Hippocratic Corpus
Encyclopedia
The Hippocratic Corpus or Hippocratic Collection, is a collection of around 60 early Ancient Greek medical works strongly associated with the physician Hippocrates
and his teachings. They are, however, varied in content, age and style, and are largely of unknown authorship.
identifies the hands of at least twenty authors in the Hippocratic Corpus. However, the varied works of the corpus have gone under Hippocrates' name since antiquity. The corpus may be the remains of a library of Cos
, or a collection compiled in the third century B.C. in Alexandria
. It was not, however, only the Coan
school of Ancient Greek medicine that contributed to it; the Cnidian
did, too. Only a fraction of the Hippocratic writings have survived. The lost medical literature is sometimes referred to in the surviving treatises, as at the beginning of Regimen. Some Hippocratic works are known only in translation. "Hippocratic" texts survive in Arabic, Hebrew, Syriac, and Latin
.
, the last decades of the 5th century BC and the first half of the 4th century BC. Among the later works, The Law, On the Heart, On the Physician, and On Sevens are all Hellenistic, while Precepts and On Decorum are from the 1st and 2nd centuries AD.
Some of the earliest works of the corpus (mid-fifth century) are connected to the Cnidian school: On Diseases II-III and the early layer within On the Diseases of Women I-II and On Sterile Women. Prorrhetics I is also mid-fifth century. In the second half of the fifth century, a single author likely produced the treatises On Airs, Waters, Places; Prognostics; Prorrhetics II; and On the Sacred Disease. Other fifth-century works include On Fleshes, Epidemics I and III (ca. 410 BC), On Ancient Medicine, On Regimen in Acute Diseases, and Polybus' On the Nature of Man/Regimen in Health (410-400 BC).
At the end of the fifth or the beginning of the fourth century, one author likely wrote Epidemics II-IV-VI and On the Humors. The coherent group of surgical treatises (On Fractures, On Joints, On Injuries of the Head, Surgery, Mochlicon) is of similar date.
The gynecological treatises On the Nature of the Woman, On the Diseases of Women, Generation, On the Nature of the Child, and On Sterile Women constitute a closely related group. identified five layers of material in this group, from the mid-fifth century to the mid-fourth century. The oldest stratum is found in On the Nature of the Woman and On the Diseases of Women II. Generation and On the Nature of the Child constitute a single work by a late-fifth-century author, who may also be identified as the author of On Diseases IV and of sections of On the Diseases of Women I. The latest layer is On Sterile Women, which was composed after the other gynecological treatises were in existence.
A single fourth-century author probably wrote On Fistulae and On Hemorrhoids.
. Books I and III of Epidemics contain forty-two case histories, of which 60% (25) ended in the patient's death. Nearly all of the diseases described in the Corpus are endemic diseases: colds, consumption, pneumonia, etc.
to a rationalism
reminiscent of the physical theories of the Presocratics, these two tendencies can exist side-by-side: "The close association between knowledge and experience is characteristic of the Hippocratics," despite "the Plato
nic attempt to drive a wedge between the two."
The author of On Ancient Medicine launches immediately into a critique of opponents who posit a single "cause in all cases" of disease, "having laid down as a hypothesis
for their account hot or cold or wet or dry or anything else they want." The method put forward in this treatise "could certainly be characterized as an empirical one," preferring the effects of diet as observed by the senses to cosmological speculations, and it was seized upon by Hellenistic Empiricist
doctors for this reason. However, "unlike the Empiricists, the author does not claim that the doctor's knowledge is limited to what can be observed by the senses. On the contrary, he requires the doctor to have quite extensive knowledge of aspects of the human constitution that cannot be observed directly, such as the state of the patient's humors and internal organs."
