Antall József szerk.: Pictures from the Past of the Healing Arts / Orvostörténeti Közlemények – Supplementum 5. (Budapest, 1972)

Pictures from the Past of the Healing Arts (Guide for the Exhibition)

PICTURES FROM THE PAST OF THE HEALING ARTS (GUIDE FOR THE EXHIBITION) I. MEDICINE IN THE ANTIQUITY AND MIDDLE AGES M

edicine is almost as old as man himself. His instincts, necessity, and experience taught man the art of healing. The objects and other illustrating material in the first part of the exhibition ranging from the Neolithic Age to the Late Middle Ages - with such outstanding peaks as the the eight medical papyri in Egypt, Hippocrates and the Classical Greak School, the great physicians of the Roman Empire, Arabian medicine - represent the development of medicine. From primeval primitive curing imbued with superstitions and the fear of the unknown forces of nature, through the medicine of the ancient Orient making already use of the observation of nature we come to rationalistic Hippocratic medicine suggesting already a classification for the symptoms of the diseases. The knowledge of the Greek physicians was further developed by the medical men of the Roman Empire, especially in the field of practical surgery. After the decline of the Byzantine medical philosophy insisting on its strict schemes, the Hellenistic scientific results were reawakened and preserved for the Middle Ages and even for the Modern Age by the prominent humanistic culture of Islam. J. Prehistoric and Primitive Medicine The characteristic feature of primeval primitive curing was that the practice of healing was based on superstitions, misbeliefs and mystical theories, since the real causes of disease could not be explained. Within the limits of their knowledge, however, they made good use of their rudimentary instruments. By collecting drug plants they introduced a practice surviving even to-day. The earliest exhibits of the museum (Fig. i.) are an idol from the Neolithic period, the representation of a cultic progenitrix and a symbol of fertility (Fig. 2.). The trephined skull of a woman from the period of the Conquest of Hun-