Nevertheless, it did help to improve the treatment of the ill during those times which did help to improve treatments in the future.

Hippocrates was by far the best physician in Ancient Greek. Although his teachings were wrong, he was the first to debate the ideas that the Greek Gods caused disease. Because of this, he was called the ‘father of medicine’. His first theory was the four humours. The four humours were: blood, yellow bile, black bile and phlegm. His ideas were that if one became ill, it was due to the imbalance of their humours meaning that he was the first to use logic and reasoning to explain the causes of diseases. He, and his followers, was also the first to describe certain diseases, such as lung disease, lung cancer, the clubbing of the fingers and heart disease. Also, he was the first documented chest surgeon and his findings are still respected today.

The Greek Galen, who later became Roman, was, quite literally, the greatest surgeon of all time; he was the first to prove that the body was controlled not only by the heart, but mostly by the brain due to nerves. He mostly is quite famous due to his development of Hippocrates’ theory the ‘four humours’. His new theory, which I had said before, was a development of the ‘four humours’ call the ‘Theory of the Opposites’. This theory states that once one of the humours is imbalanced, the best treatment was to have the opposite of that humours. One example is that if the phlegm humour was imbalanced, in simple terms – if you had a cold, you would need to have pepper to treat it. His teachings were carried on throughout the middle ages, due to the church as it was powerful. The role of the church in all this was that they stopped anyone from challenging his theories; one of the ways they stopped these debates was execution.  Because of this, no one dared to challenge Galen’s wrong teachings. One of mistakes he made was that the jaw bone consists of two bones and he was mistaken about the shape of the liver too.

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Hippocrates

Hippocrates was born around 420BC on the island of Kos and died in 377BC in Larissa. He was a very famous Greek Physician of Classical Greece and is considered one of most outstanding figures in medicine. He is sometimes referred to the father of medicine. He was given a prison sentence because his perspective of medicine was different from the whole of Greece. During his prison days, he wrote the book The Complicated Body which contains many things we believe to be true today.

He had two sons who were named Thessalus and Draco and he also had a son-in-law named Polybus. Galen, a later

physician, stated that Hippocrates successor was Polybus. Historians have said that each of his sons, Thessalus and Draco, had a son named Hippocrates.

Hippocrates is well-known for his theory of the four humours and his advancement of clinical medicine. The theory of the four humours is Hippocrates' most famous theory. Although it is now not used anymore, it is

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medically important. This theory was about how Hippocrates thought he could treat patients. The four humours were: Black bile (maybe vomit which contains blood), yellow bile (vomit), blood and phlegm. These four humours were often associated with the four seasons: Spring (blood), Summer (yellow bile), Autumn (black bile) and Winter (phlegm). They were also associated with the four elements: Air (blood and spring), Fire (yellow bile and summer), earth (black bile and autumn) and water (phlegm and winter).

Finally, Hippocrates made an oath. It was called the Hippocratic Oath. It was written in Greek. Also, it was part of the Hippocratic Corpus and historians are wondering if he wrote this corpus or not. The Hippocratic Oath was a document and historians believe that he did not write this document and that it was written after his death. This document is used very rarely today, but it have been an inspiration for similar oaths used by physicians today.

The judgement of this article is that Hippocrates is very important in the field of medicine. Although his theory of the four humours was incorrect, his mistake inspired people to learn more about the human body and may have helped improve people's understanding of medicine. So Hippocrates might really be the 'father of medicine'.

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Galen

Galen was born in 129AD and died 200AD. He was a Roman

(with Greek ethnicity) physician and surgeon. He

contributed greatly in fields of anatomy*, physiology*1 and pathology*2. Because he was the son of Aelius Nicon, a wealthy architect, Galen

received a comprehensive education, which would help him as a physician in his later life. He travelled far and wide, which helped him learn about many medical theories, before settling in Rome where he was a personal physician to several

emperors.

Galen throughout his life dissected animals to know how the body worked. He discovered that urine was produced in the kidneys, not the bladder which was common belief. Although he discovered many scientific breakthroughs within anatomy, his most important discovery was that arteries carried blood, but he did not discover circulation. Even though he made fantastic discoveries, he did make mistakes. For example he said that the jaw bone was made up of two bones, when actually it was made up of one bone. Another would be when he said that blood was created in the liver (when actually, it is not) and that blood was fuel which was burnt up for muscles.

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Hippocrates’ theory of the four humours helped Galen understand how the body worked (though he made some mistakes), but he knew that Hippocrates’ theory wouldn’t help make treatments for the ill. Due to this, Galen made his own theory called ‘Theory of Opposites’. This theory was a development of Hippocrates’ own theory. This theory was used for nearly 2000 years to treat the ill. One example of the theory was when, if you have a cold (too much phlegm), you should have something hot, like pepper. This would help to restore the body’s natural balance. This theory was wrong, but even if this theory was wrong, it helped physicians in the future to know how to actually treat patients.

The judgement of this person is that, even though he made many mistakes, he did help physicians and surgeons in the future learn how to actually treat patients. So Galen is definite one of the most important figures in medicine.

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*Anatomy is the study of the structure of animals

*1Physiology is the study of living thing’s bodily functions

*2Pathology is the study of the causes and effects of diseases.

Picture does not belong to Aynan Muse

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