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Title: Old-Time Makers of Medicine

The Story of The Students And Teachers of the Sciences

Related to Medicine During the Middle Ages

Author: James J. Walsh

Release Date: December 30, 2006 [EBook #20216]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

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Old-Time

Makers of Medicine

THE STORY OF THE STUDENTS AND TEACHERS

OF THE SCIENCES RELATED TO MEDICINE

DURING THE MIDDLE AGES

James J. Walsh, K.C.St.G., M.D.

Ph.D., LL.D., Litt.D., Sc.D.

DEAN AND PROFESSOR OF NERVOUS DISEASES AND OF THE HISTORY OF

MEDICINE AT

FORDHAM UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE; PROFESSOR OF

PHYSIOLOGICAL

PSYCHOLOGY AT THE CATHEDRAL COLLEGE, NEW YORK

NEW YORK

FORDHAM UNIVERSITY PRESS

1911

JAMES J. WALSH

THE QUINN & GODEN CO. PRESS

RAHWAY, N. J.

REVEREND DANIEL J. QUINN, S.J.

The historical material here presented was gathered for my classes at Fordham University

School of Medicine during your term as president of the University. It seems only fitting then,

that when put into more permanent form it should appear under the patronage of your name

and tell of my cordial appreciation of more than a quarter of a century of valued friendship.

"When we have thoroughly mastered contemporary science it is time to turn to past science;

nothing fortifies the judgment more than this comparative study; impartiality of mind is

developed thereby, the uncertainties of any system become manifest. The authority of facts is

there confirmed, and we discover in the whole picture a philosophic teaching which is in itself

a lesson; in other words, we learn to know, to understand, and to judge."—Littré: Œuvres

d'Hippocrate , T. I, p. 477.

"There is not a single development, even the most advanced of contemporary medicine, which

is not to be found in embryo in the medicine of the olden time."—Littré: Introduction to the

Works of Hippocrates.

"How true it is that in reading this history one finds modern discoveries that are anything but

discoveries, unless one supposes that they have been made twice."—Dujardin: Histoire de la

Chirurgie , Paris, 1774 (quoted by Gurlt on the post title-page of his Geschichte der Chirurgie ,

Berlin, 1898).

[Pg v]

PREFACE

The material for this book was gathered partly for lectures on the history of medicine at

Fordham University School of Medicine, and partly for articles on a number of subjects in the

Catholic Encyclopedia. Some of it was developed for a series of addresses at commencements

of medical schools and before medical societies, on the general topic how old the new is in

surgery, medicine, dentistry, and pharmacy. The information thus presented aroused so much

interest, the accomplishments of the physicians and surgeons of a period that is usually

thought quite sterile in medical science proved, indeed, so astonishing, that I was tempted to

connect the details for a volume in the Fordham University Press series. There is no pretence

to any original investigation in the history of medicine, nor to any extended consultation of

original documents. I have had most of the great books that are mentioned in the course of

this volume in my hands, and have given as much time to the study of them as could be

afforded in the midst of a rather busy life, but I owe my information mainly to the

distinguished German and French scholars who have in recent years made deep and serious

studies of these Old Makers of Medicine, and I have made my acknowledgments to them in

the text as opportunity presented itself.

There is just one feature of the book that may [Pg vi]commend it to present-day readers, and

that is that our medieval medical colleagues, when medicine embraced most of science, faced

the problems of medicine and surgery and the allied sciences that are now interesting us, in

very much the same temper of mind as we do, and very often anticipated our solutions of

them—much oftener, indeed, than most of us, unless we have paid special attention to history,

have any idea of. The volume does not constitute, then, a contribution to that theme that has

interested the last few generations so much,—the supposed continuous progress of the race

and its marvellous advance,—but rather emphasizes that puzzling question, how is it that men

make important discoveries and inventions, and then, after a time, forget about them so that

they have to be made over again? This is as true in medical science and in medical practice as

in every other department of human effort. It does not seem possible that mankind should ever

lose sight of the progress in medicine and surgery that has been made in recent years, yet the

history of the past would seem to indicate that, in spite of its unlikelihood, it might well come

about. Whether this is the lesson of the book or not, I shall leave readers to judge, for it was

not intentionally put into it.

OUR LADY'S DAY IN HARVEST, 1911.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

PAGE

Introduction

II.

