Medicine and Byzantine medicine

[Prince Cobra]

This is one of my regular tough threads. I tried to find info about Byzantine doctors and healers. I learned some new things. However I am not sure whether the Byzantine doctors were clergymen or they were civil. Any help will be appreciated. I will not mind if given some sites to read from...
However the thread can be used to for any discussion about the Medieval medicine, other aspects of Byzantine medicine and so on...

[matteus the inbred]

Hi Stephen
I did a course unit in mediaeval medicine for my MA degree...I'll see if I can dig out anything useful. Western mediaeval clergy were not usually doctors or surgeons as they were forbidden to spill blood, so this was usually the province of either barbers (barber-surgeons) or university trained physicians. Some barber-surgeons rose quite high by their skills (John Argentine was Henry V's surgeon) and some physicians did also practice surgery. I doubt that Byzantine doctors were usually clergy, as there are some records of Greek doctors practising in Europe. I will try to find out more...

I even managed to find an article about a mediaeval Croatian surgeon performing an operation to remove kidney stones, ouch...!

[edyzmedieval]

Clergy were never medical guys. Simple men were medics. And I can tell you, the Byzantines were very good at medicine. Here's a list with some great Byzantine medicals:

Oribasos of Pergamum(325-400) - "Medical Collection" - 70 books
Alexandros of Tralles(VI th century) - Treaty on general medicine(was a big hit...was translated into Latin, Arabic and Hebrew)
Aetios of Armida(502-575; Justinian's personal medic) - Medical enciclopedia
Paul of Egina(VII century) - Medical enciclopedia(translated in Arabic, it influenced very much the Arabic medicine)

Constantinople had many hospitals. There is one still standing(at least that's what I know...) made by Ioannos I Komnen in 1112. Even Mikhail Psellos and Anna Komnena were considering themselves medics.
And Anna Komnena is mentioning the hospitals in her book. There was one in Constantinople "which required one whole day to visit everything"(Steven Runciman).

Hope it helps.

[Avicenna]

Didn't the Byzantines not practice so much due to Christianity? I think they thought the body was only temporary residence of the soul, so therefore didn't do much to keep it in great form. Most of medical advances were in the Islamic world in this stage I think, so the Byzantines weren't that great.

This is all from one book though, so I can't be sure.

[edyzmedieval]

This was the ORTHODOX Church, not the Catholic Church.

They borrowed from Islam, but they didn't borrow extensively. Most of their research is their own work.

[Prince Cobra]

Small update: yes many of the byz physicians were civil. And there were some well-edicated clergymen who also were physicians. In addition there were Jews who were also physicians in Byzantium. And thanks for the info! It allowed me to continue my story until I found more info.

And yes, I found that the hospitals in the Byzantium were for healing the people not the place where the ill just died ( as in Western Europe).