Available for the first time in paperback, this first large-scale, sole-authored history of ancient medicine for almost 100 years uses both archaeological and written evidence to survey the development of medical ideas from early Greece to late Antiquity. Vivian Nutton pays particular attention to the life and work of doctors in the communities, links between medicine and magic, and examines the different approaches to medicine across the ancient world. With many texts made accessible for the first time, and providing new evidence, this broad exploration challenges usual perspectives, and proves an invaluable resource for students of both classics and the history of medicine.

Table of Contents

Sources and Scope. Patterns of Disease. Before Hippocrates. Hippocrates, the Hippocratic Corpus and the Defining of Medicine. Hippocratic Theories. Hippocratic Practices. Religion and Medicine in Fifth- and Fourth-Century Greece. From Plato to Praxagoras. Alexandria, Anatomy and Experimentation. Hellenistic Medicine. Rome and the Transplantation of Greek Medicine. The Consequences of Empire: Pharmacology, Surgery and the Roman Army. The Rise of Methodism Humoral Alternatives. The Life and Career of Galen. Galenic Medicine. All Sorts and Conditions of (Mainly) Men. Medicine and the Religions of the Later Roman Empire. Medicine in the Later Roman Empire