Greek Medicine

The reconstruction we are able to make of Greek knowledge of the human body and physiology significantly depends on the nature of the texts available and the alterations in their transmission. The presentation of opinions on anatomophysiology, humoral theory, nosology, semiotics and etiology of diseases therefore requires us to follow a road made up of several parallel and sometimes convergent paths, in some sections very well lit but in other sections rather dark, as well as to rely on the testimony of elliptical and not always objective sources in the presentation of their predecessors' ideas. In addition to humors, a ubiquitous and, in some treatises, highly valued constituent of the body is pneuma, a term that not only designates wind and breath but also inner air, respirations and, in the medieval Latin tradition, “spirits”. Asclepiades was the originator of methodical medicine, which was hugely successful in the early imperial period.