An Introduction to the History of Science, Ch 1
Walter Libby
Rita Head's Group
AN INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE, BY WALTER LIBBYCHAPTER I
SCIENCE AND PRACTICAL NEEDS--EGYPT AND BABYLONIAIf you consult encyclopedias and special works in reference to the early
history of any one of the sciences,--astronomy, geology, geometry,
physiology, logic, or political science, for example,--you will find
strongly emphasized the part played by the Greeks in the development of
organized knowledge. Great, indeed, as we shall see in the next chapter,
are the contributions to the growth of science of this highly rational
and speculative people. It must be conceded, also, that the influence on
Western science of civilizations earlier than theirs has come to us, to
a considerable extent at least, through the channels of Greek
literature.Nevertheless, if you seek the very origins of the sciences, you will
inevitably be drawn to the banks of the Nile, and to the valleys of the
Tigris and the Euphrates. Here, in Egypt, in Assyria and Babylonia,
dwelt from very remote times nations whose genius was practical and
religious rather than intellectual and theoretical, and whose mental
life, therefore, was more akin to our own than was the highly evolved
culture of the Greeks. Though more remote in time, the wisdom and
practical knowledge of Thebes and Memphis, Nineveh and Babylon, are more
readily comprehended by our minds than the difficult speculations of
Athenian philosophy.Much that we have inherited from the earliest civilizations is so
familiar, so homely, that we simply accept it, much as we may light, or
air, or water, without analysis, without inquiry as to its origin, and
without full recognition of how indispensable it is. Why are there seven
days in the week, and not eight? Why are there sixty minutes in the
hour, and why are there not sixty hours in the day? These artificial
divisions of time are accepted so unquestioningly that to ask a reason
for them may, to an indolent mind, seem almost absurd. This acceptance
of a week of seven days and of an hour of sixty minutes (almost as if
they were natural divisions of time like day and night) is owing to a
tradition that is Babylonian in its origin. From the Old Testament
(which is one of the greatest factors in preserving the continuity of
human culture, and the only ancient book which speaks with authority
concerning Babylonian history) we learn that Abraham, the progenitor of
the Hebrews, migrated to the west from southern Babylonia about
twenty-three hundred years before Christ. Even in that remote age,
however, the Babylonians had established those divisions of time which
are familiar to us. The seven days of the week were closely associated
in men's thinking with the heavenly bodies. In our modern languages they
are named after the sun, the moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and
Saturn, which from the remotest times were personified and worshiped.
Thus we see that the usage of making seven days a unit of time depends
on the religious belief and astronomical science of a very remote
civilization. The usage is so completely established that by the
majority it is simply taken for granted.Another piece of commonplace knowledge--the cardinal points of the
compass--may be accepted, likewise, without inquiry or without
recognition of its importance. Unless thrown on your own resources in an
unsettled country or on unknown waters, you may long fail to realize how
indispensable to the practical conduct of life is the knowledge of east
and west and north and south. In this matter, again, the records of
ancient civilizations show the pains that were taken to fix these
essentials of science. Modern excavations have demonstrated that the
sides or the corners of the temples and palaces of Assyria and Babylonia
were directed to the four cardinal points of the compass. In Egypt the
pyramids, erected before 3000 B.C., were laid out with such strict
regard to direction that the conjecture has been put forward that their
main purpose was to establish, in a land of shifting sands, east and
west and north and south. That conjecture seems extravagant; but the
fact that the PhÅ"nicians studied astronomy merely because of its
practical value in navigation, the early invention of the compass in
China, the influence on discovery of the later improvements of the
compass, make us realize the importance of the alleged purpose of the
pyramids. Without fixed points, without something to go by, men, before
they had acquired the elements of astronomy, were altogether at sea. As
they advanced in knowledge they looked to the stars for guidance,
especially to the pole star and the imperishable star-group of the
northern heavens. The Egyptians even developed an apparatus for telling
the time by reference to the stars--a star-clock similar in its purpose
to the sundial. By the Egyptians, also, was carefully observed the
season of the year at which certain stars and constellations were
