Published by De Gruyter

Medicine in the Medieval Mediterranean

Edited by: Alain Touwaide

ISSN: 2569-314X

e-ISSN 2569-3158

Overview
Volumes

Medicine in the Medieval Mediterranean is a series devoted to all aspects of medicine in the (Eastern) Mediterranean area during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages (3rd/4th centuries to the 16th). Though with a clear focus on Greek (Byzantine) medicine, it also includes the contributions of the cultures that were present or emerged in the area during the Middle Ages and after, and which interacted with Byzantium (e.g. the Syrian and Arabic worlds, Jewish and Slavic cultures, Turkish peoples, particularly the Ottomans, and Coptic communities).

Medicine is understood in a broad sense: not only medical theory, but also the health conditions of people, nosology and epidemiology, the economy of health, and the non-conventional forms of medicine, that is, all the spectrum of activities dealing with human health. The series publishes the results of cutting-edge research, so providing a wide range of scholarly and scientific fields with new data for further explorations.

The series has been launched in 2010 by Ashgate with a volume on a bioarchaeological study of Byzantine Crete (7th-12th cent.). Since then it has published critical editions with commentary of texts as different as the Arabic and Latin translations of classical medical and scientific treatises, a recent iatrosofion, and hospital manuals, in addition to studies on medieval herbalism and a Census of Greek Medical Manuscripts. In 2016 it was published by Routledge.

Series Editor:

Alain Touwaide, Institute for the Preservation of Medical Traditions, Washington, DC, and San Marino, CA.

For over 40 years, Alain Touwaide has studied the production and diffusion of medical and pharmaceutical knowledge across the eastern Mediterranean world with a particular focus on the Byzantine Empire and its neighbors. Originally a Classicist, he is interested in transcultural processes and the medico-scientific analysis of ancient knowledge.

Scientific Committee:

Vivian Nutton, FBA, emeritus professor of the history of medicine at UCL, has edited and translated many medical works from Antiquity and the Renaissance. He is the author of Ancient Medicine, ed. 2, 2013.

Marie Hélène Congourdeau, honorary researcher at the CNRS (France), works on ancient Greek embryology, Byzantine medicine and epidemics in Byzantium.

Dimitri Gutas, Professor of Arabic and Graeco-Arabic studies, Yale University, works on the medieval transmission and translation of Greek philosophy and science into Arabic and on Arabic philosophy.

Filippo Ronconi, associate professor at the School for Advanced Studies in Social Sciences (EHESS) of Paris, works on ancient and medieval Greek and Latin manuscripts. He focuses on bibliology, codicology, paleography and on textual transmission.

Book Ahead of Publication 2025

Graeco-Egyptian Alchemy

A Catalogue of Manuscripts in Greek Libraries

Vangelis Koutalis

More Cite

Volume five of the Catalogue des manuscrits alchimiques grecs (CMAG), published in 1928, was devoted to the manuscripts of Spain and those held in the libraries of Athens. In its second part, compiled by Albert Severyns, five manuscripts were listed, in total. Only three of them were described.

The present publication lists and describes a large number of manuscripts, currently held in Greek libraries, which were not included in the 5th volume of CMAG. It also provides a new description of the three manuscripts described by Severyns. In addition to manuscript descriptions, it contains an Appendix, which offers the full transcription of short unpublished tracts, tables, variant readings from the printed editions, and other items that might prove useful for the history of alchemy.

Besides being a de facto supplement to CMAG, this catalogue may contribute to the current revival of interest in the history of Graeco-Egyptian alchemy. It brings to light primary sources, previously unnoticed, that are valuable pieces in the dynamic mosaic of a field of knowledge, i.e. alchemy, the historical mutations of which had considerable impact on the evolution of a variety of other disciplines, ranging from metallurgy to philosophy and medicine

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.0000/9783110792744
ISBN:: 9783110792744
ISBN:: 9783110792768
ISBN:: 9783110791198
Subject:: Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies
Subject:: Classical Studies
Subject:: Ancient Science and Medicine
Publisher:: De Gruyter

Book Ahead of Publication 2025

Medical Anthropology in the Late Middle Ages

Body, Soul, and the Virtues according to Peter of Abano

Matthew Klemm

More Cite

This book considers the introduction of materialist and physiological reasoning into late medieval discourse on the soul in the work of Peter of Abano (d.1316); in this, it adds a vital component to our understanding of this important period in the history of medicine and of the philosophy of human nature. Peter was an influential physician and philosopher whose activities spanned from Paris to Padua to Constantinople, where he played a vital role in the appropriation of Greek and Arabic medical and natural philosophical sources in the Latin West. In his engagement with these sources, he sought a “reconciliation” (as his most famous work, the Conciliator, was titled) of medicine and philosophy. Through this reconciliation, Peter develops a rich description of the integration of physical and spiritual operations, and of physiological and mental capacities, leading him to discussions of imagination, moral virtues, and intellectual powers. Because Peter developed many of his ideas within a traditional medical framework, he created a distinctively “medical” anthropology. His unique understanding of human nature would remain influential for centuries to come.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.0000/9783110612639
ISBN:: 9783110612639
ISBN:: 9783110611526
ISBN:: 9783110611342
Subject:: Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies
Subject:: Classical Studies
Subject:: Ancient Science and Medicine
Publisher:: De Gruyter

Book 2022

Plague in Byzantine Times

A Medico-historical Study

Costas Tsiamis

Volume 9 in this series

More Cite

The lack of reliable demographic data for Byzantine cities raises questions as to the actual rate of expansion and mortality of plague. This essentially leads to the question of change and progress of the nature of infectious diseases in that period. Also, the analysis of the written sources raised a series of questions, mainly epidemiological in nature: the entry points and spreading of the disease in the Mediterranean, the epidemic dynamics as well as the evolution of the microbial agent of plague, i.e. Yersinia pestis.

The present study offers a substantial explanation for the outbreaks of plague that struck Byzantium by exploring the multiple factors that caused or triggered epidemics. The study covers the entire period extending from the beginning of the Byzantine Empire until its fall in 1453, which was marked by two major pandemics, namely the Plague of Justinian and the Black Death. All known primary sources were collected and grouped from a spatiotemporal perspective, so as to retrace the unfolding of the two pandemics. The focus of the research shifts from known historical frameworks to ones of human activities, endemic foci and natural environment of the era as risk factors of the outbreaks.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110613636
ISBN:: 9783110613636
ISBN:: 9783110611250
ISBN:: 9783110611199
Subject:: Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies
Subject:: Classical Studies
Subject:: Ancient Science and Medicine
Publisher:: De Gruyter

Book 2024

Galen on the Pulses

Medico-historical Analysis, Textual Tradition, Translation

Ian Hugh Johnston, Niki Papavramidou

Volume 10 in this series

More Cite

The arterial pulse was a major aspect of all three major medical traditions - Western, Chinese and Indian. Galen's extant works are the only significant account of Western views surviving from ancient times. Not only does he set out his own views in great detail but he also gives a large amount of information on the views of others whose writings are lost. In the translated treatises in the present work, Galen deals with basic anatomy and physiology, classification of the types of pulses, diagnosis of and from the pulses, causal factors of clinical relevance and the very important matter of the prognostic value of the pulses. This is the first translation into a modern Western language of Galen's very substantial body of work on this subject.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110612677
ISBN:: 9783110612677
ISBN:: 9783110611885
ISBN:: 9783110611618
Subject:: Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies
Subject:: Classical Studies
Subject:: Ancient Science and Medicine
Publisher:: De Gruyter