), against opponents who (perhaps following Protagoras
' critique of expert knowledge) claim it produces no better results against disease than chance (an attack served by the fact that doctors refused to treat the serious and difficult cases they judged to be incurable by their art). The treatise may be considered "the first attempt at general epistemology bequeathed to us by antiquity," although this may only be because we have lost fifth-century rhetoric
al works that took a similar approach.
For this writer, as for the author of On the Places in Man, the art of medicine has been wholly discovered. While for the author of On the Places in Man "the principles discovered in it clearly have very little need of good luck," the author of The Art acknowledges the practical limitations that arise in the therapeutic application of these principles. Likewise for the author of On Regimen, the "knowledge and discernment of the nature of man in general—knowledge of its primary constituents and discernment of the components by which it is controlled" may be completely worked out, and yet in practice it is difficult to determine and apply the correct and proportionate diet and exercise to the individual patient.
considers that epilepsy
(the so-called "sacred" disease) "has a natural cause, and its supposed divine origin is due to men's inexperience and to their wonder at its peculiar character." An exception to this rule is found in Dreams (Regime IV), in which prayers to the gods are prescribed alongside more typically Hippocratic interventions. Though materialistic
determinism
goes back in Greek thought at least to Leucippus
, "One of the greatest virtues of the physicians of the Hippocratic Collection is to have stated, in its most universal form, what was later to be called the principle of determinism. All that occurs has a cause. It is in the treatise of The Art that the most theoretical statement of this principle is to be found: 'Indeed, under a close examination spontaneity disappears; for everything that occurs will be found to do so through something [dia ti].'" In a famous passage of On Ancient Medicine, the author insists on the importance of knowledge of causal explanations: "It is not sufficient to learn simply that cheese is a bad food, as it gives a pain to one who eats a surfeit of it; we must know what the pain is, the reasons for it [dia ti], and which constituent of man is harmfully affected."
."
The most famous work in the Hippocratic Corpus is the Hippocratic Oath
, a landmark declaration of medical ethics. The Hippocratic Oath is both philosophical and practical; it not only deals with abstract principles but practical matters such as removing stones and aiding one's teacher financially. It is a complex and probably not the work of one man. It remains in use, though rarely in its original form.
The preamble of On the Physician offers "a physical and moral portrait of the ideal physician," and the Precepts also concern the physician's conduct. Treatises such as On Joints and Epidemics VI are concerned with the provision of such "courtesies" as providing a patient with cushions during a procedure, and Decorum includes advice on good manners to be observed in the doctor's office or when visiting patients.
, a translator of the Corpus, goes further and calls it sometimes “obscure”. Of course, not all of the Corpus is of this “laconic” style, though most of it is. It was Hippocratic practice to write in this style.
The whole corpus is written in Ionic Greek, though the island of Cos was in a region that spoke Doric Greek
.
The Art and On Breaths show the influence of Sophistic rhetoric; they "are characterized by long introductions and conclusions, antitheses
, anaphoras, and sound effects typical of Gorgianic
style." Other works also have rhetorical elements. In general, it can be said that "the Hippocratic physician was also an orator," with his role including public speeches and "verbal wrestling matches."
and was edited by Marcus Fabius Calvus
in Rome
. The first complete Greek
edition followed the next year from the Aldine Press
in Venice
. A significant edition was that of Émile Littré
who spent twenty-two years (1839–1861) working diligently on a complete Greek edition and French translation of the Hippocratic Corpus. This was scholarly, yet sometimes inaccurate and awkward. Another edition of note was that of Franz Zacharias Ermerins
, published in Utrecht between 1859 and 1864. Kühlewein's Teubner edition (1894-1902) "mark[ed] a distinct advance."
Beginning in 1967, an important modern edition by Jacques Jouanna and others began to appear (with Greek text, French translation, and commentary) in the Collection Budé
. Other important bilingual annotated editions (with translation in German or French) continue to appear in the Corpus medicorum graecorum published by the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften.