visible at dawn. This was of special importance in the case of Sirius,
for its heliacal rising, that is, the period when it rose in conjunction
with the sun, marked the coming of the Nile flood (so important in the
lives of the inhabitants) and the beginning of a new year. Not
unnaturally Sirius was an object of worship. One temple is said to have
been so constructed as to face that part of the eastern horizon at which
this star arose at the critical season of inundation. Of another temple
we are told that only at sunset at the time of the summer solstice did
the sun throw its rays throughout the edifice. The fact that astronomy
in Egypt as in Babylonia, where the temples were observatories, was
closely associated with religion confirms the view that this science was
first cultivated because of its bearing on the practical needs of the
people. The priests were the preservers of such wisdom as had been
accumulated in the course of man's immemorial struggle with the forces
of nature.It is well known that geometry had its origin in the valley of the Nile,
that it arose to meet a practical need, and that it was in the first
place, as its name implies, a measurement of the earth--a crude
surveying, employed in the restoration of boundaries obliterated by the
annual inundations of the river. Egyptian geometry cared little for
theory. It addressed itself to actual problems, such as determining the
area of a square or triangular field from the length of the sides. To
find the area of a circular field, or floor, or vessel, from the length
of the diameter was rather beyond the science of 2000 B.C. This was,
however, a practical problem which had to be solved, even if the
solution were not perfect. The practice was to square the diameter
reduced by one ninth.In all the Egyptian mathematics of which we have record there is to be
observed a similar practical bent. In the construction of a temple or a
pyramid not merely was it necessary to have regard to the points of the
compass, but care must be taken to have the sides at right angles. This
required the intervention of specialists, expert "rope-fasteners," who
laid off a triangle by means of a rope divided into three parts, of
three, four, and five units. The Babylonians followed much the same
practice in fixing a right angle. In addition they learned how to bisect
and trisect the angle. Hence we see in their designs and ornaments the
division of the circle into twelve parts, a division which does not
appear in Egyptian ornamentation till after the incursion of Babylonian
influence.There is no need, however, to multiply examples; the tendency of all
Egyptian mathematics was, as already stated, concerned with the
practical solution of concrete problems--mensuration, the cubical
contents of barns and granaries, the distribution of bread, the amounts
of food required by men and animals in given numbers and for given
periods of time, the proportions and the angle of elevation (about 52°)
of a pyramid, etc. Moreover, they worked simple equations involving one
unknown, and had a hieroglyph for a million (the drawing of a man
overcome with wonder), and another for ten million.The Rhind mathematical papyrus in the British Museum is the main source
of our present knowledge of early Egyptian arithmetic, geometry, and of
what might be called their trigonometry and algebra. It describes itself
as "Instructions for arriving at the knowledge of all things, and of
things obscure, and of all mysteries." It was copied by a priest about
1600 B.C.--the classical period of Egyptian culture--from a document
seven hundred years older.[Illustration: EARLIEST PICTURE KNOWN OF A SURGICAL OPERATION. EGYPT,
2500 B.C.]Medicine, which is almost certain to develop in the early history of a
people in response to their urgent needs, has been justly called the
foster-mother of many sciences. In the records of Egyptian medical
practice can be traced the origin of chemistry, anatomy, physiology, and
botany. Our most definite information concerning Egyptian medicine
belongs to the same general period as the mathematical document to which
we have just referred. It is true something is known of remoter times.
The first physician of whom history has preserved the name, I-em-hetep
(He-who-cometh-in-peace), lived about 4500 B.C. Recent researches have
also brought to light, near Memphis, pictures, not later than 2500 B.C.,
of surgical operations. They were found sculptured on the doorposts at
the entrance to the tomb of a high official of one of the Pharaohs. The
patients, as shown in the accompanying illustration, are suffering pain,
and, according to the inscription, one cries out, "Do this [and] let me
go," and the other, "Don't hurt me so!" Our most satisfactory data in
reference to Egyptian medicine are derived, however, from the Ebers
papyrus. This document displays some little knowledge of the pulse in
different parts of the body, of a relation between the heart and the
other organs, and of the passage of the breath to the lungs (and heart).
