Medical economy during the Middle Ages : a contribution to the history of European morals, from the time of the Roman Empire to the close of the fourteenth century / by George F. Fort.

  • Fort, George F. (George Franklin), 1843-1909.
Date:
1883
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Medical economy during the Middle Ages : a contribution to the history of European morals, from the time of the Roman Empire to the close of the fourteenth century / by George F. Fort. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    a most distinguished and enlightened professor of this avoca- tion about the year lOO. His eminent abiHties and cultured skill enabled him to practice the healing art at will through- out its entire scope, especially in its strictest pathological branches. Little is known of him beyond the gracious com- mendation of Galen, although it is claimed that he was ele- vated to the archiatria by Hadrian as a just recognition of transcendent talents.' Touching his erudition and quarrel- some nature the attestation of writers is unanimous, while the just commendation is as freely awarded of brilliancy and subtilty of genius, especially in the accuracy of his distinction between diverse physical pain and the careful analysis of pulse and fevers.'^ Such of these diagnoses as portray the varia- tions of pain, traced to its origin or seat, have escaped the dissipating effect of intermediate ages, and with slight modifi- cation are adopted as authority in the present day. Not less valuable were the services of this scholastic in the depart- ment of surgery. His descriptions of the solution of the members and limbs of the human frame are portrayed by the hand of a skilled master. As a sanitary precaution against poisoned wounds, he ap- plied the simplest specifics, and is claimed to have been the first who solved mineral waters into their chemical analyses, such for instance as soda, alum, sulphur, iron, copper, etc.'* A pustular malady, in its general characteristics exhibiting a close identity with the variole, was sketched out so early as the beginning of the second century by Herodotus, a disciple of Agathinus. From this description his writings have often- 69 Galeni De Composit. Medic, Lib. II., c. I. ™ Hieronym. Mercurialis, De Arte Gymnast, Lib. VII., c. 8. '1 Galen, De Composit. Medic, Lib. II., c. i. '2Und ist mit einigen modificationen in die heutige zeichenlehre iibergangen, Lessing, Geschichte der Medezin, Th. I., p. 94. ■f^Lessing, op. cit., Th. I., p. 95. 7* Galeni Medicamenta ad Sugillationes, Tom. XII., p. 808. Ibid. Tom. XIII., p. 167.