Image Details

Erich Lessing

Often referred to as the “father of medicine,” Hippocrates (c.460–377 B.C.E.) is depicted here in a marble bust, now in the Louvre, carved no later than the first century B.C.E. Hippocrates founded a school of medicine and ethics on the island of Cos, where he was born, and his name was later associated with numerous medical theories. But since it is unlikely that he wrote any of the works traditionally attributed to him, it is not known exactly what he espoused. From the 8th to 11th centuries C.E., Arab scholars drew on ideas attributed to Hippocrates and on works by other Greek and Roman authorities; these scholars then added considerably to this body of ancient knowledge and laid one cornerstone of the modern science of medicine.