It contains a list of diseases. In the main it is a collection of
prescriptions for the eyes, ears, stomach, to reduce tumors, effect
purgation, etc. There is no evidence of a tendency to homeopathy, but
mental healing seems to have been called into play by the use of
numerous spells and incantations. Each prescription, as in medical
practice to-day, contains as a rule several ingredients. Among the seven
hundred recognized remedies are to be noted poppy, castor-oil, gentian,
colchicum, squills, and many other familiar medicinal plants, as well as
bicarbonate of soda, antimony, and salts of lead and copper. The fat of
the lion, hippopotamus, crocodile, goose, serpent, and wild goat, in
equal parts, served as a prescription for baldness. In the interests of
his art the medical practitioner ransacked the resources of organic and
inorganic nature. The Ebers papyrus shows that the Egyptians knew of the
development of the beetle from the egg, of the blow-fly from the larva,
and of the frog from the tadpole. Moreover, for precision in the use of
medicaments weights of very small denominations were employed.The Egyptian embalmers relied on the preservative properties of common
salt, wine, aromatics, myrrh, cassia, etc. By the use of linen smeared
with gum they excluded all putrefactive agencies. They understood the
virtue of extreme dryness in the exercise of their antiseptic art. Some
knowledge of anatomy was involved in the removal of the viscera, and
much more in a particular method they followed in removing the brain.In their various industries the Egyptians made use of gold, silver,
bronze (which on analysis is found to consist of copper, tin, and a
trace of lead, etc.), metallic iron and copper and their oxides,
manganese, cobalt, alum, cinnabar, indigo, madder, brass, white lead,
lampblack. There is clear evidence that they smelted iron ore as early
as 3400 B.C. maintaining a blast by means of leather tread-bellows. They
also contrived to temper the metal, and to make helmets, swords,
lance-points, ploughs, tools, and other implements of iron. Besides
metallurgy they practiced the arts of weaving, dyeing, distillation.
They produced soap (from soda and oil), transparent and colored glass,
enamel, and ceramics. They were skilled in the preparation of leather.
They showed aptitude for painting, and for the other fine arts. They
were expert builders, and possessed the engineering skill to erect
obelisks weighing hundreds of tons. They cultivated numerous vegetables,
grains, fruits, and flowers. They had many domestic animals. In seeking
the satisfaction of their practical needs they laid the foundation of
geometry, botany, chemistry (named, as some think, from the Egyptian
Khem, the god of medicinal herbs), and other sciences. But their
practical achievements far transcended their theoretical formulations.
To all time they will be known as an artistic, noble, and religious
people, who cherished their dead and would not allow that the good and
beautiful and great should altogether pass away.Excavations in Assyria and Babylonia, especially since 1843, have
brought to our knowledge an ancient culture stretching back four or five
thousand years before the beginning of the Christian era. The records of
Assyria and Babylonia, like those of Egypt, are fragmentary and still in
need of interpretation. Here again, however, it is the fundamental, the
indispensable, the practical forms of knowledge that stand revealed
rather than the theoretical, speculative, and purely intellectual.By the Babylonian priests the heavens were made the object of expert
observation as early as 3800 B.C. The length of the year, the length of
the month, the coming of the seasons, the course of the sun in the
heavens, the movements of the planets, the recurrence of eclipses,
comets, and meteors, were studied with particular care. One motive was
the need of a measurement of time, the same motive as underlies the
common interest in the calendar and almanac. It was found that the year
contained more than 365 days, the month (synodic) more than 29 days, 12
hours, and 44 minutes. The sun's apparent diameter was contained 720
times in the ecliptic, that is, in the apparent path of the sun through
the heavens. Like the Egyptians, the Babylonians took special note of
the stars and star-groups that were to be seen at dawn at different
times of the year. These constellations, lying in the imaginary
belt encircling the heavens on either side of the ecliptic, bore
names corresponding to those we have adopted for the signs of the
zodiac,--Balance, Ram, Bull, Twins, Scorpion, Archer, etc. The
Babylonian astronomers also observed that the successive vernal (or
autumnal) equinoxes follow each other at intervals of a few seconds
less than a year.A second motive that influenced the Babylonian priests in studying the
movements of the heavenly bodies was the hope of foretelling events. The
planets, seen to shift their positions with reference to the other
heavenly bodies, were called messengers, or angels. The appearance of
Mars, perhaps on account of its reddish color, was associated in their
imaginations with war. Comets, meteors, and eclipses were considered as
omens portending pestilence, national disaster, or the fate of kings.
