Egyptians, not Greeks were true fathers of medicine

EurekaAlert.org ^ | 5-9-07 | Aeron Haworth

[Renfield]

Scientists examining documents dating back 3,500 years say they have found proof that the origins of modern medicine lie in ancient Egypt and not with Hippocrates and the Greeks.

The research team from the KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology at The University of Manchester discovered the evidence in medical papyri written in 1,500BC – 1,000 years before Hippocrates was born.

"Classical scholars have always considered the ancient Greeks, particularly Hippocrates, as being the fathers of medicine but our findings suggest that the ancient Egyptians were practising a credible form of pharmacy and medicine much earlier," said Dr Jackie Campbell.

"When we compared the ancient remedies against modern pharmaceutical protocols and standards, we found the prescriptions in the ancient documents not only compared with pharmaceutical preparations of today but that many of the remedies had therapeutic merit."

The medical documents, which were first discovered in the mid-19th century, showed that ancient Egyptian physicians treated wounds with honey, resins and metals known to be antimicrobial.

The team also discovered prescriptions for laxatives of castor oil and colocynth and bulk laxatives of figs and bran. Other references show that colic was treated with hyoscyamus, which is still used today, and that cumin and coriander were used as intestinal carminatives.

Further evidence showed that musculo-skeletal disorders were treated with rubefacients to stimulate blood flow and poultices to warm and soothe. They used celery and saffron for rheumatism, which are currently topics of pharmaceutical research, and pomegranate was used to eradicate tapeworms, a remedy that remained in clinical use until 50 years ago.

"Many of the ancient remedies we discovered survived into the 20th century and, indeed, some remain in use today, albeit that the active component is now produced synthetically," said Dr Campbell.

"Other ingredients endure and acacia is still used in cough remedies while aloes forms a basis to soothe and heal skin conditions."

Fellow researcher Dr Ryan Metcalfe is now developing genetic techniques to investigate the medicinal plants of ancient Egypt. He has designed his research to determine which modern species the ancient botanical samples are most related to.

"This may allow us to determine a likely point of origin for the plant while providing additional evidence for the trade routes, purposeful cultivation, trade centres or places of treatment," said Dr Metcalfe. "The work is inextricably linked to state-of-the-art chemical analyses used by my colleague Judith Seath, who specialises in the essential oils and resins used by the ancient Egyptians."

Professor Rosalie David, Director of the KNH Centre, said: "These results are very significant and show that the ancient Egyptians were practising a credible form of pharmacy long before the Greeks.

"Our research is continuing on a genetic, chemical and comparative basis to compare the medicinal plants of ancient Egypt with modern species and to investigate similarities between the traditional remedies of North Africa with the remedies used by their ancestors of 1,500 BC."

[Renfield]

Pingy....

[Red Badger]

So the Greeks were Hippocrites?.........

[Lokibob]

The Greeks invented sex, but the Italians modified it to involve women.

.....Bob

[Dustbunny]

Egyptians, not Greeks were true fathers of medicine

I thought that was always a known fact. We were taught that in school, course that was over 50 years ago when they actually taught the truth.

[Mad Dawg]

Bingo! It was almost exactly 50 years ago the Mr Knight of blessed memory - world’s best elementary school science teacher, pbuh, told us that the Egyptians did trepanning - taking out a chunk of broken skull so it wouldn’t impinge on the brain ... and that people survived it.

[AnAmericanMother]

Guess what!

The Neanderthals did trepanning, so did the ancient Peruvians, the Babylonians, and the ancient Celts.

Prehistoric skulls have been found in Germany not only with lovely neat round holes cut in them, but regrowth of the bone to fill the hole . . . which shows that the patients actually SURVIVED the operation.

They may have been trying to let "evil spirits" out, but in the case of a traumatic head injury it was the right thing to do.

[wideawake]

showed that ancient Egyptian physicians treated wounds with honey

If you want to make absolutely, positively sure that a wound will be infected - put some honey on it.

[Old_Mil]

...this joined a historic cohort of cures for diseases dating back to the Ancient Egyptians: pig's eyes, bat's blood, dog's urine and crocodile dung.

Sure, and the Sioux were on the verge of perfecting warp drive before Custer attacked.

[Old_Mil]

They may have been trying to let "evil spirits" out, but in the case of a traumatic head injury it was the right thing to do.

You are assuming that they performed such surgeries on people who actually had traumatic head injuries.

[AnAmericanMother]

Well, since a number of the skulls show obvious fractures and star-shaped impact patterns, yeah.

It was the idiots in 17th c. France and the Netherlands who recommended trepanning for all sorts of things having nothing to do with brain injury . . . . I think it was Prince William of Orange whose physician trepanned him something like 75 times. His skull must have looked like Swiss cheese.

Somewhere there's a Gillray cartoon of some poor soul being trepanned (without anesthetic.)

[blam]

"You are assuming that they performed such surgeries on people who actually had traumatic head injuries."

That was an ancient way of dealing with Democrats/socialists. They recognized it as a brain problem.

[Londo Molari]

That was well before islam took hold in Egypt. Now Egypt is a backward hellhole full of cult members.

[Mad Dawg]

If you want to make absolutely, positively sure that a wound will be infected - put some honey on it.

Ooh Ooh! I disagree! Do you have some backup? Here's why I disagree, and I odn't mean this to be conlcu=lusive or anything, I'm just lobbing something to you for you to hit it out of the park:

Honey is so supersaturted that as long as it is not diluted nothing can grow in it and somethings will have the H20 osmozed right the heck out of 'em.

The reason honey is not good for small human type personell is that it gets diluted in their tummies which are not sufficiently acidic to whomp the cooties, and then botulinus and other neat stuff which was just being dormant there can take off.

So they told me in the days when I had 18 hives.

[blam]

Making Holes in the Skull: Ancient Psychosurgery?

"From the Middle Ages well into the 18th century in Europe, trepanning was common as a medical procedure very much like bloodletting, i.e.; it had no medical usefulness per se. Repeated trepanning was common; for instance it is related that Prince Philip of Orange was trepanned 17 times by his physician. De La Touche, a French physician trepanned 52 times one of his patient, within a two-month period! Many physicians, from the Roman times on, also believed that the bone slabs (called rondelles) taken from trepanned skulls had therapeutic value when pulverized and mixed with other beverages given to the patients for several diseases. "

The Rondelles

[Alkhin]

There is a book I read once, and I need to get a copy again, because it is a very good look at the life of Luke - called “Dear and Glorious Physician” and Luke’s mentor is an Egyptian medicine man who teaches Luke much of what he knows. I almost more fascinated by the Egyptian than I was by Luke. I highly recommend this book.

[wideawake]

as long as it is not diluted nothing can grow in it

It attracts insects who want to eat it.

[AnAmericanMother]

Wow . . . we used to have five.

Now we live in a very shady hole by a creek, and the bees don't like it here.

So we set up a hobby hive for a friend who has a beautiful situation on a nice sunny hill. The hive is on a stand at the edge of a woodline right beside a beautiful open pasture. Tons of tulip poplar trees in the woods. The bees are happy little productive rascals. We got 18 full frames of honey off the hive last year . . .

[AnAmericanMother]

Looks like I had conflated a bunch of stuff in my memory bank . . . but one Orange looks pretty much like another . . .

[Mad Dawg]

My happiest year, 1983, was when I got over half a ton of honey! Tulip Poplar and white clover mostly.