Hippocrates was born in Cos, as far as can be ascertained, about the
year 460 B.C., and is alleged to have lived to be 99, or, as
some say, 109 years of age. It is claimed that his father, Heraclides,
was a direct descendant of Æsculapius, and that his mother, Phenarita,
was of the family of Hercules. His father and his paternal ancestors
in a long line were all priests of the Æsculapian temples, and his
sons and their sons after them also practised medicine in the same
surroundings. The family, traceable for nearly 300 years, among whom
were seven of the name of Hippocrates, were all, it would appear,
singularly free from the charlatanism which the Greek dramatists
attributed to the Æsculapian practitioners, from the superstition which
overlaid the medical science of so many older and later centuries, and
especially from the fantastic pharmacy which was to develop to such an
absurd extent in the following five hundred years.
It is not possible to distinguish with any confidence the genuine
from the spurious writings attributed to Hippocrates which have come
down to us. But the note which even his imitators sought to copy was
one of directness, lucidity, and candour. He tells of his failures as
simply as of his successes. He does not seek to deduce a system from
his experience, and though he is reputed to be the originator of the
theory of the humours, he does not allow the doctrine to influence his
treatment, which is based on experience.
[Illustration:
This portrait of Hippocrates, which is given in Leclerc’s
“History of Medicine,” is stated to be copied from a medal
in the collection of Fulvius Ursinus, a celebrated Italian
connoisseur. It is believed that the medal was struck by the
people of Cos at some long distant time in honour of their
famous compatriot. A bust in the British Museum, found near
Albano, among some ruins conjectured to have been the villa
of Marcus Varro, is presumed to represent Hippocrates on the
evidence of the likeness it bears to the head on this medal.
]
The medical views of Hippocrates do not concern us here except as
they affect his pharmaceutical practice; but a very long chapter
might be written on his pharmacy, that is to say, on the use he made
of drugs in the treatment of disease. Galen believed that he made
his preparations with his own hand, or at least superintended their
preparation. Leclerc’s list of the medicaments mentioned as such in the
works attributed to Hippocrates have been already quoted, and it will
be found that after deducting the fruits and vegetables, the milks of
cows, goats, asses, mules, sheep, and bitches, as well as other things
which perhaps we should hardly reckon as medicaments, there remain
between one hundred and two hundred drugs which are still found in our
drug shops. There are a great many animal products, some copper and
lead derivatives, alum, and the earths so much esteemed; but evidently
the bulk of his materia medica was drawn from the vegetable kingdom.
Hippocrates was considerably interested in pharmacy. Galen makes him
say, “We know the nature of medicaments and simples, and make many
different preparations with them; some in one way, some in another.
Some simples must be gathered early, some late; some we dry, some we
crush, some we cook,” &c. He made fomentations, poultices, gargles,
pessaries, katapotia (things to swallow, large pills), ointments, oils,
cerates, collyria, looches, tablets, and inhalations, which he called
perfumes. For quinsy, for example, he burned sulphur and asphalte with
hyssop. He gave narcotics, including, it is supposed, the juice of
the poppy and henbane seeds, and mandragora; purgatives, sudorifics,
emetics, and enemas. His purgative drugs were generally drastic ones:
the hellebores, elaterium, colocynth, scammony, thapsia, and a species
of rhamnus.
Hippocrates describes methods for what he calls purging the head and
the lungs, that is, by means of sneezing and coughing. He explains how
he diminishes the acridity of spurge juice by dropping a little of it
on a dried fig, whereby he gets a good remedy for dropsy. He has a
medicine which he calls Tetragonon, or four-cornered. Galen conjectures
that this was a tablet of crude antimony. Leclerc more reasonably
suggests that it was a term for certain special kinds of lozenges, and
points out that not long after Hippocrates physicians used a trochiscus
trigonus, or three-cornered lozenge for another purpose.
Although he used many drugs, Hippocrates is especially insistent on
Diet as the most important aid to health. He claims to have been the
first physician who had written on this subject, and this assertion is
confirmed by Plato, who, however, somewhat grimly commends the ancient
doctors for neglecting this branch of treatment, for, he says, the
modern ones have converted life into a tedious death. Barley water is
repeatedly recommended by the physician of Cos, with various additions
to suit the particular case under consideration. Oxymel is the usual
associate, but dill, leeks, oil, salt, vinegar, and goats’ fat also
figure.
Particular instructions are also given about the wine to be drunk,
the kind, and the quantity of water with which it is to be diluted in
spring, summer, autumn, and winter. In one place, at the end of the
3rd Book on Diet, a word is used which apparently means that persons
fatigued with long labour should “drink unto gaiety” occasionally; but
there is some doubt about the correct translation of that word.
V