The fortunes of individuals could be predicted from a knowledge of the
aspect of the heavens at the hour of their birth. This interest in
astrology, or divination by means of the stars, no doubt stimulated the
priests to make careful observations and to preserve religiously the
record of astronomical phenomena. It was even established that there is
a cycle in which eclipses, solar and lunar, repeat themselves, a period
(_saros_) somewhat more than eighteen years and eleven months. Moreover,
from the Babylonians we derive some of our most sublime religious and
scientific conceptions. They held that strict law governs the apparently
erratic movements of the heavenly bodies. Their creation myth proclaims:
"Merodach next arranged the stars in order, along with the sun and moon,
and gave them laws which they were never to transgress."The mathematical knowledge of the Babylonians is related on the one hand
to their astronomy and on the other to their commercial pursuits. They
possessed highly developed systems of measuring, weighing, and
counting--processes, which, as we shall see in the sequel, are essential
to scientific thought. About 2300 B.C. they had multiplication tables
running from 1 to 1350, which were probably used in connection with
astronomical calculations. Unlike the Egyptians they had no symbol for a
million, though the "ten thousand times ten thousand" of the Bible
(Daniel VII: 10) may indicate that the conception of even larger numbers
was not altogether foreign to them. They counted in sixties as well as
in tens. Their hours and minutes had each sixty subdivisions. They
divided the circle into six parts and into six-times-sixty subdivisions.
Tables of squares and cubes discovered in southern Babylonia were
interpreted correctly only on a sexagesimal basis, the statement that 1
plus 4 is the square of 8 implying that the first unit is 60. As we have
already seen, considerable knowledge of geometry is apparent in
Babylonian designs and constructions.According to a Greek historian of the fifth century B.C., there were no
physicians at Babylon, while a later Greek historian (of the first
century B.C.) speaks of a Babylonian university which had attained
celebrity, and which is now believed to have been a school of medicine.
Modern research has made known letters by a physician addressed to an
Assyrian king in the seventh century B.C. referring to the king's chief
physician, giving directions for the treatment of a bleeding from the
nose from which a friend of the prince was suffering, and reporting the
probable recovery of a poor fellow whose eyes were diseased. Other
letters from the same general period mention the presence of physicians
at court. We have even recovered the name (Ilu-bani) of a physician who
lived in southern Babylonia about 2700 B.C. The most interesting
information, however, in reference to Babylonian medicine dates from the
time of Hammurabi, a contemporary of the patriarch Abraham. It appears
from the code drawn up in the reign of that monarch that the Babylonian
surgeons operated in case of cataract; that they were entitled to twenty
silver shekels (half the sum for which Joseph was sold into slavery, and
equivalent to seven or eight dollars) for a successful operation; and
that in case the patient lost his life or his sight as the result of an
unsuccessful operation, the surgeon was condemned to have his hands
amputated.The Babylonian records of medicine like those of astronomy reveal the
prevalence of many superstitious beliefs. The spirits of evil bring
maladies upon us; the gods heal the diseases that afflict us. The
Babylonian books of medicine contained strange interminglings of
prescription and incantation. The priests studied the livers of
sacrificial animals in order to divine the thoughts of the gods--a
practice which stimulated the study of anatomy. The maintenance of state
menageries no doubt had a similar influence on the study of the natural
history of animals.The Babylonians were a nation of agriculturists and merchants. Sargon of
Akkad, who founded the first Semitic empire in Asia (3800 B.C.), was
brought up by an irrigator, and was himself a gardener. Belshazzar, the
son of the last Babylonian king, dealt in wool on a considerable scale.