's Chirurgerie ("Surgery"), was published in 1597, but a complete English translation of a dozen and a half "genuine" works was not offered in English until Francis Adams' publication of 1849. Other works of the corpus remained untranslated into English until the resumed publication of the Loeb Classical Library
edition beginning in 1988. The first four Loeb volumes were published in 1923-1931, and five further volumes appeared between 1988 and 2010. A tenth volume by Ann Ellis Hanson
, containing the gynecological treatises, is expected to complete the series.
Possibly genuine works of Hippocrates
Works of Polybus
Works predating Hippocrates
Works of the age or spirit of Hippocrates
Gynecological works
Post-Hippocratic works (age of Aristotle
and Praxagoras
)
Late and dubious works
Other Greek texts
Bibliography
Hippocrates
Hippocrates of Cos or Hippokrates of Kos was an ancient Greek physician of the Age of Pericles , and is considered one of the most outstanding figures in the history of medicine...
and his teachings. They are, however, varied in content, age and style, and are largely of unknown authorship.
Authorship, name, origin
Of the texts in the corpus, none is proven to be by Hippocrates himself. The works of the corpus range from Hippocrates' time and school to many centuries later and rival points of view. Franz Zacharias ErmerinsFranz Zacharias Ermerins
Franz Zacharias Ermerins was a Dutch Physician and medical-editor whose literary work encompassed Hippocrates and ancient Greek medicine....
identifies the hands of at least twenty authors in the Hippocratic Corpus. However, the varied works of the corpus have gone under Hippocrates' name since antiquity. The corpus may be the remains of a library of Cos
Kos
Kos or Cos is a Greek island in the south Sporades group of the Dodecanese, next to the Gulf of Gökova/Cos. It measures by , and is from the coast of Bodrum, Turkey and the ancient region of Caria. Administratively the island forms a separate municipality within the Kos peripheral unit, which is...
, or a collection compiled in the third century B.C. in Alexandria
Alexandria
Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...
. It was not, however, only the Coan
Kos
Kos or Cos is a Greek island in the south Sporades group of the Dodecanese, next to the Gulf of Gökova/Cos. It measures by , and is from the coast of Bodrum, Turkey and the ancient region of Caria. Administratively the island forms a separate municipality within the Kos peripheral unit, which is...
school of Ancient Greek medicine that contributed to it; the Cnidian
Knidos
Knidos or Cnidus is an ancient settlement located in Turkey. It was an ancient Greek city of Caria, part of the Dorian Hexapolis. It was situated on the Datça peninsula, which forms the southern side of the Sinus Ceramicus, now known as Gulf of Gökova. By the fourth century BC, Knidos was located...
did, too. Only a fraction of the Hippocratic writings have survived. The lost medical literature is sometimes referred to in the surviving treatises, as at the beginning of Regimen. Some Hippocratic works are known only in translation. "Hippocratic" texts survive in Arabic, Hebrew, Syriac, and Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
.
Dates and groupings
The majority of the works in the Hippocratic Corpus date from the Classical periodClassical Greece
Classical Greece was a 200 year period in Greek culture lasting from the 5th through 4th centuries BC. This classical period had a powerful influence on the Roman Empire and greatly influenced the foundation of Western civilizations. Much of modern Western politics, artistic thought, such as...
, the last decades of the 5th century BC and the first half of the 4th century BC. Among the later works, The Law, On the Heart, On the Physician, and On Sevens are all Hellenistic, while Precepts and On Decorum are from the 1st and 2nd centuries AD.
Some of the earliest works of the corpus (mid-fifth century) are connected to the Cnidian school: On Diseases II-III and the early layer within On the Diseases of Women I-II and On Sterile Women. Prorrhetics I is also mid-fifth century. In the second half of the fifth century, a single author likely produced the treatises On Airs, Waters, Places; Prognostics; Prorrhetics II; and On the Sacred Disease. Other fifth-century works include On Fleshes, Epidemics I and III (ca. 410 BC), On Ancient Medicine, On Regimen in Acute Diseases, and Polybus' On the Nature of Man/Regimen in Health (410-400 BC).
