Philosophy and medicine of

Western Europe

Lecture 5
The feudal system was established in different
countries of the world at different historical
times. This process of transition from slavery to
feudalism took place in forms specific to each
country. So, in China this happened around the
3rd-2nd centuries BC. e., in India - in the first
centuries of our era, in Transcaucasia and Central
Asia in the 4th-6th centuries, in the countries of
Western Europe - in the 5th-6th centuries, in
Russia - in the 9th century.
Fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD.
e. For Western Europe, it represents the
historical line between the slave-owning
formation and the new formation that replaced
it - feudal, between so-called antiquity and the
Middle Ages. The Middle Ages—the era of
feudal, or serfdom, relations covers the 12th–
13th centuries.
Under feudalism, there were two main
classes: feudal lords and dependent serfs.
Subsequently, with the growth of cities, the
layer of urban artisans and merchants became
stronger - the future third estate, the
bourgeoisie. There was an incessant struggle
between the two main classes of feudal
society throughout the Middle Ages.
The feudal system of France, Germany, and
England went through three stages. The first
stage of feudalism (from the 5th to the 10th-
11th centuries)—the early Middle Ages—
followed directly after the fall of the slave
system in Rome as a result of a slave uprising
and the invasion of “barbarians.”
The progressive features of the feudal system did not appear soon.
New forms of social life emerged slowly. The Celtic and Germanic
tribes that defeated the slave states brought with them the remnants of
the tribal system with its economic and cultural features, primarily
natural forms of economy. The transition from the ancient world to the
Middle Ages in Western Europe was initially associated with deep
economic and cultural decline. In the early Middle Ages, subsistence
farming predominated. The countries of Western Europe have
experienced a decline in science for a number of centuries. In the
second stage of feudalism in Western Europe (approximately from the
11th to the 15th centuries) - in the developed Middle Ages - with the
growth of productive forces, cities grew - centers of crafts and trade.
Craftsmen in cities united into workshops, the development of which
was characteristic of this stage. Along with subsistence farming, barter
farming developed. Commodity-money relations strengthened. Trade
developed and grew within the country and between countries.
The entire spiritual culture of the Middle Ages was under the yoke of
church ideology, which affirmed the divine immutability of the existing
class order and oppression. “The worldview of the Middle Ages was
predominantly geological... the church was the highest generalization
and sanction of the existing feudal system.” St. Augustine in the 4th
century put forward a statement that is characteristic in this regard: “The
authority of Holy Scripture is above all the abilities of the human mind.”
The official church fought against heresies - attempts to be critical of the
Holy Scriptures and church authorities. These heresies reflected the
social protest of peasants and townspeople. To suppress heresies at the
end of this period, a special body was created in the Catholic countries of
Western Europe - the Inquisition. The clergy was also the only educated
class. From here it naturally followed that church dogma was the starting
point and basis of all thinking. Jurisprudence, natural science,
philosophy - all the content of these sciences was given in accordance
with the teachings of the church. In the Middle Ages, science was
considered a servant of the church, and it was not allowed to go beyond
the limits established by faith.
In the X-XII centuries, scholasticism
became the dominant form of philosophy
in Western Europe. In the 13th century,
scholasticism reached its peak. The
meaning of scholasticism was to
substantiate, systematize and protect the
official church ideology through artificial
formalistic logical tricks. The class
significance of scholasticism was to justify
the feudal hierarchy and religious ideology
for the purpose of brutal exploitation of the
working people and strangulation of
progressive thought.
The centers of medieval medicine were
universities. The prototypes of Western
European universities were the schools that
existed in the Arab caliphates and the
school in Salerio. A university-type higher
school existed in Byzantium already in the
middle of the 9th century. In Western
Europe, universities initially represented
private associations of teachers and
students, to a certain extent similar to craft
guilds, in accordance with the general guild
system of the Middle Ages.
