LITERARY SOURCES ON GREEK MEDICINE OF PREHISTORIC ERA AND THE 'DARK' AGE (BEFORE 600 BCE) (BEFORE 600 BCE)
Abstract
The aim of this contribution is to present and discuss literary sources pertaining to the development of Greek medicine in the prehistoric period (the Bronze Age, mainly the second millennium BCE) and the so-called Dark Age (from 1050 BCE until 600 BCE). Very few literary sources on Greek medicine of this period survive.
From the Bronze Age, there are several texts, surviving mainly on clay tablets, which were written in syllabic, linear scripts A and B. From the Dark Age, one can draw some amount of information about medical knowledge and healing from works of art (poetry), mainly from Homeric epics.
And while this information is fragmentary, it does enable us to understand and reconstruct some details pertaining not only to the medical practices, therapeutic methods, and even physicians and their assistants, but also about religious ideas linked to health and healing at the time.