Excavation in the land watered by the Tigris and Euphrates tells the
tale of the money-lenders, importers, dyers, fullers, tanners,
saddlers, smiths, carpenters, shoemakers, stonecutters, ivory-cutters,
brickmakers, porcelain-makers, potters, vintners, sailors, butchers,
engineers, architects, painters, sculptors, musicians, dealers in rugs,
clothing and fabrics, who contributed to the culture of this great
historic people. It is not surprising that science should find its
matrix in so rich a civilization.The lever and the pulley, lathes, picks, saws, hammers, bronze
operating-lances, sundials, water-clocks, the gnomon (a vertical pillar
for determining the sun's altitude) were in use. Gem-cutting was highly
developed as early as 3800 B.C. The Babylonians made use of copper
hardened with antimony and tin, lead, incised shells, glass, alabaster,
lapis-lazuli, silver, and gold. Iron was not employed before the period
of contact with Egyptian civilization. Their buildings were furnished
with systems of drains and flushes that seem to us altogether modern.
Our museums are enriched by specimens of their handicraft--realistic
statuary in dolerite of 2700 B.C.; rock crystal worked to the form of a
plano-convex lens, 3800 B.C.; a beautiful silver vase of the period 3950
B.C.; and the head of a goat in copper about 4000 B.C.Excavation has not disclosed nor scholarship interpreted the full record
of this ancient people in the valley of the Tigris and the Euphrates,
not far from the Gulf of Persia, superior in religious inspiration, not
inferior in practical achievements to the Egyptians. Both these great
nations of antiquity, however, failed to carry the sciences that arose
in connection with their arts to a high degree of generalization. That
was reserved for another people of ancient times, namely, the Greeks.REFERENCES F. H. Garrison, _An Introduction to the History of Medicine_. H. V. Hilprecht, _Excavations in Assyria and Babylonia_. Max Neuburger, _History of Medicine_. A. H. Sayce, _Babylonians and Assyrians_.
SCIENCE AND PRACTICAL NEEDS--EGYPT AND BABYLONIAIf you consult encyclopedias and special works in reference to the early
history of any one of the sciences,--astronomy, geology, geometry,
physiology, logic, or political science, for example,--you will find
strongly emphasized the part played by the Greeks in the development of
organized knowledge. Great, indeed, as we shall see in the next chapter,
are the contributions to the growth of science of this highly rational
and speculative people. It must be conceded, also, that the influence on
Western science of civilizations earlier than theirs has come to us, to
a considerable extent at least, through the channels of Greek
literature.Nevertheless, if you seek the very origins of the sciences, you will
inevitably be drawn to the banks of the Nile, and to the valleys of the
Tigris and the Euphrates. Here, in Egypt, in Assyria and Babylonia,
dwelt from very remote times nations whose genius was practical and
religious rather than intellectual and theoretical, and whose mental
life, therefore, was more akin to our own than was the highly evolved
culture of the Greeks. Though more remote in time, the wisdom and
practical knowledge of Thebes and Memphis, Nineveh and Babylon, are more
readily comprehended by our minds than the difficult speculations of
Athenian philosophy.Much that we have inherited from the earliest civilizations is so
familiar, so homely, that we simply accept it, much as we may light, or
air, or water, without analysis, without inquiry as to its origin, and
without full recognition of how indispensable it is. Why are there seven
days in the week, and not eight? Why are there sixty minutes in the
hour, and why are there not sixty hours in the day? These artificial
divisions of time are accepted so unquestioningly that to ask a reason
for them may, to an indolent mind, seem almost absurd. This acceptance
of a week of seven days and of an hour of sixty minutes (almost as if
they were natural divisions of time like day and night) is owing to a
tradition that is Babylonian in its origin. From the Old Testament
(which is one of the greatest factors in preserving the continuity of
human culture, and the only ancient book which speaks with authority
concerning Babylonian history) we learn that Abraham, the progenitor of
the Hebrews, migrated to the west from southern Babylonia about
twenty-three hundred years before Christ. Even in that remote age,
however, the Babylonians had established those divisions of time which
are familiar to us. The seven days of the week were closely associated
in men's thinking with the heavenly bodies. In our modern languages they
are named after the sun, the moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and
Saturn, which from the remotest times were personified and worshiped.
