Hippocratic Recipes: Oral and Written Transmission of Pharmacological Knowledge in Fifth- and Fourth-century Greece

385 Pages·2009·2.982 MB·English

by  Laurence M. V. Totelin

HIPPOCRATIC RECIPES
STUDIES IN
ANCIENT MEDICINE
Edited by
JOHN SCARBOROUGH
PHILIP J. VAN DER EIJK
ANN HANSON
NANCY SIRAISI
VOLUME 34
Hippocratic Recipes
Oral and Written Transmission of Pharmacological
Knowledge in Fift h- and Fourth-Century Greece
By
LAURENCE M. V. TOTELIN
LEIDEN • BOSTON
2009
Cover illustration: Aesculapius, the Greek god of medicine, is shown fl anked by
Apollo and Hippocrates. Th ey are presented with exotic medicinal substances which
are, to the right, turned into medicines in a pharmaceutical laboratory. Oil 18th
century. By: Johannes Zacharias Simon Prey. Wellcome Library, London.
Th is book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication-Data
Totelin, Laurence M. V.
Hippocratic recipes : oral and written transmission of pharmacological knowledge in
fi ft h- and fourth-century Greece / by Laurence M. V. Totelin.
p. ; cm.—(Studies in ancient medicine, ISSN 0925-1421 ; v. 34)
Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
ISBN 978-90-04-17154-1 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Hippocrates—Knowledge—
Pharmacology. 2. Pharmacology—Greece—History—To 1500. 3. Drug
development—Greece—History—To 1500. I. Title. II. Series.
[DNLM: 1. Hippocrates. 2. Pharmaceutical Preparations—history. 3. Drug
Compounding—history. 4. Greek World. 5. History, Ancient. 6. Pharmacology—
history. 7. Prescriptions, Drug—history. W1 ST918K v.34 2008 /
QV 11 GG6 T717h 2008]
RM300.T68 2008
615’.190938–dc22
2008035399
ISSN 0925-1421
ISBN 978 90 04 17154 1
Copyright 2009 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, Th e Netherlands.
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To my parents

CONTENTS
Acknowledgements ............................................................................. xi
Maps ...................................................................................................... xiii
Abbreviations ...................................................................................... xv
Introduction Under the spell of the pharmakon ........................ 1
Sources ............................................................................................. 4
Methodology and summary ......................................................... 16
Chapter One Oral transmission of medical knowledge and
written recipes ................................................................................. 21
Introduction .................................................................................... 21
Th e compendiast/stemmatic model and its criticism .............. 23
Orality and the Hippocratic catalogues of recipes ................... 39
Linguistic approaches to recipes and catalogues of recipes .... 47
Catalogues of recipes as collections of fragments and as
discourse colonies ...................................................................... 61
Appendix Types of medications and application/
administration verbs .................................................................. 64
Chapter Two Th e history of the written catalogues of
recipes ............................................................................................... 67
Introduction .................................................................................... 67
Th e composition of the Hippocratic gynaecological
collections of recipes ...................................................................... 68
Th e beginnings of the tradition of small collections of
recipes .......................................................................................... 91
Th e disappearance of the Pharmakitis? ...................................... 98
Conclusions So much lost . . . ..................................................... 102
Appendix Diseases 2.42–43 and Aff ections 18 ........................ 105
Chapter Th ree Hippocratic recipes between home remedies
and Haute Médecine ...................................................................... 111
Introduction .................................................................................... 111
Th e sources of the compilers of gynaecological recipes .......... 114
Th e High and the Low ................................................................... 125
viii contents
Are the gynaecological recipes an exception?—Dietetics and
pharmacology in the Hippocratic treatises ............................ 132
Conclusions ..................................................................................... 138
Chapter Four Imports, geographical determinism and
infl uences: Th e use of exotic and luxury ingredients in the
Hippocratic catalogues of recipes ................................................ 141
Introduction .................................................................................... 141
A note on naming materia medica in ancient Greece ............. 144
Exotic ingredients ........................................................................... 145
Greek ingredients accompanied by geographical epithets ...... 164
Final discussion on exotic and luxury ingredients ................... 172
Th e question of infl uences ............................................................ 177
Table One Th e exotic ingredients of the Hippocratic
Corpus that are not accompanied by geographical
epithets ......................................................................................... 190
Table Two Th e exotic ingredients of the Hippocratic
Corpus that are accompanied by geographical epithets ..... 192
Table Th ree Greek products accompanied by geographical
epithets in the Hippocratic Corpus ........................................ 194
Chapter Five Fertility and sex: Th e symbolism attached to
some ingredients of the Hippocratic gynaecological
recipes ............................................................................................... 197
Introduction .................................................................................... 197
Ingredients bearing sexual and fertility connotations in the
gynaecological recipes ............................................................... 199
Ingredients used both to promote and to curb fertility .......... 214
Conclusions Refl ections on the notion of effi cacy ................ 219
Chapter Six Reading, studying and using the Hippocratic
Catalogues of recipes ..................................................................... 225
Introduction .................................................................................... 225
Th e material presentation of recipe collections in antiquity
and the Middle Ages ................................................................. 226
Th e audience of the Hippocratic recipes .................................... 231
Th e involvement of the female patient in her cure:
An analysis of the feminine participles in gynaecological
treatises . ....................................................................................... 248
Conclusions ..................................................................................... 257
contents ix
Chapter Seven Th e aft erlife of Hippocratic recipes ................... 259
Introduction .................................................................................... 259
Hippocrates as an authority in the fi eld of pharmacology ..... 261
Hippocrates as a negative infl uence in the fi eld of
pharmacology ............................................................................. 269
Unacknowledged borrowing or coincidental similarity? ......... 274
Latin translations of the Hippocratic gynaecological
recipes .......................................................................................... 278
Conclusions ..................................................................................... 295
Conclusions Th e fl uidity of pharmacological knowledge ......... 297
Bibliography ......................................................................................... 303
General Index ...................................................................................... 327
Index of Passages Cited ..................................................................... 343
Index of Ingredients ........................................................................... 353