Prehistoric, Ancient and Medieval Medicine

This volume presents 21 chapters on prehistoric to medieval medicine
across Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Near East. Emphasizing interdisciplinary
methods, it surveys research directions and offers studies spanning the Stone Age to the
Middle Ages, grouped into three chronological sections.

This volume contains a total of 21 chapters on prehistoric, ancient, and medieval medicine, presented from various perspectives. After a general introduction outlining the directions, possibilities, and methods of research in archaeology and the history of medicine in the period under review and arguing for the necessity of an interdisciplinary approach, there follow 20 chapters presenting specific research topics. These chapters cover a wide chronological span, from the Stone Age to more or less the end of the Middle Ages, and geographical extent, from Western Europe through the Mediterranean (including Egypt and the Levant) to the Near East (including modern Iraq). The papers in this volume are divided into three sections, roughly spanning prehistory, the Classical era and the Middle Ages respectively. 

List of Figures and Tables

Foreword

Editors and Contributors

Introduction: Archaeology and History of Medicine of the Prehistoric to Medieval Periods in the Twenty-first Century – Tomáš Alušík

Chapter 01: Shanidar Cave in Iraqi Kurdistan: A Sanctuary for Medical Treatment and Healing for the Injured and Ailing Members of its Neanderthal and Proto-Neolithic H. sapiens Occupants – Anagnostis P. Agelarakis

Chapter 02: Disease and Medicine in the Hittite Kingdom – Robert Arnott (†)

Chapter 03: An Akkadian Ritual Against ‘Mountain Fever’ – Letizia Savino

Chapter 04: The Life after the Pyramid Age: A Secondary Cemetery at Djedkare’s Necropolis at Saqqara (Egypt) – Hana Vymazalová

Chapter 05: The Earliest Documented Healers/Physicians in the Ancient Greek World (c. 3500/3000-500 BC) – Tomáš Alušík

Chapter 06: The Maintenance of Female Sexual and Reproductive Health in the Prehistoric Aegean – Brandelyn Andres

Chapter 07: Dealing with Epidemics in Antiquity - Social Reactions and Emotions – Rupert Breitwieser

Chapter 08: An Archaeology of Temperaments, or from Four Humours to Four Temperaments – Sylva Fischerová

Chapter 09: The Athenian Plague: an Historical Hoax? – Lutz Alexander Graumann

Chapter 10: ‘You Need to Sail to Antikyra’: Healing Classical Madness – Athanasios Sideris

Chapter 11: The Asklepieion of Paros: Restudy of the Old Evidence and New Archival Sources – Tomáš Alušík and Pavla Alušíková Dostalíková

Chapter 12: Cure and Cult at the Asklepieion of Lebena in Crete – Milena Melfi

Chapter 13: Healing Places in the Ancient World: So-Called Healing Sanctuaries Revisited. New Perspectives on Archaeological Sites in Central Italy (4th – 1st Century BC) – Velia Benthin

Chapter 14: Nutrition and Health in Imperial Roman Populations with Implications for Tuberculosis – Jared J. Eddy

Chapter 15: The Rhetoric of Healing: Strategies of Persuasion in Greek Healing Prayers and Exorcisms – Daniel Vaucher

Chapter 16: Pilgrimage to the Healing Cults in the Near East and Egypt During Late Antiquity: Continuity Between Pagan and Christian Antiquity – Vlastimil Drbal

Chapter 17: From Asklepieion to Kosmidion? Temple Sleep: A Dynamic Ritual in Late Antiquity – Mark Beumer

Chapter 18: Temperament and Emotion: Embodied Emotion in Late Antique Medical Thought and Modern Paradigm Shifts in Neuroscience – Conan T. Doyle

Chapter 19: Hospitaller Care of the Order of St John in the Holy Land – Robin Pánek

Chapter 20: The Earliest Written Records of Medieval Hospitals in the Territory of Present-Day Slovakia – Matej Gogola

• Edited by Tomáš Alušík
• Edited by Pavla Alušíková Dostalíková
• Edited by Milena Melfi
• Edited by Conan T. Doyle
• Edited by Rupert Breitwieser