Thus we see that the usage of making seven days a unit of time depends
on the religious belief and astronomical science of a very remote
civilization. The usage is so completely established that by the
majority it is simply taken for granted.Another piece of commonplace knowledge--the cardinal points of the
compass--may be accepted, likewise, without inquiry or without
recognition of its importance. Unless thrown on your own resources in an
unsettled country or on unknown waters, you may long fail to realize how
indispensable to the practical conduct of life is the knowledge of east
and west and north and south. In this matter, again, the records of
ancient civilizations show the pains that were taken to fix these
essentials of science. Modern excavations have demonstrated that the
sides or the corners of the temples and palaces of Assyria and Babylonia
were directed to the four cardinal points of the compass. In Egypt the
pyramids, erected before 3000 B.C., were laid out with such strict
regard to direction that the conjecture has been put forward that their
main purpose was to establish, in a land of shifting sands, east and
west and north and south. That conjecture seems extravagant; but the
fact that the PhÅ"nicians studied astronomy merely because of its
practical value in navigation, the early invention of the compass in
China, the influence on discovery of the later improvements of the
compass, make us realize the importance of the alleged purpose of the
pyramids. Without fixed points, without something to go by, men, before
they had acquired the elements of astronomy, were altogether at sea. As
they advanced in knowledge they looked to the stars for guidance,
especially to the pole star and the imperishable star-group of the
northern heavens. The Egyptians even developed an apparatus for telling
the time by reference to the stars--a star-clock similar in its purpose
to the sundial. By the Egyptians, also, was carefully observed the
season of the year at which certain stars and constellations were
visible at dawn. This was of special importance in the case of Sirius,
for its heliacal rising, that is, the period when it rose in conjunction
with the sun, marked the coming of the Nile flood (so important in the
lives of the inhabitants) and the beginning of a new year. Not
unnaturally Sirius was an object of worship. One temple is said to have
been so constructed as to face that part of the eastern horizon at which
this star arose at the critical season of inundation. Of another temple
we are told that only at sunset at the time of the summer solstice did
the sun throw its rays throughout the edifice. The fact that astronomy
in Egypt as in Babylonia, where the temples were observatories, was
closely associated with religion confirms the view that this science was
first cultivated because of its bearing on the practical needs of the
people. The priests were the preservers of such wisdom as had been
accumulated in the course of man's immemorial struggle with the forces
of nature.It is well known that geometry had its origin in the valley of the Nile,
that it arose to meet a practical need, and that it was in the first
place, as its name implies, a measurement of the earth--a crude
surveying, employed in the restoration of boundaries obliterated by the
annual inundations of the river. Egyptian geometry cared little for
theory. It addressed itself to actual problems, such as determining the
area of a square or triangular field from the length of the sides. To
find the area of a circular field, or floor, or vessel, from the length
of the diameter was rather beyond the science of 2000 B.C. This was,
however, a practical problem which had to be solved, even if the
solution were not perfect. The practice was to square the diameter
reduced by one ninth.In all the Egyptian mathematics of which we have record there is to be
observed a similar practical bent. In the construction of a temple or a
pyramid not merely was it necessary to have regard to the points of the
compass, but care must be taken to have the sides at right angles. This
required the intervention of specialists, expert "rope-fasteners," who
laid off a triangle by means of a rope divided into three parts, of
three, four, and five units. The Babylonians followed much the same
practice in fixing a right angle. In addition they learned how to bisect
and trisect the angle. Hence we see in their designs and ornaments the
division of the circle into twelve parts, a division which does not
appear in Egyptian ornamentation till after the incursion of Babylonian
influence.There is no need, however, to multiply examples; the tendency of all
Egyptian mathematics was, as already stated, concerned with the
practical solution of concrete problems--mensuration, the cubical
contents of barns and granaries, the distribution of bread, the amounts
of food required by men and animals in given numbers and for given
periods of time, the proportions and the angle of elevation (about 52°)
of a pyramid, etc. Moreover, they worked simple equations involving one
unknown, and had a hieroglyph for a million (the drawing of a man
overcome with wonder), and another for ten million.The Rhind mathematical papyrus in the British Museum is the main source
of our present knowledge of early Egyptian arithmetic, geometry, and of
what might be called their trigonometry and algebra. It describes itself
as "Instructions for arriving at the knowledge of all things, and of
things obscure, and of all mysteries." It was copied by a priest about
1600 B.C.--the classical period of Egyptian culture--from a document
seven hundred years older.[Illustration: EARLIEST PICTURE KNOWN OF A SURGICAL OPERATION. EGYPT,
2500 B.C.]Medicine, which is almost certain to develop in the early history of a
people in response to their urgent needs, has been justly called the
foster-mother of many sciences. In the records of Egyptian medical
practice can be traced the origin of chemistry, anatomy, physiology, and
botany. Our most definite information concerning Egyptian medicine
belongs to the same general period as the mathematical document to which
we have just referred. It is true something is known of remoter times.
