History & Medicine: How Disease Was Diagnosed And Treated In Ancient Egypt.

A Book of Wounds

The ancient Egyptian medical manual, written around 1600 BC, describes treatment for fractures, dislocations, wounds, tumours and other surgical disorders. The Greek historian Herodotus, writing in the 5th century BC, marvelled at the sheer number of doctors in Egypt, and at their degree of specialization. 'Every physician is for one disease and not several', he wrote, 'and the whole country is full of physicians; for there are physicians of the eyes, others of the head, others of the teeth, others of the belly, others of obscure diseases.'

Medicine Man
Hesire, the Chief of Dentists and Physicians in Egypt around the 27th-26th centuries BC, sits at a table at which he makes out his prescriptions. His writing-case is slung over his left shoulder, and his symbolic staff of authority is tucked beneath his right arm.

The respect for medicine started at the very top in the royal household itself. One of the most powerful men in royal circles was the Superintendent of Physicians- and there was even a highly regarded specialist who regulated the pharoah's bowels. Physicians went to special medical schools, where they were taught anatomy and herbalism. They also learned to read and write, and produced a number of manuals that have survived to the present day.

Healthy minds in healthy bodies

The Book of Wounds, for instance, instructs physicians to make the most of their sense of touch, to feel their patient's injuries with their hands and to diagnose tumours by comparing them with the texture of fruit. The manuals also set out some modern principles of diagnosis, recognizing the link between states of mind and physical well-being. One doctor, for example, reports that his patient is too oppresed to eat, while another, noting his patient's despondency, remarks that his face is as if he wept.
Egyptian physicians modelled the internal workings of the body on the network of irrigation canals that sustained the countryside around them. They proposed that the bodily network consisted of a system of vessels, or metu, originating in the heart, which was believed to carry round all the bodily liquids essential to good health. Just as crop failure followed when irrigation canals were blocked, a blockage in the metu would lead to ill health. The ancient Egyptians gained at least a rudimentary knowledge of human anatomy and physiology, not through dissection- which was forbidden, but by paying close attention to the removal of bodily organs before the work of embalming and mummification took place.

Brain of pig, blood of bat

An ailing Egyptian might confidently expects his doctor to arrive armed with a vast array of healing potions and remedies, among them perhaps burned hoof of ass, or the fat of a black snake. Many medicines were derived from animals, notably pigs' brains, the spleen or liver of an ox and hippopotamus fat- while others had more exotic origins. Blood of bat, gall of tortoise and dried swallow's liver were just a few of the remedies suggested for possible treatment of eye diseases, which were common in ancient Egypt.

Drugs were classified according to their desired effects, rather than by their ingredients. One jar might be labelled 'To improve the hearing', and another 'To expel disease in the belly'. All carried strict instructions on how they were to be used. Some had to be mixed with wine, others made into cakes, and all had to be measured out with the greatest accuracy. Polypharmacy, in which several remedies are prescribed in combination, was common in ancient Egypt- and many treatments specified ointments and suppositories in addition to drugs which were taken by mouth.

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