Great Physicians in Early Christian Times

III.

Great Jewish Physicians

IV.

Maimonides

Great Arabian Physicians

109

VI.

The Medical School at Salerno

141

VII.

Constantine Africanus

163

VIII.

Medieval Women Physicians

177

IX.

Mondino and the Medical School of Bologna

202

Great Surgeons of the Medieval Universities

234

XI.

Guy de Chauliac

282

XII.

Medieval Dentistry—Giovanni of Arcoli

313

XIII.

Cusanus and the First Suggestion of Laboratory Methods in Medicine 336

XIV.

Basil Valentine, Last of the Alchemists, First of the Chemists

349

APPENDICES

St. Luke the Physician

381

II.

Science at the Medieval Universities

400

III.

Medieval Popularization of Science

427

"Of making many books there is no end."— Eccles. xii, 12 (circa 1000 b.c.).

"The little by-play between Socrates and Euthydemus suggests an advanced condition of

medical literature: 'Of course, you who have so many books are going in for being a doctor,'

says Socrates, and then he adds, 'there are so many books on medicine, you know.' As Dyer

remarks, whatever the quality of these books may have been, their number must have been

great to give point to this chaff."— Aequanimitas , William Osler, M.D., F.R.S., Blakistons,

Philadelphia, 1906.

"Augescunt aliae gentes, aliae minuuntur;

Inque brevi spatio mutantur saecla animantum,

Et, quasi cursores vitai lampada tradunt."

—OVID.

One nation rises to supreme power in the world, while another declines, and, in a brief space

of time, the sovereign people change, transmitting, like racers, the lamp of life to some other

that is to succeed them.

"There is one Science of Medicine which is concerned with the inspection of health equally in

all times, present, past and future."

—PLATO.

[Pg 1]

INTRODUCTION

Under the term Old-Time Medicine most people probably think at once of Greek medicine,

since that developed in what we have called ancient history, and is farthest away from us in

date. As a matter of fact, however, much more is known about Greek medical writers than

those of any other period except the last century or two. Our histories of medicine discuss

Greek medicine at considerable length and practically all of the great makers of medicine in

subsequent generations have been influenced by the Greeks. Greek physicians whose works

have come down to us seem nearer to us than the medical writers of any but the last few

centuries. As a consequence we know and appreciate very well as a rule how much Greek

medicine accomplished, but in our admiration for the diligent observation and breadth of view

of the Greeks, we are sometimes prone to think that most of the intervening generations down

to comparatively recent times made very little progress and, indeed, scarcely retained what the

Greeks had done. The Romans certainly justify this assumption of non-accomplishment in

medicine, but then in everything intellectual Rome was never much better than a weak copy

of Greek thought. In science the Romans did nothing at all worth while talking about. All

their medicine they borrowed [Pg 2]from the Greeks, adding nothing of their own. What food

for thought there is in the fact, that in spite of all Rome's material greatness and wide empire,

her world dominance and vaunted prosperity, we have not a single great original scientific

thought from a Roman.

Though so much nearer in time medieval medicine seems much farther away from us than is

Greek medicine. Most of us are quite sure that the impression of distance is due to its almost

total lack of significance. It is with the idea of showing that the medieval generations, as far as

was possible in their conditions, not only preserved the old Greek medicine for us in spite of

the most untoward circumstances, but also tried to do whatever they could for its

development, and actually did much more than is usually thought, that this story of "Old-Time

Makers of Medicine" is written. It represents a period—that of the Middle Ages—that is, or

was until recently, probably more misunderstood than any other in human history. The

purpose of the book is to show at least the important headlands that lie along the stream of

medical thought during the somewhat more than a thousand years from the fall of the Roman

Empire under Augustulus (476) until the discovery of America. After that comes modern

medicine, for with the sixteenth century the names and achievements of the workers in

medicine are familiar—Paracelsus, Vesalius, Columbus, Servetus, Cæsalpinus, Eustachius,

Varolius, Sylvius are men whose names are attached to great discoveries with which even

those who are without any pretence to knowledge of medical history are [Pg 3]not

unacquainted. In spite of nearly four centuries of distance in time these men seem very close

to us. Their lives will be reserved for a subsequent volume, "Our Forefathers in Medicine."

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