COURSE OUTLINE:
Units and Topics
- COURSE INTRODUCTION
- Slide presentation (I): Egyptian Environment and Material Culture
- Slide presentation (II): Religious and Medical Rituals
- The physician vs. Egyptologist dilemma
- Limitations of western logic to understanding Egyptian medicine
- Egyptian approach to understanding abstract phenomena
- HISTORIOGRAPHY OF EGYPTIAN MEDICINE
- Short history of palaeopathology
- Constituent disciplines of Egyptian medical history
- Sources for the study of Egyptian medicine and medical practice
- EGYPTIAN MAGIC: AN OVERVIEW
- Egyptian world-view and cosmology
- Indivisibility of religion and "magic"
- Essential nature of "magic"
- Function and character of heka, "creative power"
- Kinds of magical applications in medical procedures
- Text readings:
- - the Bentresh Stela
- - "magical" papyri
- - Ebers papyrus (selections)
- THEORETICAL BASES OF DISEASE: AETIOLOGY
- Intellectual and religious constructs related to disease:
- - spiritual causes of illness; malefic deities
- - physical causes of illness
- - principle of âaâ: spiritual/biological attack
- - nature and character of wekhedu:
- wekhedu as aetiological principle
- wekhedu as materia peccans (pyaemia?)
Formulation of specific therapies; preventive medicine
- CHARACTER AND LEGACY OF EGYPTIAN MEDICINE
- Essential characteristics of Egyptian medicine
- Therapy as the integration of the religious and the "rational" and empirical
- Distinctions between Egyptian and Greek medicines
- Legacy of Egyptian medicine to the Greeks and thereafter:
- - the temple-santorium of Asclepius on Cos
- - incubation of dreams as Egyptian custom
- - possible Egyptian influences on Cnidian medicine
- - the Museum (Mouseion) and Library of Alexandria
- - indebtedness of specific Greek and Greco-Roman physicians and natural historians to Egyptian medicine and pharmacopoeia
- - the cult of Asclepius viz. Imouthes/Imhotep
- - Egyptian origins of the Rx-insignia and the caduceus
- THE EGYPTIAN PHYSICIAN
- Nomenclature of physicians (kinds):
- - swnw, "physician"
- - w'ab-priest of Sakhmet
- - controller of Selket
- - amulet-maker, magician, embalmer, etc.
- Primary function as priest and cult officiant
- activities of Greek and Egyptian physicians in Ptolemaic Egypt
- Greek medical economics:
- - the iatrikon, "physicians' tax," and Ptolemaic medical service
- Medical training in Egypt
- The House of Life (Per-ankh): function and organization
- - examples of Houses of Life (Sais, Bubastis, and el-Amarna)
- - "scribe of the House of Life" (Egy.) = "interpreter of dreams" (Gr.)
- Hierarchies of Egyptian physicians: titles and autobiographies
- International repute of Egyptian physicians
- - examples of Egyptian physicians overseas
- FEATURES OF EGYPTIAN MEDICAL PRACTICE
- Anatomy:
- - sources and extent of Egyptian anatomical knowledge
- - notions of internal organs and free passageways through the body
- - the "Book of the Heart" and the circulatory system
- Specializations:
- - Greek accounts of Egyptian specializations
- - evidence for specialization
- - kinds of specialized medical practices
- Medical papyri and texts:
- - Greek tradition: St. Clement and the 42 hermetic books
- - specific medical papyri: descriptions and contents
- - identifying master treatises:
- "Book of the "Heart," "Book of what Pertains to Wounds," "Book of what Pertains to the Embalmer," "Book of the Wandering of Wekhedu," "Book of Transforming a Man into a Youth," etc.
- - approaches to medical therapy in the papyri
- - case studies and medical procedures
- Papyrus Ebers and Edwin Smith surgical papyrus
- EGYPTIAN SURGICAL PRACTICES
- Evidences of surgery
- Characteristics and limitations
- Surgical procedures:
- - trepanation (trephination)
- - amputation
- - circumcision
- - castration
- Surgical instruments and tools:
- - the Cairo Museum collection
- - the Kom Ombo Temple reliefs: instruments or temple implements?
- RELIGIOUS CURING
- Healing deities
- Healing statues: cippi
- Incubation of dreams as therapeutical procedure
- Egyptian temples as health service providers:
- - self-dedication contracts (to gods and temples) as medical annuity contracts
- - temples as health maintenance organizations (HMOs)
- Pilgrimages to temples
- Temple-sanatoria as places of cure:
- - Deir el-Bahari: Shrine of Imouthes and Amenothes
- - Abu Sir (temple of Sahure); Kom Ombo(?): temple of Sobek and Harweris
- - Asclepion at Saqqara ("tomb" of Imouthes/Imhotep)
- - sanatorium of Hathor at Dendera: architecture and function
- WOMEN'S HEALTH
- Question of female physicians
- - limitations of evidence
- - sole example: Peseshet, "overseer of physicians"
- Obstetrical practices and child birthing
- Pregnancy tests and birth prognoses
- - Papyrus Carlsberg VIII and el-Lahun (Kahun) papyrus
- Contraception and attitudes toward abortion
- - case studies: el-Lahun (Kahun) and Ebers papyri
- Gynaecology and women's diseases:
- - case studies: el-Lahun (Kahun) and Ebers papyri
- MATERIA MEDICA
- International repute of Egyptian pharmacology
- Egyptian drugs and medicaments
- Form, content and indications for prescribed remedies
- Case studies
- Analyses of select active ingredients
- Hallucinogenic drugs and psycho-active agents
- DENTISTRY AND DENTAL PRACTICE
- Characteristics of dental practice
- Dental diseases and treatments
- Orthodontics and oral surgery
- Dental appliances
- PALAEOPATHOLOGY
- Human palaeobiology: definition, objectives and findings
- Methodologies:
- - autopsies
- - radiological studies (X-ray, CAT Scanning, MRI, etc.)
- - molecular anthropology and DNA research
- State of Egyptian health, physical condition and lifespan
- Evidence of diseases and causes of death
- Case studies
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