In the 11th century, a university arose in Salerno,
transformed from the Salerno Medical School near Naples;
in the 12th-13th centuries, universities appeared in Bologna,
Moelle, Paris, Padua, Oxford, and in the 14th century - in
Prague and Vienna. The number of students at universities
did not exceed several dozen in all faculties. The statutes and
curricula of medieval universities were controlled by the
Catholic Church. The entire structure of life at universities
was copied from the structure of church institutions. Many
doctors belonged to monastic orders. Secular doctors,
entering medical positions, took an oath similar to the oath of
priests.
Universities also allowed the study of some ancient writers.
In the field of medicine, such an officially recognized
ancient author was primarily Galen. Medieval medicine took
from Galen his conclusions, colored by idealism, but
completely discarded his method of research (experiments,
autopsies), which was his main merit. Of the works of
Hippocrates, those were accepted that reflected his
materialistic views in medicine with the least force. The task
of scientists was, first of all, to confirm the correctness of
the teachings of recognized authorities in the relevant field
and comment on it. Commentaries on the works of one or
another authoritative writer were the main type of medieval
scientific literature. Natural science and medicine were
nourished not by experiments, but by the study of texts—
Galen and Hippocrates.
Galileo spoke about one scholastic who, having
seen from an anatomist that the nerves converge
in the brain, and not in the heart, as Aristotle
taught, said: You showed me all this so clearly
and palpably that if Aristotle s text had not said
the opposite (and it directly says that nerves
originate in the heart), then it would be necessary
to recognize this as the truth. The teachings and
the very nature of science were purely scholastic.
The students memorized what the professors said.
The works of Hippocrates, Galen, and Ibn Sino
(Avicenna) were considered dogmatic in
medicine. The glory and brilliance of the
medieval professor lay primarily in his erudition
and ability to confirm each of his positions with
quotes taken from some authority and cited from
memory.
Disputes presented the most convenient opportunity to express all
their knowledge and art. Truth and science meant only what was
written, and medieval research became simply an interpretation of
what was known. Galen's commentaries on Hippocrates were
widely used, and many commented on Galen.
In the XIII-XIV centuries, scholastic medicine with its abstract
constructions, speculative conclusions and disputes developed in
the universities of Western Europe. Therefore, in Western
European medicine, along with the means obtained by medical
practice, there was also a place for those whose use was based on
distant comparison, on the instructions of alchemy, astrology,
which acted on the imagination or satisfied the whims of the
wealthy classes.
Medicine of the Middle Ages was characterized by complex
medicinal prescriptions. Pharmacy was directly related to
alchemy. The number of parts in one recipe often reached
several dozen. Antidotes occupied a special place among
medicines: the so-called theriac, which included 70 or more
components (the main component is snake meat), as well as
mithridate (opal). Theriac was also considered a remedy against
all internal diseases, including “pestilence” fevers. These funds
were highly valued. In some cities, especially famous for their
theriacs and mithridates and selling them to other countries
(Venice, Nuremberg), the production of these products was
carried out publicly, with great solemnity, in the presence of
authorities and invited persons.
Autopsies of corpses during pestilence were carried out already in the 6th century
AD. e., but they contributed little to the development of medicine. The first
autopsies, traces of which have reached us, were carried out from the 13th
century. In 1231, Emperor Frederick II allowed the autopsy of a human corpse to
be performed once every 5 years, but in 1300 the Pope established severe
punishment for anyone who dared to dismember a human corpse or boil it to
make a skeleton. From time to time, some universities were allowed to perform
autopsies on corpses. The Faculty of Medicine in Montpellier in 1376 received
permission to dissect the corpses of those executed; in Venice in 1368 it was
allowed to perform one autopsy per year. In Prague, regular autopsies began only
in 1400, that is, 52 years after the opening of the university. The University of
Vienna has received such permission since 1403, but in 94 years (from 1404 to
1498) only 9 autopsies were performed there. At the University of Greifswald, the
first human corpse was dissected 200 years after the university was founded. The
autopsy was usually performed by a barber. During the autopsy, the professor
theorist read Galen's anatomical work aloud in Latin. Typically, dissection was
limited to the abdominal and thoracic cavities. Among the medieval universities
of Western Europe, Salerno and Padua played a progressive role and were less
influenced by scholasticism than others.
