Medicine In the Middle Ages

Medicine In the Middle Ages

After the collapse of the Roman Empire midway through the first

millennium A.D. many of its former provinces suffered from regression.

As the affluent empirical resources had been taken away with the

withdrawal of the Roman armies from Britain, few had the knowledge or

skill to continue their work or to preserve their foundations of a

great society. With the chaos following the Romans' withdrawal, while

Britain was invaded by the Vikings, Saxons and Normans, much of their

knowledge was lost.

Very few people could read or write so the books the Romans had

learned from were useless. As the British people were conquered by

nations who had never been under the Roman influence and therefore had

no understanding of their literature or practical beliefs, they

regressed to a similar way of life they led from before the Romans

came.

The Roman doctors had followed practical methods of diagnosis,

prognosis, treatment and surgery but this approach was soon replaced

by superstitious and spiritual remedies. The Romans had many Gods but

their religion had never been truly accepted in Britain and the native

people held mainly pagan beliefs. With these beliefs went methods of

medicinal treatment that were based on appeasing specific spirits or

superstition. When Britain became a Christian nation these beliefs

continued and, although the spiritual cures were mostly replaced by

prayer, they still had very little effect.

The Romans had got much of their knowledge from the Greeks, who came

up with many theories about the cause of disease. The most popular was

the Theory of the Four Humours, which stated that illne...

... middle of paper ...

... fled to the countryside while the poor stayed in the

overcrowded towns to die. People who caught the plague were shut

inside their houses with their families. Many theories were developed

about how the plague was spread. Most people thought it was spread by

bad smells in the air and no one attributed it to the rats.

The Middle Ages was a time of serious regression and very little

progress was made. This was mainly because of the influence of

Christianity and the hysterical witch-hunts that led to people being

too scared to oppose the rulings of the Church. Its influence was so

powerful that until the time of Henry VIII the Church had more power

then the King. People forgot the Roman ways of thinking and instead

adopted and re-learned the pagan beliefs of Britain's conquerors,

including those which affected medicine.