The book, Fasciculus Medicinae, was a guide to all things medical, including treating wounds and diagnosing complications in pregnant women. Now, thanks to an online exhibition from the New York Academy of Medicine, you can delve into its sometimes bizarre take on medicine at a critical moment for the profession.
' takes readers on a tour of one of medicine's most influential texts. It was first printed in 1491 by a pair of Venetian brothers who brought together a group of medical treatises and added illustrations. Over the next century, the book was reprinted and embellished, and the exhibition shows the evolution of medical knowledge that occurred as medicine morphed from medieval understandings of the body to a more enlightened Renaissance perspective. (The New York Academy of Medicine) Perhaps the most fascinating part of the book is its illustrations. There's the Zodiac Man, a male figure whose body is split up into sun signs and instructions on how to let blood depending on the time of year.
There's Wound Man, an illustration of a down-on-his-luck person with life-threatening wounds from such weapons as arrows and clubs. Disease Man offers insight into the kinds of illnesses a doctor would have diagnosed and treated.
(The New York Academy of Medicine) Whether you want to learn how doctors would have tasted the urine of diseased patients or to compare how the book developed over the years, the exhibit is packed with visuals and text that show just how influential Fasciculus Medicinae became. Case in point: It contained the first printed scene of human dissection, an image that transformed the way physicians thought about the body. Entertaining, insightful and often disgusting, the exhibition is a chance to reflect on just how far medicine has come - and how differently the people of the past viewed anatomy and disease. 2017 © The Washington Post This article was originally published.
Doctor In 16's Century
16th Century Medicine The Ottomans Order Ironfire now at: or locally through: On Sale Jan 6, 2004 A Delacorte Book Bantam Dell A Division of Random House, Inc. ISBN 0-385-33601-2 $ 24.95 under the title The Sword and the Scimitar Hutchinson A Division of Random House UK ISBN: £18.99 under the title Asha: Sohn von Malta Schneekluth ISBN: EUR 22,90 The Medicine of Ironfire 'Plague derives from man’s iniquity and is the means by which the Lord punishes idolatry and the profanation of His gospel. The principal antidote against the plague is conversion.' Though it was the age of reason, such ideas were far from extinct. Medical schools still taught the Canon of Medicine by Avicenna, a Persian doctor who had been dead for four hundred years, and the works of Galen, a Greek physician whose views had been the standard for more than a thousand. H uman health was believed to require an equilibrium between the four main bodily fluids, or humors - blood, yellow bile, black bile, and phlegm.
Each humor was built up from the four elements and displayed two of the four primary qualities: hot, cold, wet, and dry. Doctors were reluctant to trust their own direct observations whenever they conflicted with ancient wisdom. Out of religious concern for the sanctity of the human body, dissections were still chiefly restricted to animals, and strict laws prohibited the practice. Dogs and pigs provided most of the raw material for study.
By the mid 16th century, medical faculties were reluctantly beginning to adopt the study of corpses, mostly those of executed criminals. There were never enough, and bright medical students, undeterred by fear of punishment, often took matters into their own hands. By night those who could not afford the services of grave-robbers wielded a shovel themselves, digging up fresh corpses for clandestine study. Excreta Most physicians rarely deigned to touch a patient, save for taking a pulse or checking a fever, relying instead upon the examination of excreta in order to render a diagnosis and prescribe treatment. Samples were probed for consistency, odor, and shade.
Urine was swirled, sniffed, and held up to the light. An accomplished physician could identify more than a score of different colors and densities, and describe the significance of each. There were five shades of yellow, four of red, and five of green (from pistachio to rainbow to verdigris to emerald to leek). There were two shades near black; one translucent; and another the white of milk or parchment, each shade carrying a specific implication.
There were infinite subtleties. Urine might smell fetid, sweet, or putrid, and display variations due to sex, age, and mental state.
The liquid might be oleaginous, or ruddy, or resemble raw meat washings. It might remind one of poor wine or chick-pea water. It might be thick or thin, turbid or clear, musty or semen-like. Even the sediment could be broken into ten distinct types, from flaky to fleshy to mucoid. To the seasoned eye and nose, such nuances might indicate dispersion of vitality, the presence of an atrabilious humour, deficient digestive power, or—when white or slightly reddish—even herald the advent of dropsy.