Already in ancient times, the Roman colony of Salerno,
located south of Naples, was known for its healing climate.
The influx of patients naturally led to the concentration of
doctors here. At the beginning of the 6th century, meetings
were held in Salerno to read the works of Hippocrates later,
in the 9th century, a medical school was created in Salerno,
the prototype of the university that arose in the 11th century.
The teachers at the Salerno School were people of different
nationalities. Teaching consisted of reading the works of
Greek and Roman, and later Arab writers, and interpreting
what they read. Widely known in the Middle Ages in Western
Europe was the “Salerno Sanitary Regulations,” a popular
collection of rules for individual hygiene, which was
compiled in the 11th century in poetic form in Latin and was
published several times.
The University of Padua, which differed from most medieval
universities in the possessions of Venice, began to play a role later,
towards the end of the Middle Ages, during the Renaissance. It was
founded in the 13th century by scientists who fled from the papal
regions and from Spain from the persecution of the Catholic Church
reaction. In the 16th century it became a center of advanced medicine.
Black Death
The Middle Ages in the West and East were characterized by a new
phenomenon, unknown to the ancient world on such a scale - large
epidemics. Among the numerous epidemics of the Middle Ages, the “Black
Death” in the middle of the 14th century left a particularly difficult memory
- the plague with the addition of other diseases. Historians, based on data
from chronicles, church burial records, city chronicles and other documents,
claim that many large cities were deserted. These devastating epidemics
were accompanied by devastation in all areas of economic and social life. A
number of conditions contributed to the development of epidemics: the
emergence and growth of cities, characterized by overcrowding, cramped
conditions and dirt, mass movements of a huge number of people - because.
the so-called great migration of peoples from East to West, later a large
military colonization movement in the opposite direction - the so-called
Crusades (eight campaigns during the period from 1096 to '291). Epidemics
of the Middle Ages, like infectious diseases of antiquity, are usually
described under the general name “pestilence” loimos (literally “plague”).
But, judging by the surviving descriptions, various diseases were called
plague (pestilence): plague, typhus (primarily typhus), smallpox, dysentery,
etc. There were often mixed epidemics.
The widespread prevalence of leprosy (this name also covered a
number of other skin lesions, in particular syphilis) during the
Crusades led to the formation of the Order of St. Lazarus for
charity for lepers. Hence the shelters for lepers received the name
infirmaries. Along with infirmaries, shelters for other infectious
patients arose. Monastic medicine in Western Europe was entirely
subordinated to religious ideology. Its main task was to promote the
spread of Catholicism.
Medical assistance to the population, along with the missionary
and military activities of the monks, was an integral part of the
complex of activities carried out by the Catholic Church during
the conquest of new territories and peoples by the feudal lords.
Along with the cross and sword, medicinal herbs served as a tool
of Catholic expansion. The monks were ordered to provide
medical assistance to the population. Most of the monks,
naturally, lacked deep medical knowledge and medical
specialization, although among them, undoubtedly, there were
skilled healers. Monastic hospitals served as practical schools for
monastic doctors, where they accumulated experience in treating
diseases and making medicines. But by linking medicine with the
church, observance of rituals, prayers, repentance, and healing
with “miracles of saints,” they hindered the development of
scientific medicine.
Surgery developed from the branches of practical
medicine in the Middle Ages in connection with
numerous wars. Surgery in the Middle Ages was
carried out not so much by doctors who graduated
from medical faculties, but by practitioners -
chiropractors and barbers. The most complete
generalization of the experience of medieval surgery
was given in the 16th century by the founder of
surgery.