Arabian Medicine by Edward G. Browne; Thomas Adams'sReview by: D. B. MacdonaldIsis, Vol. 4, No. 2 (Oct., 1921), pp. 349-350Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/224263 .

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the most noteworthy advance of MIELI'S work over any other study of Greek science which has yet been attempted. Whether it will be possible for one individual to continue such comprehensive studies of scientific ideas to the end of the eighteenth century with anything approaching the thoroughness and scholarship of this volume is highly problematical. The mass of literary material becomes too enormous to be encompassed within an ordinary lifetime.

The bibliography, making no pretence of completeness, nevertheless presents, in brief characterizations of a large number of works, mate- rial which is of great value to any student of Greek thought and achievement in relation to the general history of science.

The further volumes of this undertaking, two of which are said to be nearly ready for the press, are anticipated with the expectation that they also will mark, as this volume does, definite advancement in the serious study of the intellectual history of man.

(University of Michigan.) Louis C. KARPINSKI.

Arabian Medicine, being the FITZPATRICK Lectures delivered at the College of Physicians in November 1919 and November 1920, by EDWARD G. :BROWNE, M. B., F. R. C. P., Sir THOMAS ADAMS'S pro- fessor of Arabic in the University of Cambridge, vIII - 138 p., Cam- bridge, at the University Press, 1921.

In this most interesting and valuable book almost the only thing to which serious exception can be taken is the title. That can only help to perpetuate the unhappy delusion, far too common in our encyclo- pedias and books of reference, that the Mohammedan civilization was racially and geographically Arabian; while it may be asserted most absolutely that there never existed any such things, in a scientific sense, as an Arabian philosophy, an Arabian art, an Arabian science or, as in this case, an Arabian medicine. These sprang up in the Mohammedan civilization, but were the contributions of other races and countries and were connected with Arabia only by being written in a form of the Arabic language. They were no more Arabian than the works, though written in Latin, of a ninth century Irish monk in Ireland were Roman. It is true that Professor BROWNE knows this and explains it most carefully in the opening pages of his book. But the mischief of popular miscomprehension has already been done; and the title of a book goes much farther than the book itself.

A complete history of Moslem medicine is, of course, impossible in these 126 pages of text. We have only a sketch; but such headings as (( evolution of scientific terminology in Arabic )), ( psychothera-

the most noteworthy advance of MIELI'S work over any other study of Greek science which has yet been attempted. Whether it will be possible for one individual to continue such comprehensive studies of scientific ideas to the end of the eighteenth century with anything approaching the thoroughness and scholarship of this volume is highly problematical. The mass of literary material becomes too enormous to be encompassed within an ordinary lifetime.

The bibliography, making no pretence of completeness, nevertheless presents, in brief characterizations of a large number of works, mate- rial which is of great value to any student of Greek thought and achievement in relation to the general history of science.

The further volumes of this undertaking, two of which are said to be nearly ready for the press, are anticipated with the expectation that they also will mark, as this volume does, definite advancement in the serious study of the intellectual history of man.

(University of Michigan.) Louis C. KARPINSKI.

Arabian Medicine, being the FITZPATRICK Lectures delivered at the College of Physicians in November 1919 and November 1920, by EDWARD G. :BROWNE, M. B., F. R. C. P., Sir THOMAS ADAMS'S pro- fessor of Arabic in the University of Cambridge, vIII - 138 p., Cam- bridge, at the University Press, 1921.

In this most interesting and valuable book almost the only thing to which serious exception can be taken is the title. That can only help to perpetuate the unhappy delusion, far too common in our encyclo- pedias and books of reference, that the Mohammedan civilization was racially and geographically Arabian; while it may be asserted most absolutely that there never existed any such things, in a scientific sense, as an Arabian philosophy, an Arabian art, an Arabian science or, as in this case, an Arabian medicine. These sprang up in the Mohammedan civilization, but were the contributions of other races and countries and were connected with Arabia only by being written in a form of the Arabic language. They were no more Arabian than the works, though written in Latin, of a ninth century Irish monk in Ireland were Roman. It is true that Professor BROWNE knows this and explains it most carefully in the opening pages of his book. But the mischief of popular miscomprehension has already been done; and the title of a book goes much farther than the book itself.

A complete history of Moslem medicine is, of course, impossible in these 126 pages of text. We have only a sketch; but such headings as (( evolution of scientific terminology in Arabic )), ( psychothera-

REVIEWS REVIEWS 349 349

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peusis ), (( School of Toledo ), ( dissection in Moslem lands )), ( Moslem hospitals ), ( fees of physicians n, u dropsy cured by a diet of locusts )), (( early tradition of anaesthesia ), will show how high is its interest. Prof. BROWNE rightly believes in anecdotes and has accumulated a number of striking (( clinical cases)) from Arabic and Persian records. Even the Arabian Nights in the Tale of TAWADDUD is drawn in. Of the physicians whose lives and methods are described AVICENNA we all know, but RAZI, a far greater name, will probably be new to non- orientalists, in spite of the several European editions of his masterly study of small-pox and measles. When, in next year's FITZPATRICK

lectures, Prof. BROWNE treats in detail, as he promises, the (( Qanun)) of AVICENNA it might be well, for the general mise en scene of his subject, to deal specifically with two matters: the relation of the phy- sician to the physicist and the relation of both to the magician. For these AVICENNA, who had in him a dash of the systematizer and also of the charlatan, is an excellent starting point. Professor BROWNE, of course, knows the popular romances in Turkish and Arabic - prob. ably, too, in Persian - of the life of AVICENNA, the magician. If he will compare these with the medieval European lives of VIRGILIUS the magician, he will notice how closely they agree in incidents and that there can be little or no doubt of a close relationship. Other sides of Mohammedan medicine which invite further study are hypno. tism, evidently referred to as ilm at-tawahhum in the (c Fihrist ))

(p. 309, 1. 12, p. 312, 1. 25) and the kutub al-bah, the Moslem equiv- alent for our (( self and sex)) books. It would be highly interesting to know how professed physicians formally dealt with such subjects. To the first Prof. BROWNE makes general reference as (( psychothera- peusis )) (p. 82 ff.) and (c suggestion )) (p. 90); but there was evidently a specific and at least semi-scientific literature, derived allegedly from India. Does hypnotism, it may be worth while to ask, appear in Greek medicine ? There are some little details which might be consid- ered in a future edition. IBN KHALDUN (p, 7) was almost certainly a Berber, not an Arab; to call the body of traditions of the sayings and doings of MOHAMMED ( carefully authenticated ) (p. 12) suggests at least that they are trustworthy - of course they are not; it is a grave misunderstanding of the development of Moslem thought to describe the Mu'tazila school of theology as (( more liberal ) (p. 5), although HORTEN uses the term regularly; see, to the contrary, GOLDZIHER'S ( Vorlesungen ), p. 117; read ABU' I-HASAN (p. 31 foot), in spite of PAYNE and BURTON, and IBN BATTUTA (p. 101).

There is an admirable 12 page index.

D. B. MACDONALD.

350 ISIS. IV. 1922

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