Humors and Vapors Doctors consulted not only medical texts but also books on astrology and numbers-and, of course, the Bible. Hippocrates’ Epidemics was essential in interpreting the length of time between significant stages of disease, which could help predict the outcome. A physician would carefully calculate where in the “medical month” (precisely twenty-six days and twenty-two hours) a patient’s symptoms and subsequent fevers or other crises had occurred. Every effort would be dedicated to striking the proper balance between the all-important humors—hot and dry, cold and moist—that kept the body well, or, when out of balance, made it ill.
After making a diagnosis, the doctor would prescribe medication, diet, or surgery. Patients were cautioned not to eat fruit after salad, the mixture of which could overload one’s humours with deadly results.
Strenuous sex must be avoided, for it might induce seizures. Apothecaries prepared purgatives for syphilis, emetics for poison, and tinctures of lead and mercury to cure the vapors, those exhalations of the liver and stomach that produced hysteria and depression. Anesthesia Anesthesia was primitive and most often not used at all.
A surgeon's ability was measured by the time he took to operate. A patient's hands and feet were bound to the table while amputations or other procedures were performed. Various methods were tried. The hammer stroke involved encasing the patient’s head in a leather helmet that guided the surgeon as he delivered a solid blow to the skull with a wooden hammer, rendering the patient either unconscious or dead. Narcotic sponges were soaked in mandrake and belladonna and pressed over the mouth of the patient, who sucked the solution and either fell into a deep sleep or died. Shock and sepsis killed most of those who survived the blade. Treatments Dried ground boar penis could cure pleurisy, while pigeon dung was helpful for eye irritations.
Grease was applied to burns, and verbena was prescribed for the bite of a rabid dog. Blood-letting was the most common treatment for alleviating symptoms of disease and for releasing malignant humors. One palette of blood—precisely three ounces—was let for pleurisy, and was drawn from the elbow of the arm opposite the affected side.
Two to four palettes were drawn from the chest to cure peripneumonia. The basilic vein was bled for difficulties of the liver or spleen, while the temporal vein was tapped for melancholy or migraine. Every malady had its vein, and every vein its malady. Wounds were cleaned and washed with salted water as a first aid measure. Splinting and traction were employed in the treatment of fractures. Broken skull bones were treated by elevation of the depressed fragments, while trephining was resorted to when necessary. Wounds involving soft tissues were sutured & severed blood vessels were ligatured as the tying up of bleeding arteries & veins had begun to replace the cautery as haemostatic.
The wound was then dressed with tow or wool. In injuries of the mouth which rendered the intake of food difficult or impossible, nourishment administered by means of nutrient enemas. ( From The Medical History of Malta, Paul Cassar, 1964) The innovators Paracelsus, a Protestant, wanted to build a new science of medicine on the study of nature. He insisted—radically—that physicians should rely on their eyes and ears rather than the words of the ancients, an idea which did not find great favor. He justified the use of a wide variety of folk cures (scorned, at least in theory, by many physicians) Andreas Vesalius (1514 -1564), a battlefield surgeon, supervised artists (including Titian) who drew more accurate illustrations based upon direct observation: a blasphemy that was not easily forgiven by the Church.
Ambroise Pare (1510-90), was self-taught, serving as an army surgeon and surgeon to the king. He devised new surgical instruments, introduced the use of artificial limbs and eyes, suspected flies of carrying disease, and even attempted the implantation of artificial teeth. Station playlist keygen for mac mac. His most important contribution was the development of successful techniques for battlefield amputations. He reintroduced the old Roman practice of employing ligature prior to amputation, which greatly reduced bleeding and shock. He abandoned the brutal technique of plunging the limb into boiling elder oil mixed with treacle. Having run out of oil on one occasion, he treated the raw limb with a mixture of egg yolk, oil of roses, and turpentine.
The results were remarkable. He tried similar poultices on gunshot wounds, and noticed a reduction in infection. From this he reached the radical conclusion that gunshot wounds were not by themselves poisonous, theorizing that somehow infection was introduced into the wound from outside. He used wine as an antiseptic, and taught the repeated debridement of wounds.
His use of adhesive bandages also promoted healing. Pare's ideas, though demonstrably effective, did not take hold in a medical culture afraid of change. The practice of treating traumatic amputation with cautery and boiling oil survived another 300 years.
