Galen

But it is not perfectly good, and so is not zealous giving.

As if a knight should give a shield to a doctor, and the doctor should give a copy of the aphorisms of Hippocrates or the art of Galen to the knight.

Wherefore the wise say that the face of the gift ought to resemble that of the receiver.

That is to say, should be suitable to him, and should be useful.

Explain that.

So in the gladiatorial days of Rome, there was a physician named Galen, G-A-L-E-N.

He actually has several pieces of anatomy named after him.

There's the great vein of Galen in the head.

And it turned out that Unsurprisingly, gladiators had a lot of head trauma and spine trauma due to the nature of the position that they were in.

And Galen was one of the first to note that damage to specific parts of the brain and the spine led to... sort of very reliable and replicatable deficits in people.

So, you know, initially noticing that if the spinal cord is severed in certain kinds of ways, you might become paralyzed if it's fully cut.

If half the spinal cord is cut, you're only hemiparetic, so only on half side, but it's only...

But also keep in mind, and I'm going to talk about this kind of in the next section, but keep in mind... how common war is and specifically things like hand-to-hand combat cannons swords um later on we'll see bayonets arrows arrows axes things like that where you can get injured but you could live but you could be left with a physical deformity right and when these groups really anyone back then is going to war you're really assembling the peasants and the farmers and really everyone every every like able-bodied male that is around so when you're seeing wartime injuries it's on a wide scale it's not just a particular class of people or group of people it's kind of like people from all up and down the spectrum right can get these injuries right and thus suffer the consequences of these of these injuries So al-Zahawi also describes basic surgical techniques like cautery, like wound management and translations of his works make their way to medieval Europe as so many Arab texts do in this time period for medieval medical students in Europe.

So medical students at this time in Europe are being lectured and taught the theories of Galen, who was a Greek, an ancient Greek physician.

And part of this training was dissection, which might surprise you since the Catholic Church was very anti-dissection.

A greater knowledge of anatomy is emerging at this time.

We're seeing a turn away from things like humoral theory.

And the

teachings of Galen.

Exactly.

He will make no display of his power of speaking, yet for his speaking will he be admired.

He will not discourse upon the dicta of Hippocrates and Galen and their adversaries, but neither will he be troubled by diseases and suffer pain at the misfortunes of others.

He will not set forth the principles of Ecclesiastes, Ptolemaeus, and Heron, but neither will he be pained by the tumid vaunts of uncultured men.

He will make no display of the doctrines of Plato and Aristotle and Pyrrhon, and the names of any Democritus, and Heraclitus, Anaxagoras, Cleanthes, and Epichoros, and all the other members of the venerable Porch and Academy.

There will be nothing difficult to do in this case

caseGorgibus is a simpleton, a boor, who will readily believe everything you say, provided you speak to him of Hippocrates, of Galen, and that you have brass enough

You mean that I shall have to speak of philosophy and mathematics? Leave that to me.

If he is a man as easily deceived as you say, I answer for everything.

I sent for you to come and see my daughter, who is ill.

I put all my hopes in you.

Hippocrates says, and Galen too with strong reasoning argues, that a person does not feel well when he is ill.

You are right to put all your hopes in me, for I am the greatest, the cleverest, the wisest doctor in the vegetable, animal, and mineral faculty.