Medicine in medieval England c.1250 -c.1500

• Supernatural and religus explanations

  • The Church had great influende over people lived.
  • People were very religious and followed the teachings of the Catholic Church
  • It was be believed that God controlled everything that happned in the world including disease and illness
  • Most people were Christian and belied that illnes and disease as puishment for sin
  • Some people also thought it was a test of a person faith - either by God or by the Devil
• Astrology

  • One way to dagnose disease was astrology
  • A physicial would use a star chart
  • The use of astrology to diagnose illness and disease became more popular after the Black Death.
  • The impact of the disease was so huge that people strongly wanted to be able to explain why it had happened
• The influence of ancient theories on mediecal medicine

  • The likes of hippocrates and galens work being studied carefully was possible because their work had been translated and made sense of by Islamic scholars.
  • After the Roman Empire had ended, Islamic Empire had become a centre of learning
  • Medival phyicians in Catholic Europe were discouraged from challenging these ideas because the ideas of hippocrates and Galen fitted in with the teachings of the Bible
• What did people also beliee about medicine?

  People in the Middle Ages also believed that illness could be explained using reason and observation.
• The theory of the four humours

  • The theory of the four humours came from Hippocrates and was the most important non-religious theory used to explain illness.
  • This was a rational idea
  • The theory stated that the body was made up of four humours:

  1. Blood
  2. Phlegm - a liquid released b couhing or sneezing
  3. Black Bile- a dark liquid released by vomiting
  4. yellow bile - a ligt liquid release by vomiting

  • It was believed that the four humurs had to remain in balanced for good health
• Galen and the thory of opposites

  • Galen deeloped Hippocrates' ideas further
  • Galen belived that the humours could be balanced using the theory of opposites. Example, if a paitent had too much blood and was hot and dry, they could be trated with cumcumber because it was cold and wet
  • This was very popular in medival times
  • Galen believed in the soul and his ideas fitted with the teachs of the Catholic Church
  • Because the Catholic Church controled universities and medical teachings, Galen's ideas remained central to learing about the body, diseas and medicine in medieval period
• Miasma theory

  • It was believed that this poisoned air was what made people ill
  • Some people belived the air had been poisoned by God, because they thought God caused all illness
• Religious actions to prevent disease

  • living a life free from sin
  • attending church services and processions
  • prayer - people prayed for God forgiveness of their sins
  • pilgrimages
  • wearing magical or religious charms
  • fasting - people did this to show they were sorry for their sins
  • flagellation - some people whipped themsevles in pblic and asked God to forgive their sins
• Purifying the air to prevent disease

  The miasma theory indicated that unclean

  • carrying posies - bunches of sweet-smelling herbs and flowers
  • lighting fires to drive away and bad air and sometime burning herb or substances to 'clean the air'
  • ringing bells or allwing birds to fly around the house to keep the air moving
• Cleaning the streets

  Because of the miasma theory medival towns thought it best to keep the streats clean not because of the right reasons though.

  They did this by:

  1. employing rakers to kep the streets clean
  2. punishing people if they threw waste onto the streets
  3. making butchers dispose there waste outside the city walls
  4. Building public latrines (public toilets)
• Other methods of prevention

  • People were advised by the Church and physicians to wash regularly, excercise and to balance the four humours
• Treatments to stop disease

  As of the classic medical belief the four humours if blood was thought to be out of balance, then people would carry out bloodletting. This treatmet would include:

  • cutting into a vein
  • using leeches
  • placing heated cups over a cut or scratch
• Barber surgeons

  Barber surgeons would carry out basic surgery, such as bloodletting sewing up wounds and removing growths from the outidethe body.
• Family traditions and treatment to prevent disease:

  • Most people in medival England were treated by female family members, such as their wife or mother
  • Traditions and treatment were passed down from one family to the next
  • Sometimes individual women would be viewed as particularly knowledgeable about treatments and remedies. They were known as ‘wise women’.
• Herbal treatments

  • The most common treatments were made from herbs, minerals, plants and animal parts.
  • There were successful herbal treatments for infection that included honey, which we still use today.
• Apothecaries

  • This is like a modern-day chemist, apothecaries understoo both he healing and poisonous properties of plants and herbs
• Hospital care

  • The number of hospitals increased during the medieval period
  • Most of the hospitals in Engalnd were run by the church
  • Hospitals dd not always treat the sick but cared for them through prayer and providing an environment when they could rest and recover
  • They did not let terminal people in to te holpitals as they couldnt care for them and was worried they the disease was spread
• Leprosy

  • Leprosy was a skin disease that led to fingers and toes falling off, hair falling out and eventually death
  • If somone caught leprosy, they were separted from the community and made to live in a 'leper house'. They would also wear a cloak and ring a bell to warn other of their presence and to warn them to stay away.
  • People with leprosy and other disease were not allowed in hopitals.
  • This was because it was recognised that the illnesses could be spread quickly to other patients, even if it was not known how this happened.
• Physicians

  • Medieval physicians trained at a universty for at least seven years.
  • They studied the books of ancient physicians such as Hippocrates and Galen.
  • A physician would diagnose a paitent's illness and recommend treatment after close observation.
  • Physicians were expensive and only the rich could afford to see them.