Greek medical beliefs

Abstract

"Nothing is more difficult than a beginning" wrote Byron of Poetry, and this remark fitly applies to my case, for although the material is abundant, indeed bountiful yet it is very difficult to sift what is really Greek from what has been borrowed by them from other cultures such as the Egyptian, Minoan and Assyrian. Contrary to what is held by many the medical knowledge of these people was relatively well developed, as can be seen from certain Egyptian papyri which described surgical procedures demanding considerable anatomical knowledge, and from that masterpiece of Assyrian art, "The Dying Lioness", originally found in the palace of Assurbanipal, depicting the lioness with a 'severed spinal cord from the arrows of her attackers crawling, dragging her paralysed hind limb behind.