Though a man of science, Pare believed in witches and devils, and of course in the miraculous cures of God, whom he never failed to credit for his successes. Assorted medical wisdom of the 16th century:. God implanted the soul in the embryo forty days after conception. The soul controlled growth and nutrition, sensation and motion, and all rational activity. The liver created blood, which was used by the brain to create invisible nervous spirits which flowed through the nervous system and were vectors of sensation and motion. Women were nothing more than imperfect versions of men.
Individuals were either sanguine (hot and moist), choleric (hot and dry), phlegmatic (cold and moist) or melancholic (cold and dry) according to their predominant temperaments. Disease struck when one or more parts of the body became disturbed by an external cause. According to Hippocratic tradition, there were six non-naturals, whose good or bad management maintained the body in a state of health or provoked disease. These were air, food, and drink, exercise (including sex) and rest, sleep and wakefulness, bodily evacuations, and the passions of the soul. Gluttony, over-exercise, anger, and sexual athleticism were the sure harbingers of disease. Hunting to excess could raise the body’s temperature, overheat the heart, and launch a fever. Diagnoses could be made from the nature of excrement, and tint of skin.
A lemon-yellow color suggested a blockage of the liver; a brown complexion an obstruction of the spleen; a black tongue, an ardent fever; hooked nails, phthisis, red cheeks, peripneumonia.from The Medical World of Early Modern France Laurence Brockliss & Colin Jones. Oxford, 1997.
Shakespeare, self proclaimed poet and renowned playwright, lived in the age of the Renaissance. More specifically, the time at which the Tudor family ruled England, during these times, there were deep-rooted religious cleansings and ongoing witch hunts, that sought out anyone and everyone that did not follow suit. Shakespeare (1564-1616A.D.) was born in, and lived through the medical renaissance, which was the point between 1400 and 1700A.D. That innovated the medicines used in Europe. These treatments were eventually diffused throughout the world. The most typical consensus made by medical technicians of the time believed in the body to be maintained up by a balance of bodily humors (liquids), though during the mid 1500s new methods of treatment were introduced through experimentation, however, despite these advances made by the more wealthy, the more destitute population continued to receive traditional treatment.
During the Elizabethan age, it was widely conceded that a person’s temperament was decided by the state of their humors, which were sanguine, choler, phlegmatic, and melancholic. This belief in humors originates in the ancient Greek’s beliefs and medical foundations which were reinforced by philosophers Plato, Aristotle and Socrates among others.
Each of these humors also relates to a substance from the body and a corresponding element, blood and air, yellow bile and fire, phlegm and water, black bile and earth respectively. Furthermore, these substances and humors responded to specific environments related to them. In short, the entire process breaks down as this: sanguine manifested itself in blood and the element of air and is maintained by hot and moist conditions.
Choler was identified with yellow bile and the e. Middle of paper.chaucer/coursematerials/humours.html. Mowrey, Daniel B. The Scientific Validation of Herbal Medicine.
New Canaan, CT: Keats Pub., 1986. 767: Medicine in New France.' University of Houston. Penrose, Jane. An Encyclopedia of Tudor Medicine: big Book.
Oxford: Heinemann Educational, 1998. '16th Century Medicine.' A World History Encyclopedia. 'Temperament A Brief Survey, with Modern Applications' Temperament: A Brief Survey, with Modern Applications.
'Tudor Medicine.' History Learning Site. 'Tudor Medicine.'
Herbal Remedies in FDA Limbo Thesis: There needs to be regulation of herbal remedies and dietary supplements from an outside source that is not interested in the monetary benefits from the herbal market. Although herbal remedies and dietary supplements can be beneficial to many Americans, the United States needs to implement an administration to analyze, research, and regulate what herbs are in supplements, and their acceptable uses. Introduction: Herbal supplements and herbal treatments are nothing new to people looking for a way to enhance their diets or to those trying to find an alternative to traditional drugs. tags: Diet Dietary Essays Strong Essays 2558 words (7.3 pages). Herbal Remedies VS. Modern Medicine When you are sick you take medicine, but there are many remedies for the same problems. The use of herbal remedies traces back to the Chinese in the use of Traditional Chinese Medicine, as well by a compiled book in China written back more than 2,000 years ago (Wachtel-Galor & Benzie, 2011).
Modern medicine has roots that are more recent in the development and production of synthesize drugs (Wachtel-Galor & Benzie, 2011). The old generations took herbal remedies to improve their health, but now as time and people, progressed modern medicine comes on top.
tags: Alternative medicine, Medicine, Herbalism Strong Essays 774 words (2.2 pages). Aim: This project aims on the analysis of herbal remedies used for weight loss, to detect the presence of adulterants.