The first physician of whom history has preserved the name, I-em-hetep
(He-who-cometh-in-peace), lived about 4500 B.C. Recent researches have
also brought to light, near Memphis, pictures, not later than 2500 B.C.,
of surgical operations. They were found sculptured on the doorposts at
the entrance to the tomb of a high official of one of the Pharaohs. The
patients, as shown in the accompanying illustration, are suffering pain,
and, according to the inscription, one cries out, "Do this [and] let me
go," and the other, "Don't hurt me so!" Our most satisfactory data in
reference to Egyptian medicine are derived, however, from the Ebers
papyrus. This document displays some little knowledge of the pulse in
different parts of the body, of a relation between the heart and the
other organs, and of the passage of the breath to the lungs (and heart).
It contains a list of diseases. In the main it is a collection of
prescriptions for the eyes, ears, stomach, to reduce tumors, effect
purgation, etc. There is no evidence of a tendency to homeopathy, but
mental healing seems to have been called into play by the use of
numerous spells and incantations. Each prescription, as in medical
practice to-day, contains as a rule several ingredients. Among the seven
hundred recognized remedies are to be noted poppy, castor-oil, gentian,
colchicum, squills, and many other familiar medicinal plants, as well as
bicarbonate of soda, antimony, and salts of lead and copper. The fat of
the lion, hippopotamus, crocodile, goose, serpent, and wild goat, in
equal parts, served as a prescription for baldness. In the interests of
his art the medical practitioner ransacked the resources of organic and
inorganic nature. The Ebers papyrus shows that the Egyptians knew of the
development of the beetle from the egg, of the blow-fly from the larva,
and of the frog from the tadpole. Moreover, for precision in the use of
medicaments weights of very small denominations were employed.The Egyptian embalmers relied on the preservative properties of common
salt, wine, aromatics, myrrh, cassia, etc. By the use of linen smeared
with gum they excluded all putrefactive agencies. They understood the
virtue of extreme dryness in the exercise of their antiseptic art. Some
knowledge of anatomy was involved in the removal of the viscera, and
much more in a particular method they followed in removing the brain.In their various industries the Egyptians made use of gold, silver,
bronze (which on analysis is found to consist of copper, tin, and a
trace of lead, etc.), metallic iron and copper and their oxides,
manganese, cobalt, alum, cinnabar, indigo, madder, brass, white lead,
lampblack. There is clear evidence that they smelted iron ore as early
as 3400 B.C. maintaining a blast by means of leather tread-bellows. They
also contrived to temper the metal, and to make helmets, swords,
lance-points, ploughs, tools, and other implements of iron. Besides
metallurgy they practiced the arts of weaving, dyeing, distillation.
They produced soap (from soda and oil), transparent and colored glass,
enamel, and ceramics. They were skilled in the preparation of leather.
They showed aptitude for painting, and for the other fine arts. They
were expert builders, and possessed the engineering skill to erect
obelisks weighing hundreds of tons. They cultivated numerous vegetables,
grains, fruits, and flowers. They had many domestic animals. In seeking
the satisfaction of their practical needs they laid the foundation of
geometry, botany, chemistry (named, as some think, from the Egyptian
Khem, the god of medicinal herbs), and other sciences. But their
practical achievements far transcended their theoretical formulations.
