Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Note on abbreviations and references
- Note on manuscripts and editions
- 1 Galen and his system: an introduction
- 2 Galen's Book on Venesection against Erasistratus (translation)
- 3 Galen's Book on Venesection against the Erasistrateans in Rome (translation)
- 4 Galen's Book on Treatment by Venesection (translation)
- 5 Development of Galen's views and methods as shown in the three works
- 6 Galen, venesection and the Hippocratic Corpus
- 7 Galen's practice of venesection
- 8 Galen's revulsive treatment and vascular anatomy
- 9 The testimony of other writers and the validity of Galen's opinions on sites for venesection
- 10 Galen's use of venesection as an evacuant: can it be justified? A medical digression
- 11 Conclusion
- Glossary
- Works cited
- Index
6 - Galen, venesection and the Hippocratic Corpus
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 August 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Note on abbreviations and references
- Note on manuscripts and editions
- 1 Galen and his system: an introduction
- 2 Galen's Book on Venesection against Erasistratus (translation)
- 3 Galen's Book on Venesection against the Erasistrateans in Rome (translation)
- 4 Galen's Book on Treatment by Venesection (translation)
- 5 Development of Galen's views and methods as shown in the three works
- 6 Galen, venesection and the Hippocratic Corpus
- 7 Galen's practice of venesection
- 8 Galen's revulsive treatment and vascular anatomy
- 9 The testimony of other writers and the validity of Galen's opinions on sites for venesection
- 10 Galen's use of venesection as an evacuant: can it be justified? A medical digression
- 11 Conclusion
- Glossary
- Works cited
- Index
Summary
At the beginning of his first work on venesection Galen expresses his surprise that Erasistratus, a man so punctilious in matters of detail, should have mentioned venesection only once in all his works, and at that only in passing; for, says Galen, it is a remedy of such strength and efficacy that it was regarded by the ancients as nothing less than the most effective of all. It is made clear later that the ancients to whom he refers are, in fact, Erasistratus' predecessors in the profession, including Hippocrates; Galen frequently mentions Hippocrates' use of the remedy in this work, observing that he employed it in most diseases and in the most acute, and that even Asclepiades, who rejected almost all the other methods of Hippocrates, nevertheless still made use of venesection. In another work Galen maintains that venesection has been dealt with very completely by Hippocrates. He is not alone in this opinion. Littré observes: ‘When we enquire which remedies, among the many that were used, are most frequently mentioned as having been applied, we find that bloodletting and the evacuants – emetics and, in particular, purgatives – play the principal role in the therapy of the Hippocratic physicians, and hence of Hippocrates himself.’ Adams expresses a similar opinion in his commentary on Paulus Aegineta. ‘We have had occasion frequently to remark’, he says, ‘that Hippocrates practised venesection freely in various diseases. He has left no treatise, however, expressly on the subject.’
The impression conveyed by both these nineteenth-century writers, and by Galen himself, is that the Hippocratic writers frequently mentioned venesection, and used it freely.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Galen on BloodlettingA Study of the Origins, Development and Validity of his Opinions, with a Translation of the Three Works, pp. 112 - 121Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1986