Greek Medicine Compared To The Medicine Of Previou

537 Words3 Pages
The Greeks had two forms of medicine, supernatural and natural. These areas are both very different. The supernatural side relied on the healing of aliments by the grace of god (specifically the god of healing – Asclepios). His temples we built for his worship and provided a place to take the sick. Here the patient was sent through a set of processes designed to cure the disease or illness. They thought that diseases were caused by a higher power, such as spirits entering the body. This is clearly a development. This is typical of mankind; anything with an indefinite cause was blamed upon a spirit or God, such as the creation in the Bible. Even in prehistoric times people put everything down to spirit ancestors, who created everything. The Aborigines treated anything without an obvious cause was blamed on spirits (epilepsy, heart attack) and hence a spiritual cure was the only thing that seemed sensible, like the Greek supernatural medicine. Nevertheless, these people didn’t have written language like the Greeks, Egyptians also believed in the presence of spirits in the body of you had an illness. However, in spite of them having a written language to store medical records they combined the two medicines into one, where the magical cures were given alongside herbal remedies and drugs (made from minerals, herbs, and animal parts). This is different from the Greek approach, which had two distinct areas of expertise. The natural side led by the “philosophers” of the day and age. They had one main theory, the four humours. They were convinced that illness was caused by an imbalance in these four humours (blood, black bile, yellow bile and phlegm). This branch of Greek medicine was thought by Aristotle who collected his ideas and compiled them into a clear statement of the cause and treatment of disease. Most of these Greek thinkers (primarily Hippocratic theorists)

More about Greek Medicine Compared To The Medicine Of Previou

Open Document