The Knidian school consequently failed to distinguish when one disease caused many possible series of symptoms. Medicine at the time of Hippocrates knew almost nothing of human anatomy and physiology because of the Greek taboo forbidding the dissection of humans. The Knidian school of medicine focused on diagnosis.
Īncient Greek schools of medicine were split (into the Knidian and Koan) on how to deal with disease. However, Hippocrates did work with many convictions that were based on what is now known to be incorrect anatomy and physiology, such as Humorism. Indeed there is not a single mention of a mystical illness in the entirety of the Hippocratic Corpus. He separated the discipline of medicine from religion, believing and arguing that disease was not a punishment inflicted by the gods but rather the product of environmental factors, diet, and living habits. Hippocrates was credited by the disciples of Pythagoras of allying philosophy and medicine. Hippocrates is credited with being the first person to believe that diseases were caused naturally, not because of superstition and gods.
Men regard its nature and cause as divine from ignorance and wonder. It is thus with regard to the disease called Sacred: it appears to me to be nowise more divine nor more sacred than other diseases, but has a natural cause from the originates like other affections. He died, probably in Larissa, at the age of 83, 85 or 90, though some say he lived to be well over 100. Several different accounts of his death exist. Hippocrates taught and practiced medicine throughout his life, traveling at least as far as Thessaly, Thrace, and the Sea of Marmara. Plato mentions Hippocrates in two of his dialogues: in Protagoras, Plato describes Hippocrates as "Hippocrates of Kos, the Asclepiad" while in Phaedrus, Plato suggests that "Hippocrates the Asclepiad" thought that a complete knowledge of the nature of the body was necessary for medicine. Hippocrates was probably trained at the asklepieion of Kos, and took lessons from the Thracian physician Herodicus of Selymbria. Soranus said that Hippocrates learned medicine from his father and grandfather ( Hippocrates I), and studied other subjects with Democritus and Gorgias. According to Galen, a later physician, Polybus was Hippocrates' true successor, while Thessalus and Draco each had a son named Hippocrates (Hippocrates III and IV). The two sons of Hippocrates, Thessalus and Draco, and his son-in-law, Polybus, were his students. Soranus wrote that Hippocrates' father was Heraclides, a physician, and his mother was Praxitela, daughter of Tizane. Hippocrates is mentioned in passing in the writings of two contemporaries: Plato, in Protagoras and Phaedrus, and Aristotle's Politics, which date from the 4th century BC. Later biographies are in the Suda of the 10th century AD, and in the works of John Tzetzes, which date from the 12th century AD. Soranus of Ephesus, a 2nd-century Greek physician, was Hippocrates' first biographer and is the source of most personal information about him. Historians agree that Hippocrates was born around the year 460 BC on the Greek island of Kos other biographical information, however, is likely to be untrue. Illustration of the story of Hippocrates refusing the presents of the Achaemenid Emperor Artaxerxes, who was asking for his services. He is also credited with greatly advancing the systematic study of clinical medicine, summing up the medical knowledge of previous schools, and prescribing practices for physicians through the Hippocratic Corpus and other works. Hippocrates is commonly portrayed as the paragon of the ancient physician and credited with coining the Hippocratic Oath, which is still relevant and in use today. However, the achievements of the writers of the Hippocratic Corpus, the practitioners of Hippocratic medicine, and the actions of Hippocrates himself were often conflated thus very little is known about what Hippocrates actually thought, wrote, and did. The Hippocratic school of medicine revolutionized ancient Greek medicine, establishing it as a discipline distinct from other fields with which it had traditionally been associated ( theurgy and philosophy), thus establishing medicine as a profession. He is traditionally referred to as the "Father of Medicine" in recognition of his lasting contributions to the field, such as the use of prognosis and clinical observation, the systematic categorization of diseases, or the formulation of humoural theory. 370 BC), also known as Hippocrates II, was a Greek physician of the Age of Pericles ( Classical Greece), who is considered one of the most outstanding figures in the history of medicine.