At the end of the fifth or the beginning of the fourth century, one author likely wrote Epidemics II-IV-VI and On the Humors. The coherent group of surgical treatises (On Fractures, On Joints, On Injuries of the Head, Surgery, Mochlicon) is of similar date.
The gynecological treatises On the Nature of the Woman, On the Diseases of Women, Generation, On the Nature of the Child, and On Sterile Women constitute a closely related group. identified five layers of material in this group, from the mid-fifth century to the mid-fourth century. The oldest stratum is found in On the Nature of the Woman and On the Diseases of Women II. Generation and On the Nature of the Child constitute a single work by a late-fifth-century author, who may also be identified as the author of On Diseases IV and of sections of On the Diseases of Women I. The latest layer is On Sterile Women, which was composed after the other gynecological treatises were in existence.
A single fourth-century author probably wrote On Fistulae and On Hemorrhoids.
Content
The Hippocratic Corpus contains textbooks, lectures, research, notes and philosophical essays on various subjects in medicine, in no particular order. These works were written for different audiences, both specialists and laymen, and were sometimes written from opposing view points; significant contradictions can be found between works in the Corpus.Case histories
One significant portion of the corpus is made up of case historiesMedical history
The medical history or anamnesis of a patient is information gained by a physician by asking specific questions, either of the patient or of other people who know the person and can give suitable information , with the aim of obtaining information useful in formulating a diagnosis and providing...
. Books I and III of Epidemics contain forty-two case histories, of which 60% (25) ended in the patient's death. Nearly all of the diseases described in the Corpus are endemic diseases: colds, consumption, pneumonia, etc.
Theoretical and methodological reflections
In several texts of the corpus, the ancient physicians elaborate theories of illness, sometimes grappling with the methodological difficulties that lie in the way of effective and consistent diagnosis and treatment: "One of the great merits of the physicians of the Hippocratic Corpus is that they are not content to practice medicine and to commit their experience to writing, but that they have reflected on their own activity."Reason and experience
While the approaches range from empiricismEmpiricism
Empiricism is a theory of knowledge that asserts that knowledge comes only or primarily via sensory experience. One of several views of epistemology, the study of human knowledge, along with rationalism, idealism and historicism, empiricism emphasizes the role of experience and evidence,...
to a rationalism
Rationalism
In epistemology and in its modern sense, rationalism is "any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification" . In more technical terms, it is a method or a theory "in which the criterion of the truth is not sensory but intellectual and deductive"...
reminiscent of the physical theories of the Presocratics, these two tendencies can exist side-by-side: "The close association between knowledge and experience is characteristic of the Hippocratics," despite "the Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
nic attempt to drive a wedge between the two."
The author of On Ancient Medicine launches immediately into a critique of opponents who posit a single "cause in all cases" of disease, "having laid down as a hypothesis
Hypothesis
A hypothesis is a proposed explanation for a phenomenon. The term derives from the Greek, ὑποτιθέναι – hypotithenai meaning "to put under" or "to suppose". For a hypothesis to be put forward as a scientific hypothesis, the scientific method requires that one can test it...
for their account hot or cold or wet or dry or anything else they want." The method put forward in this treatise "could certainly be characterized as an empirical one," preferring the effects of diet as observed by the senses to cosmological speculations, and it was seized upon by Hellenistic Empiricist
Empiric school
The Empiric school of medicine was an ancient school of medicine in ancient Greece and Rome. They were so called from the word empeiria because they professed to derive their knowledge from experiences only, and in doing so set themselves in opposition to the Dogmatic school...
doctors for this reason. However, "unlike the Empiricists, the author does not claim that the doctor's knowledge is limited to what can be observed by the senses. On the contrary, he requires the doctor to have quite extensive knowledge of aspects of the human constitution that cannot be observed directly, such as the state of the patient's humors and internal organs."
