Medical History Archive
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History of spine surgery in the ancient and medieval worlds
Posted on May 20, 2012 | No CommentsFor purposes of an overview and to highlight changing trends in spine surgery, he divides the paper into four eras of medicine: 1) Egyptian and Babylonian; 2) Greek and early Byzantine; 3) Arabic; and 4) medieval. -
The discovery of the body: human dissection and its cultural contexts in ancient Greece
Posted on May 18, 2012 | No CommentsThis paper explores, first, the cultural factors - including traditional Greek attitudes to the corpse and to the skin, also as manifested in Greek sacred laws - that may have prevented systematic human dissection during almost all of Greek antiquity -
Jamasp, an Ancient Persian Pharmacist
Posted on May 14, 2012 | No CommentsJamasp, the great Persian scientist who lived about 500 BC, is introduced in this article. He was the minister of king Vishtasb and contemporary with Zoroaster. -
Dementia in the Greco-Roman world
Posted on May 7, 2012 | No CommentsSeveral classical sources – some of them medical– offer intriguing descriptions of many cognitive and behavioral symptoms in dementia, which are currently used for diagnostic purposes. -
Aztec medicine
Posted on April 22, 2012 | No CommentsThe Aztecs were the most powerful among Mexican nations at the time of Cortes's arrival, and after a long migration from the north, they had settled in Chapultepecon the shores of the Lake of Texcoco - around A.D. 1267. -
Holes in the head and more: surgery in the Aegean Bronze Age
Posted on March 16, 2012 | No CommentsThis work attempts to remove some of this speculation, and look at what we really know about one aspect of medicine in the Aegean Bronze Age, the practice of surgery, from the actual pathological, archaeological and textual evidence. -
The plague of Athens, 430-427 BC
Posted on March 15, 2012 | No CommentsOne of the earliest, and perhaps better known of the epidemics that struck the ancient world was the ‘Plague of Athens’. The first outbreak occurred in the city in the early summer of 430 BC, in the second year of the Peloponnesian War, and continued until it died out in 427 BC. -
Second oldest case of Prostate Cancer discovered in Egyptian mummy
Posted on February 2, 2012 | No CommentsWith the diagnosis of the first real case of prostate cancer in a mummy, researchers say the causes of cancer may be more genetic than was originally thought. -
Early history of wound treatment
Posted on January 22, 2012 | No CommentsThe first written records containing medical information date from about 2500 BC. Clay tablets from this time have been discovered in Mesopotamia and the first medical papyri from Egypt are probably some seven hundred years younger... -
Is consent in medicine a concept only of modern times?
Posted on January 18, 2012 | No CommentsAlthough the issue of consent in medical practice has grown immensely in recent years, and it is generally believed that historical cases are unknown, our research amongst original ancient Greek and Byzantine historical sources reveals that it is a very old subject which ancient philosophers and physicians have addressed.