Pictures from the Past of the Healing Arts / Orvostörténeti Közlemények – Supplementum 18-19. (Budapest, 2000)
Pictures from the Past of the Healing Arts - Guide to the Exhibition
The cilice or penitence belt of St. Marguerite of Antiochcia (No.ll) is a copy. The original one is in the collection of the Treasury of the Esztergom Cathedral. It was used by the Clarissa nuns of Pozsony (today Bratislava, capital of Slovakia) on a similar purpose. In order to help the parturient the belt was placed on her waist. Europe's population was frequently decimated by epidemics during the Middle Ages. Leprosy, plague, (haemorrhagic ) smallpox and ergotism were the most regular ones. The sick were usually expelled from the rest of society, and there were the religious orders which tried to organize their care. You can see a roll (No.6) above the skull, which was issued in 1346; it tells us that on the site of the today Hotel Gellért, the Hospitale Ecclesiae Sanctae Elisabethae was built, an institution run by the Order of the Knights of St. John. The coloured photos show altar-pieces of the churches of Bártfa (today Bardejov in Slovakia) and from Kassa (today KoSice in Slovakia) (No.l). The paintings were made in memóriám of Saint Elizabeth (1207-1231). She was another member of the Árpád dynasty, who married to a German Markgraf when fifteen, and had several children. She was deeply religious and devoted her life to sick care. Her early death came in a cloister in Marburg (Thiiringia) when she was only 24 years old, in 1231. Due to the many miracles that were ascribed to her she was soon canonised in 1235. The painter has presented the princess in a leprosarium (i.e. in a hospital for lepers) when giving a bath to a group of sick, and curing their wounds. Another remembrance from this period is a charter of the Johannita Convent of Budafelhévíz from 1290 (No. 10). This monastery with a hospital was built around the today Buda side of the Margit Bridge in Budapest. The other charter you can see here was sealed by Peter of Bologna (No.9), protonotarius of Pope Eųgen¡ųs IV. (pontificat 1431-1447). According to the charter, Peter promised indulgence for all who had contributed donations to the Hospital of St. Gellért. The pharmaceutical mortar on the right is a Hungarian make from the 14th century (No. 10). It was excavated in Pozsony. The rests are a pharmaceutical case (15th century), a leper medal (1539) (No. 3), a plague coin (1527) (No. 4), a few alchemist coins (No. 14) and an astrologer's amulet (17th century) (No.13). The next glass-cabinet presents medical literature and equipment of late medieval times. These pictures remind us the life of the universities. The book in the show-case, entitled Das ist das Buch der Cirurgia is the work of Hieronymus Braunschwig (1450-1533) (No. 8.), and was published in Augsburg 1597. It was one of the first German surgical works that have ever been printed. There is an interesting surgical instrument, an earscoop (No.6.) in the cabinet, dated from the beginning of the 16th century. This one was found at the excavations of the medieval walls of Eger Castle in Hungary. Next to it you can see a few ribbed Gothic pharmaceutical mortars (No. 12) manufactured between the Ĥ hö h centuries. Our oldest apothecary jar (No. 7) was produced in Faenza (Italy) some time between 1520 and 1530. The French term itself, faience, was originally used for the 33