Epistemology and the scientific status of medicine
The author of The Art is at pains to defend the status of medicine as an art (techneTechne
Techne, or techné, as distinguished from episteme, is etymologically derived from the Greek word τέχνη which is often translated as craftsmanship, craft, or art. It is the rational method involved in producing an object or accomplishing a goal or objective...
), against opponents who (perhaps following Protagoras
Protagoras
Protagoras was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher and is numbered as one of the sophists by Plato. In his dialogue Protagoras, Plato credits him with having invented the role of the professional sophist or teacher of virtue...
' critique of expert knowledge) claim it produces no better results against disease than chance (an attack served by the fact that doctors refused to treat the serious and difficult cases they judged to be incurable by their art). The treatise may be considered "the first attempt at general epistemology bequeathed to us by antiquity," although this may only be because we have lost fifth-century rhetoric
Rhetoric
Rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the facility of speakers or writers who attempt to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. As a subject of formal study and a productive civic practice, rhetoric has played a central role in the Western...
al works that took a similar approach.
For this writer, as for the author of On the Places in Man, the art of medicine has been wholly discovered. While for the author of On the Places in Man "the principles discovered in it clearly have very little need of good luck," the author of The Art acknowledges the practical limitations that arise in the therapeutic application of these principles. Likewise for the author of On Regimen, the "knowledge and discernment of the nature of man in general—knowledge of its primary constituents and discernment of the components by which it is controlled" may be completely worked out, and yet in practice it is difficult to determine and apply the correct and proportionate diet and exercise to the individual patient.
Natural vs. divine causality
Whatever their disagreements, the Hippocratic writers agree in rejecting divine and religious causes and remedies of disease in favor of natural mechanisms. Thus On the Sacred DiseaseOn the Sacred Disease
On the Sacred Disease is a work of the Hippocratic Corpus, written in 400 BCE. The authorship of this piece can not be confirmed and is therefore regarded as dubious. The treatise is thought to contain the first recorded observations of epilepsy in humans. The author explains these phenomena by an...
considers that epilepsy
Epilepsy
Epilepsy is a common chronic neurological disorder characterized by seizures. These seizures are transient signs and/or symptoms of abnormal, excessive or hypersynchronous neuronal activity in the brain.About 50 million people worldwide have epilepsy, and nearly two out of every three new cases...
(the so-called "sacred" disease) "has a natural cause, and its supposed divine origin is due to men's inexperience and to their wonder at its peculiar character." An exception to this rule is found in Dreams (Regime IV), in which prayers to the gods are prescribed alongside more typically Hippocratic interventions. Though materialistic
Materialism
In philosophy, the theory of materialism holds that the only thing that exists is matter; that all things are composed of material and all phenomena are the result of material interactions. In other words, matter is the only substance...
determinism
Determinism
Determinism is the general philosophical thesis that states that for everything that happens there are conditions such that, given them, nothing else could happen. There are many versions of this thesis. Each of them rests upon various alleged connections, and interdependencies of things and...
goes back in Greek thought at least to Leucippus
Leucippus
Leucippus or Leukippos was one of the earliest Greeks to develop the theory of atomism — the idea that everything is composed entirely of various imperishable, indivisible elements called atoms — which was elaborated in greater detail by his pupil and successor, Democritus...
, "One of the greatest virtues of the physicians of the Hippocratic Collection is to have stated, in its most universal form, what was later to be called the principle of determinism. All that occurs has a cause. It is in the treatise of The Art that the most theoretical statement of this principle is to be found: 'Indeed, under a close examination spontaneity disappears; for everything that occurs will be found to do so through something [dia ti].'" In a famous passage of On Ancient Medicine, the author insists on the importance of knowledge of causal explanations: "It is not sufficient to learn simply that cheese is a bad food, as it gives a pain to one who eats a surfeit of it; we must know what the pain is, the reasons for it [dia ti], and which constituent of man is harmfully affected."
Medical ethics and manners
The duties of the physician are an object of the Hippocratic writers' attention. A famous maxim (Epidemics I.11) advises: "As to diseases, make a habit of two things—to help, or at least to do no harmPrimum non nocere
is a Latin phrase that means "First, do no harm". The phrase is sometimes recorded as .Nonmaleficence, which derives from the maxim, is one of the principal precepts of medical ethics that all medical students are taught in medical school and is a fundamental principle for emergency medical...
."
The most famous work in the Hippocratic Corpus is the Hippocratic Oath
Hippocratic Oath
The Hippocratic Oath is an oath historically taken by physicians and other healthcare professionals swearing to practice medicine ethically. It is widely believed to have been written by Hippocrates, often regarded as the father of western medicine, or by one of his students. The oath is written in...
, a landmark declaration of medical ethics. The Hippocratic Oath is both philosophical and practical; it not only deals with abstract principles but practical matters such as removing stones and aiding one's teacher financially. It is a complex and probably not the work of one man. It remains in use, though rarely in its original form.
The preamble of On the Physician offers "a physical and moral portrait of the ideal physician," and the Precepts also concern the physician's conduct. Treatises such as On Joints and Epidemics VI are concerned with the provision of such "courtesies" as providing a patient with cushions during a procedure, and Decorum includes advice on good manners to be observed in the doctor's office or when visiting patients.
Style
The writing style of the Corpus has been remarked upon for centuries, being described by some as, "clear, precise, and simple". It is often praised for its objectivity and concisesness, yet some have criticised it as being "grave and austere". Francis AdamsFrancis Adams (translator)
Francis Adams was a Scottish medical doctor and translator of Greek medical works.Adams had a practice in Banchory, Aberdeenshire, from 1819 to 1861...
, a translator of the Corpus, goes further and calls it sometimes “obscure”. Of course, not all of the Corpus is of this “laconic” style, though most of it is. It was Hippocratic practice to write in this style.
The whole corpus is written in Ionic Greek, though the island of Cos was in a region that spoke Doric Greek
Doric Greek
Doric or Dorian was a dialect of ancient Greek. Its variants were spoken in the southern and eastern Peloponnese, Crete, Rhodes, some islands in the southern Aegean Sea, some cities on the coasts of Asia Minor, Southern Italy, Sicily, Epirus and Macedon. Together with Northwest Greek, it forms the...
.
The Art and On Breaths show the influence of Sophistic rhetoric; they "are characterized by long introductions and conclusions, antitheses
Antithesis
Antithesis is a counter-proposition and denotes a direct contrast to the original proposition...
, anaphoras, and sound effects typical of Gorgianic
Gorgias
Gorgias ,Greek sophist, pre-socratic philosopher and rhetorician, was a native of Leontini in Sicily. Along with Protagoras, he forms the first generation of Sophists. Several doxographers report that he was a pupil of Empedocles, although he would only have been a few years younger...
style." Other works also have rhetorical elements. In general, it can be said that "the Hippocratic physician was also an orator," with his role including public speeches and "verbal wrestling matches."
Printed editions
The entire Hippocratic Corpus was first printed as a unit in 1525. This edition was in LatinLatin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
and was edited by Marcus Fabius Calvus
Marcus Fabius Calvus
Marcus Fabius Calvus van Ravenna was an author and translator of the works of Hippocrates. He first translated the Hippocratic Corpus into Latin in Rome, 1525....
in Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
. The first complete Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
edition followed the next year from the Aldine Press
Aldine Press
Aldine Press was the printing office started by Aldus Manutius in 1494 in Venice, from which were issued the celebrated Aldine editions of the classics . The Aldine Press is famous in the history of typography, among other things, for the introduction of italics...
in Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
. A significant edition was that of Émile Littré
Émile Littré
Émile Maximilien Paul Littré was a French lexicographer and philosopher, best known for his Dictionnaire de la langue française, commonly called "The Littré".-Biography:Émile Littré was born in Paris...
who spent twenty-two years (1839–1861) working diligently on a complete Greek edition and French translation of the Hippocratic Corpus. This was scholarly, yet sometimes inaccurate and awkward. Another edition of note was that of Franz Zacharias Ermerins
Franz Zacharias Ermerins
Franz Zacharias Ermerins was a Dutch Physician and medical-editor whose literary work encompassed Hippocrates and ancient Greek medicine....
, published in Utrecht between 1859 and 1864. Kühlewein's Teubner edition (1894-1902) "mark[ed] a distinct advance."
Beginning in 1967, an important modern edition by Jacques Jouanna and others began to appear (with Greek text, French translation, and commentary) in the Collection Budé
Collection Budé
The Collection Budé, or the Collection des Universités de France, is a series of books comprising the Greek and Latin classics up to the middle of the 6th century...
. Other important bilingual annotated editions (with translation in German or French) continue to appear in the Corpus medicorum graecorum published by the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften.
English translations
The first English translation from the Hippocratic Corpus, Peter LowePeter Lowe (surgeon)
Peter Lowe was a surgeon and founder of the institution now known as the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow.-Biography:Lowe was born in Scotland around 1550 and left in 1565 to study medicine on the Continent...
's Chirurgerie ("Surgery"), was published in 1597, but a complete English translation of a dozen and a half "genuine" works was not offered in English until Francis Adams' publication of 1849. Other works of the corpus remained untranslated into English until the resumed publication of the Loeb Classical Library
Loeb Classical Library
The Loeb Classical Library is a series of books, today published by Harvard University Press, which presents important works of ancient Greek and Latin Literature in a way designed to make the text accessible to the broadest possible audience, by presenting the original Greek or Latin text on each...
edition beginning in 1988. The first four Loeb volumes were published in 1923-1931, and five further volumes appeared between 1988 and 2010. A tenth volume by Ann Ellis Hanson
Ann Ellis Hanson
Ann Ellis Hanson is an American historian, and senior research scholar at the Papyrological Institute at Yale University.-Works:*, Before sexuality: the construction of erotic experience in the ancient Greek world, Editors David M. Halperin, John J. Winkler, Froma I...
, containing the gynecological treatises, is expected to complete the series.
List of works of the Corpus
(Ordering from Adams 1891, pp. 40-105; LCL = vols. of the Loeb Classical Library edition)Possibly genuine works of Hippocrates
- On Ancient Medicine or Tradition in Medicine (LCL 1)
- Prognostics (LCL 2)
- Aphorisms (LCL 4)
- Epidemics I and III (LCL 1)
- On Regimen in Acute Diseases (LCL 2, 6)
- On Airs, Waters, and Places (LCL 1)
- On the Articulations or On Joints (LCL 3)
- On Fractures (LCL 3)
- On the Instruments of Reduction or Mochlicon (LCL 3)
- On Injuries of the Head (LCL 3)
- The Hippocratic OathHippocratic OathThe Hippocratic Oath is an oath historically taken by physicians and other healthcare professionals swearing to practice medicine ethically. It is widely believed to have been written by Hippocrates, often regarded as the father of western medicine, or by one of his students. The oath is written in...
(LCL 1) - The Law or The Canon (LCL 2)
- The Physician's Establishment or Surgery (LCL 3)
Works of Polybus
- On the Nature of ManOn the Nature of ManOn the Nature of Man is a work in the Hippocratic Corpus. On the Nature of Man is attributed to Polybus, the son in law and disciple of Hippocrates, through a testimony from Aristotle's History of Animals.However as with the many other works of the Hippocratic Corpus, the authorship is regarded as...
