Quid Pro Quo: Studies in the History of Drugs

ISBN-13: 9780860783190 / Angielski / Twarda / 1992 / 330 str.

Riddle, John M.

Opis

All too often ancient herbal and other remedies have been dismissed as a simplya folklore, of no relevance to medical science. John Riddlea s approach, however, has been to explore the history of drugs with the hypothesis that ancient and medieval medicines were effective a a methodology that he expounds in the final essay (hitherto unpublished). Indeed, he shows, both from detailed case-studies and from the comparison of the listings given by classical and medieval authorities with those in modern pharmacopoeias, that our ancestors had discovered and made effective use of many of the drugs used in medicine today, from antiseptics and analgesics to oral contraceptives, even chemotherapy for cancer. There is the suggestion, therefore, that more careful examination and identification of the drugs used in the past may reveal chemicals that can be exploited anew. Central to these studies is the investigation of how a drug was used and how knowledge about it was transmitted a and perhaps also distorted in the process a from the Classical world through the Middle Ages. Les anciens remedes, phytotherapie et autres, ont trop souvent ete mis aux rangs du folklore et consideres comme na ayant aucun rapport avec la science medicale. La approche de John Riddle, cependant, a ete da explorer la histoire des drogues, en prenant pour hypothese la efficacite de la medecine ancienne et medievale a une methodologie qua il expose dans son dernier essai (jusqua A present jamais publie). En effet, il demontre A partir de cas da etudes detailles et de la comparaison etablie entre les listages fournis par les autorites antiques et medievales et ceux des pharmacopees modernes, que nos ancA tres avaient decouvert et mis A bon escient la utilisation de nombreux remedes dont se sert la medecine A la heure actuelle: des antiseptiques et analgesiques, aux contraceptifs oraux et mA me jusqua A la chimiotherapie pour le cancer. Suggestion est faite donc, qua une identification et un examen plus attentifs des drogues utilisees par le passe, pourrait reveler des produits de nouveau exploitables. Au centre de ces etudes, se trouve une enquA te menee sur la faA on dont on utilisait les remedes et dont ces connaissances etaient transmises a et peut-A tre aussi deformees a du monde antique jusqua au Moyen Age."

Recenzje

'...Riddle’s reading of medieval texts sheds welcome light on therapeutic practices of the distant past...[there are] substantive contributions to the study of medieval medicine presented in this anthology.' Bulletin of the History of Medicine, Vol. 67

Spis treści

Contents: Pomum ambrae: amber and ambergris in plague remedies; The introduction and use of Eastern drugs in the Early Middle Ages; Lithotherapy in the Middle Ages - lapidaries considered as medical texts; The Latin alphabetical Dioscorides manuscript group; Amber in ancient pharmacy: the transmission of information about a single drug; Theory and practice in medieval medicine; Book reviews, lectures, and marginal notes: three previously unknown 16th-century contributions to pharmacy, medicine and botany - Ioannes Manardus, Franciscus Frigimelica and Melchior Guilandinus; Albert on stones and minerals; Pseudo-Dioscorides Ex herbis femininis and early medieval medical botany; Gargilius Martialis as a medical writer; The Pseudo-Hippocratic Dynamidia; Ancient and medieval chemotherapy for cancer; Byzantine commentaries on Dioscorides; Folk tradition and folk medicine: recognition of drugs in Classical antiquity; Methodology of historical drug research; Indexes.