Our main focus is to detect the presences of Caffeine, Ephedrine or pseudoephedrine and lastly sibutramine. Methodology: Random samples of herbal remedies used for weight loss were collected from several herbal stores known as Al’Ataar markets. After preparing the herbal samples (extractions), we have analyzed each sample for Caffeine, Ephedrine and sibutramine by ‘High Performance Liquid Chromatography with UV detector (HPLC). tags: ephedrine, sibutramine, adulteration Strong Essays 929 words (2.7 pages).
Herbal and natural medicine is becoming increasingly popular in 21st century culture. It may be surprising to some that many of these herbal treatments and medicines have been around for centuries and are the basis for both commercially prepared medications, as well as the chemical manufacture of new pharmaceutical compounds (Phaneuf, 2005).
One of these compounds, which has influenced chemistry and medicine for centuries is willow bark, which contains the chemical salicin (Boon, 2009). Its origins and discovery, as well as the historical culture, have influenced its incorporation as the common pharmaceutical preparation known as aspirin. tags: herbal treatment, hippocrates, surgery Strong Essays 1067 words (3 pages). With the significant increase of Americans using herbal supplements over the past years, the regulations of these products has become more vital. While new information has been discovered on many of these herbal supplements, their nutrition labels and regulations have not significantly changed since the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) became law in 1994.
Over half of our population reportedly consumes herbal supplements on a regular basis (Burton). It is necessary that our nation, and the rest of the world, have up-to-date information on these products and their effects. tags: herbal products, dietary supplements, dshea Strong Essays 1354 words (3.9 pages). Vagrancy in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century England Throughout the work An Account of the Travels, Sufferings and Persecutions of Barbara Blaugdone, there is a common occurrence of imprisonment. Wherever Blaugdone traveled, she seemed to come across some confrontation with the law. This should not be surprising, for in the time period when this work was written many laws, statutes, and acts had been established to thwart the spreading of unpopular Quaker views. Many acts were established primarily to prevent the ministry of Quakerism; however universal laws, especially those to prevent vagrancy, were also used against traveling Quakers.
tags: British History 16th 17th Free Essays 727 words (2.1 pages). The lifestyle in France, just like in all other European countries, has changed dramatically since the early 1700’s. People went from farmers to factory owners to all of the professions of today’s society.
The main reason for the great changes in lifestyle that occurred in France was the Industrial Revolution, which urbanized most of France. But the Industrial Revolution was not the only thing that changed France. The monarchy fell the church changed, and the role people had in their jobs and family life change drastically.
tags: French History Essays Strong Essays 1063 words (3 pages). Literary Works in Sixteenth-Century England Literary works in sixteenth-century England were rarely if ever created in isolation from other currents in the social and cultural world. The boundaries that divided the texts we now regard as aesthetic from other texts that participated in the spectacles of power or the murderous conflicts of rival religious factions or the rhetorical strategies of erotic and political courtship were porous and constantly shifting. It is perfectly acceptable, of course, for the purposes of reading to redraw these boundaries more decisively, treating Renaissance texts as if they were islands of the autonomous literary imagination. tags: Papers Strong Essays 1997 words (5.7 pages). Alternative medicine has been around for centuries, although it has just started to become very popular in countries such as The United States. Many people now are following the trend without knowing anything about alternative medicine.
People should be aware of the benefits as well as the precautions involved in taking these natural remedies. The most common form of alternative medicine nowadays is herbal medicines. These natural remedies can be found in millions of American homes today. Herbal medicine is probably the most widely used of the alternative medicines.
tags: essays research papers fc Strong Essays 1581 words (4.5 pages). Herbal medicine is the extraction of herbs or plants which have a medicinal value in treating illnesses and diseases (Brody 1).
A herb is known as a plant that does not have a woody stem and usually dies back at the end of each growing season. It is also known as a 'natural' drug because they are derived from nature. This is unlike pharmaceutical drugs, which are synthesized from chemicals. Herbal medicine dates back a very long time. More than 4,000 years ago, the Chinese emperor Qien Nong put a book together, or a herbal, of different medicinal plants (O’ Sullivan 2). tags: essays research papers Strong Essays 1260 words (3.6 pages).
Comments are closed.
|
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |