c1250-1500: Medicine in Medieval England

Question 1

What were supernatural and religious explanations of why disease happens?

Answer 1

• God punished sins

* Astrology - the alignment of Mars and Jupiter

Question 2

What was the Theory of the Four Humours?

Answer 2

• Blood, phlegm, black bile and yellow bile

* Too much or too little of one humour causes mental or physical illness

Question 3

What was the miasma theory?

Answer 3

• The fumes given off rotting matter/human waste causes illness

Question 4

Why did Galen and Hippocrates have continuing influence in England?

Answer 4

• The Catholic Church allowed thé continuation of their medical textbooks

Question 5

What religious action was taken to prevent and treat disease?

Answer 5

· Pilgrimages and sacrifices.

· following the guidance of the Regimen Sanitatis

Question 6

What was the purpose of bloodletting and purging?

Answer 6

· Rebalancing the humours.

Question 7

Why was the air purified?

Answer 7

· To remove miasma fumes and please God.

Question 8

What herbs and remedies were used to treat illness and disease?

Answer 8

· Garlic/onions: to settle stomachs
· Therica - a popular ‘catch all’ mix of 70 herbs
· Materia Medica - a popular 12th century book of remedies

Question 9

What were new approaches to hospital care in the 1400s?

Answer 9

· Hospitals were based in monasteries and were for rest.

· Types of hospitals: for the poor, the sick, the infirm and purely for prayer

Question 10

What were traditions of care in the 1400s?

Answer 10

· Monks and nuns were instructed to pray for you.
· The normal medieval diet of bread and ale had apples and cheese added to it and sometumes fresh fish and vegetables
· The quality of care was better than the care you would receive at home.

Question 11

What was the role of a physician?

Answer 11

Physicians had to have a university degree and were regarded as medical experts. They would instruct doctors to carry out action linked to their diagnosis of a patient’s illness.

Question 12

What was the role of an apothecary?

Answer 12

To mix and recommend herbal remedies for patients.

Question 13

What was the role of a barber surgeon?

Answer 13

· They were apprentice-trained surgeons/barbers who carried out invasive surgey: e.g. lancing boils.
· The quality of their work improved throughout the 1400s because of a willingness to work for little money.