As editor of a health magazine, I can report a surge in daily press releases about the importance of regular exercise and a balanced nutritious diet in the prevention and treatment of mental illness. A much better approach than the blood-letting, purging, crude lobotomy and worse of the not-so-distant past.
You’d have thought that with much healthcare understanding anchored in the work of ancient Greeks and Romans – witness the Hippocratic Oath for example – we should have known better.
Fortunately, I have an author friend who has researched ancient Roman healthcare (and Roman lifestyle in general) to a much greater depth than my distracted mind could ever achieve. Her article for this newsletter throws interesting light on the origins of the the approach to mental health now touted so enthusiastically by all those press releases I receive.
So please welcome Jacquie Rogers, author of the Quintus Valerius mysteries set in third century Roman Britain.
Like Alistair, I write Roman novels. My Quintus Valerius mysteries feature as a continuing character, Julia Aureliana, a Romano-British medicus. So I spend a lot of time researching Roman medical practices and beliefs.
I was reminded of the lasting contribution the Romans made to medical history by a terrific recent lecture from Dr Andrew Newton, retired A&E consultant and educator. To cover all his captivating lecture here would take a week, so I’ll just pick out a few highlights, focusing on the contributions of Roman doctors and scholars, Galen and Dioscorides.
Galen explaining human anatomy as imagined by Bing AI
GALEN
Galen, born in Pergamum around AD 130, was personal physician to Roman emperors Marcus Aurelius, Commodus and Septimius Severus. Surviving to a great age, he managed to outlive them all. His enduring fame rests on the astonishing survival of over 150 of his written works, which heavily influenced Byzantine and Arab medical scholars, and later, translated back into Latin, were taught in mediaeval schools of medicine.
Galen [Wikimedia Commons]
Some of his ideas, such as the balancing of the four humours (blood, biles black and yellow, and phlegm) which he took from the teachings of Hippocrates, were misleading and have since been dismissed by modern science. But he remains rightly lauded for his skills in anatomy, as a clinician and a diagnostician.
Above all, he was the originator of the experimental method in medical practice. Previously the baleful evil eye and the will of the gods were held to be responsible for illness and affliction. Galen insisted on learning physiology through dissection, though unfortunately human autopsy had been banned by his time. Thus Galen arrived at some misapprehensions based on animal anatomy.
But his championing of a healthy lifestyle — fresh water, regular exercise, balanced diet, clean air, calm environment — both as preventative medicine and as treatment for mental illness, has outlived him.
DIOSCORIDES
Born about forty years before Galen, Dioscorides was likewise a trained Greek doctor. He became influential through his vast published pharmacopeia. On Medical Material was translated and has been widely read for almost 1500 years. It contains details of the healing properties of some 1000 medicinal plants, minerals and animals.
Dioscorides [Wikimedia Commons]
Like Galen, his writings became widespread, never out of circulation to this day. Again like Galen, Dioscorides was a pioneer of the empirical method in his field. His work was all about establishing a tried remedy for a specific illness.
Where he won out over Galen was in his avoidance of medical theory. Dioscorides rejected the passing ideas of the day, and insisted on recording solely the efficacy of a given remedy for a particular disorder.
ROMAN ARMY DOCTORS
The physiological understanding of Galen, and the vast pharmacological knowledge of Dioscorides, were put to very good use through the training and work of Roman army doctors.
As the empire grew and spread north and west, local techniques and herbs were absorbed from the new provinces and added to the body of knowledge. Roman forts and towns had hospitals, where surgeons used highly specialist instruments (see image).
Roman surgical instruments
Public health and hygiene were a priority, and while the Romans never developed microscopes, they did understand about micro-organisms. They used anaesthesia, washed wounds with vinegar antiseptics, and even identified effective contraceptive herbs.
They prioritised sewers, fresh water supplies, and the provision of bathhouses for cleanliness. Although, without soap or chlorine public baths could be a swamp of bacteria — best not entered with an open wound!
To this day, Galen’s writings on public health, and Dioscorides’ careful emphasis on testing drugs using experiment, persist in modern medicine. We owe the Romans much for the legacy they left to our modern healthcare systems.
My thanks to Jacquie Rogers for this most informative article.You can find her novels on Amazon. For links to her books, articles, blogsite and Youtube, go to Linktree.
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It’s a fascinating world, Roma. Medicine! For the fun stuff, try Pliny the Elder, who just writes down everything he has ever heard from the blokes in the pub last night. Jacquie, have you discovered Soranus yet? He was an amazing doctor who writes on childbirth.
It’s a fascinating world, Roma. Medicine! For the fun stuff, try Pliny the Elder, who just writes down everything he has ever heard from the blokes in the pub last night. Jacquie, have you discovered Soranus yet? He was an amazing doctor who writes on childbirth.