BYZANTINE EMPIRE

• Byzantine is also known as the Eastern European Empire
• Alexander of Tralles was the author of 12 books on medicine and discourage to the use of forceps for extractions
• Paul of Aegina was the father of medical books and discussed the use of a file to reduce the height of the tooth
• Western Europe was the era of ignorance, superstition and intellectual passivity. Agriculture became its means of earning livelihood
• Monastic Medicine is a traditional medieval European Medicine
• Monastic medicine is no longer based on rational principles
• Cassiodorus devoted the last 35 years of his life to learning
• Bishop Isidore of Seville believed that Men have 32 teeth while women have 30. He also described that the gingiva as the one responsible for tooth formation
• Venerable Bede mentioned that remedies of toothache include concoction of many drugs
• The hipppocratic doctrine states that toothache originates from the head down to the tooth and ends in the root
• Physica was authored by Saint Hildegard von Bingen.
• Physica is about healing power of plants, meats and minerals
• Saint Hildegard mentioned that remedies for toothache includes hot concoction of nightshade and wormwood
• Schola Medica Salernitana were the earliest changes in medieval medical thought and practice
• The church restricted the practice of medicine in monasteries
• Quacks and Humbugs were only allowed to heal, were strongly frowned upon the Church fathers.
• The Edict of the Council of Tours was declared at 1163
• The Edict stated that surgeons were treated inferior as to general practitioners of medicine
• Aristotelian ascribed toothache to the presence of decaying blood in the arteries that supply the teeth
• Simple preventive measures include rinsing with clear cold water each morning upon arising and several times later in the day
• Hildegard von Bingen believed in Toothworms, in which smoke of burning aloe and myrrh to drive it out