(LCL 4) - Regimen in Health (LCL 4)
Works predating Hippocrates
- Prorrhetics I (LCL 8)
- The Coan Praenotions (LCL 9)
Works of the age or spirit of Hippocrates
- Prorrhetics II (LCL 8)
- On Ulcers (LCL 8)
- On Fistulae (LCL 8)
- On Hemorrhoids (LCL 8)
- On the Sacred DiseaseOn the Sacred DiseaseOn the Sacred Disease is a work of the Hippocratic Corpus, written in 400 BCE. The authorship of this piece can not be confirmed and is therefore regarded as dubious. The treatise is thought to contain the first recorded observations of epilepsy in humans. The author explains these phenomena by an...
(LCL 2) - On Airs or Breaths or Of the Pneuma (LCL 2)
- On the Places in Man (LCL 8)
- The Art or The Science of Medicine (LCL 2)
- On Regimen (LCL 4)
- On Dreams (LCL 4)
- On Affections (LCL 5)
- On Internal Affections (LCL 6)
- On Diseases (LCL 5, 6)
- On the Seventh Month's Foetus (LCL 9)
- On the Eighth Month's Foetus (LCL 9)
- Epidemics II, IV-VII (LCL 7)
- On the Humors (LCL 4)
- On the Use of Liquids (LCL 8)
Gynecological works
- On Semen or Generation or On Intercourse
- On the Nature of the Child or Pregnancy
- On the Diseases of Women
- On Sterile Women
- On the Diseases of Young Women or Girls (LCL 9)
- On Superfoetation (LCL 9)
- On the Nature of the Woman
Post-Hippocratic works (age of Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
and Praxagoras
Praxagoras
Praxagoras was an influential figure of medicine in ancient Greece. He was born on the Greek island of Kos in about 340 BC. Both his father, Nicarchus, and his grandfather were physicians...
)
- On the Heart (LCL 9)
- On Aliment or Nutriment (LCL 1)
- On Fleshes (LCL 8)
- On the Weeks or On Hebdomads or On Sevens (survives completely only in Latin translations: text Roscher 1913)
- On the Glands (LCL 8)
- On the Veins (an excerpt from On the Nature of the Bones, LCL 9)
Late and dubious works
- On the Physician (LCL 2, 8)
- On Decorum or On Honorable Conduct (LCL 2)
- Precepts (LCL 1)
- On Anatomy or On Dissection (LCL 9)
- On Dentition (LCL 2)
- On the Excision of the Foetus (LCL 9)
- On Vision (LCL 9)
- On the Nature of the Bones (LCL 9)
- On the Crises (LCL 9)
- On Critical Days (LCL 9)
- On Purgative Medicines or Remedies (not in Littré or LCL editions: text Schöne 1920-1924)
- Letters and Speeches (Hippocrates: Pseudepigraphic Writings, Leiden: Brill, 1990)
See also
- Huangdi Neijing a work of comparable importance in Chinese medicine, published during the same time period
External links
English translations and Greek/English bilingual editions- Loeb edition (1923-1931): vol. 1, vol. 2, vol. 3, vol. 4
- Hippocrates: Greek texts and English translations from the Perseus ProjectPerseus ProjectThe Perseus Project is a digital library project of Tufts University that assembles digital collections of humanities resources. It is hosted by the Department of Classics. It has suffered at times from computer hardware problems, and its resources are occasionally unavailable...
- English translations by Francis Adams: HTML anthology; 1891 edition via Harvard; earlier editions
Other Greek texts
- Corpus Medicorum Graecorum edition online (1927-2003)
- Littré edition (1839-1861) via Collection Medic@ (Greek text and French translation): vols. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10
- Kühlewein edition (1894-1902): Hathi Trust c. 1, c. 2; archive.org vol. 1, vol. 2
Bibliography
- Gerhard Fichtner, Hippocratic bibliography (2011) (Berlin Academy)