History of Medicine Part 3: Ancient Greece

   Athena was the goddess of war and wisdom. Zeus was the god of all gods. Hippocrates was the god of medicine? Yes, now we are in the ANCIENT GREECE period where almost everyone was wealthy, and studies of science (and math) were popular hobbies. Men like Pythagoras (Believed number were very important in life) and Aristotle ( Made up the theory about the four humours) were examples of this. A scientist named Alcmaeon, started to wonder whether diseases could be caused by other issues besides religion like environmental issues and how a person lives. He came up with the theory that the body is always healthy as long as the elements of hot, cold, wet, and dry were balanced. This led him to be a founder of a medical school in Cnidus around 700 BC.
  Remember that the man I stated in the beginning? Hippocrates? During this time period, this brilliant scientist became known as the "father of medicine". He created a book , with a group of colleagues, called the Hippocratic Corpus, which gave around 60 Greek medical solutions for doctors to learn. This book became one of many books that will be cherished among the medical schools and teachings for thousands of years.
  Now let's talk about the four humours. Aristotle gave us a theory that contradicted the Egyptians' Channel theory and became the new aspect about the body. This theory explains that there was four humours in body and if they were balanced, then you were healthy. It was somewhat like Alcmaeon's theory, but Aristotle gave the names of what should be balanced. Those four elements were Yellow Bile, Black Bile, Blood, and Phlegm. This theory was so popular that it lasted over a thousand years!   Surgery did advance slightly during this period. Tools like the syringe and catheter were created and people enriched their knowledge about the human anatomy by doing so.
  In all, the Greeks made so much success in the medical field from learning more about the causes of diseases to the Four Humour theory. They did this in such short time and probably could of did more if it wasn't for the Romans taking over...

Sites that need to be cited:
Medicalnewstoday.com
Localhistories.org
Explorable.org