To all time they will be known as an artistic, noble, and religious
people, who cherished their dead and would not allow that the good and
beautiful and great should altogether pass away.Excavations in Assyria and Babylonia, especially since 1843, have
brought to our knowledge an ancient culture stretching back four or five
thousand years before the beginning of the Christian era. The records of
Assyria and Babylonia, like those of Egypt, are fragmentary and still in
need of interpretation. Here again, however, it is the fundamental, the
indispensable, the practical forms of knowledge that stand revealed
rather than the theoretical, speculative, and purely intellectual.By the Babylonian priests the heavens were made the object of expert
observation as early as 3800 B.C. The length of the year, the length of
the month, the coming of the seasons, the course of the sun in the
heavens, the movements of the planets, the recurrence of eclipses,
comets, and meteors, were studied with particular care. One motive was
the need of a measurement of time, the same motive as underlies the
common interest in the calendar and almanac. It was found that the year
contained more than 365 days, the month (synodic) more than 29 days, 12
hours, and 44 minutes. The sun's apparent diameter was contained 720
times in the ecliptic, that is, in the apparent path of the sun through
the heavens. Like the Egyptians, the Babylonians took special note of
the stars and star-groups that were to be seen at dawn at different
times of the year. These constellations, lying in the imaginary
belt encircling the heavens on either side of the ecliptic, bore
names corresponding to those we have adopted for the signs of the
zodiac,--Balance, Ram, Bull, Twins, Scorpion, Archer, etc. The
Babylonian astronomers also observed that the successive vernal (or
autumnal) equinoxes follow each other at intervals of a few seconds
less than a year.A second motive that influenced the Babylonian priests in studying the
movements of the heavenly bodies was the hope of foretelling events. The
planets, seen to shift their positions with reference to the other
heavenly bodies, were called messengers, or angels. The appearance of
Mars, perhaps on account of its reddish color, was associated in their
imaginations with war. Comets, meteors, and eclipses were considered as
omens portending pestilence, national disaster, or the fate of kings.
The fortunes of individuals could be predicted from a knowledge of the
aspect of the heavens at the hour of their birth. This interest in
astrology, or divination by means of the stars, no doubt stimulated the
priests to make careful observations and to preserve religiously the
record of astronomical phenomena. It was even established that there is
a cycle in which eclipses, solar and lunar, repeat themselves, a period
(_saros_) somewhat more than eighteen years and eleven months. Moreover,
from the Babylonians we derive some of our most sublime religious and
scientific conceptions. They held that strict law governs the apparently
erratic movements of the heavenly bodies. Their creation myth proclaims:
"Merodach next arranged the stars in order, along with the sun and moon,
and gave them laws which they were never to transgress."The mathematical knowledge of the Babylonians is related on the one hand
to their astronomy and on the other to their commercial pursuits. They
possessed highly developed systems of measuring, weighing, and
counting--processes, which, as we shall see in the sequel, are essential
to scientific thought. About 2300 B.C. they had multiplication tables
running from 1 to 1350, which were probably used in connection with
astronomical calculations. Unlike the Egyptians they had no symbol for a
million, though the "ten thousand times ten thousand" of the Bible
(Daniel VII: 10) may indicate that the conception of even larger numbers
was not altogether foreign to them. They counted in sixties as well as
in tens. Their hours and minutes had each sixty subdivisions. They
divided the circle into six parts and into six-times-sixty subdivisions.
Tables of squares and cubes discovered in southern Babylonia were
interpreted correctly only on a sexagesimal basis, the statement that 1
plus 4 is the square of 8 implying that the first unit is 60. As we have
already seen, considerable knowledge of geometry is apparent in
Babylonian designs and constructions.According to a Greek historian of the fifth century B.C., there were no
physicians at Babylon, while a later Greek historian (of the first
century B.C.) speaks of a Babylonian university which had attained
celebrity, and which is now believed to have been a school of medicine.
Modern research has made known letters by a physician addressed to an
Assyrian king in the seventh century B.C. referring to the king's chief
physician, giving directions for the treatment of a bleeding from the
nose from which a friend of the prince was suffering, and reporting the
probable recovery of a poor fellow whose eyes were diseased. Other
letters from the same general period mention the presence of physicians
at court. We have even recovered the name (Ilu-bani) of a physician who
lived in southern Babylonia about 2700 B.C. The most interesting
information, however, in reference to Babylonian medicine dates from the
time of Hammurabi, a contemporary of the patriarch Abraham. It appears
from the code drawn up in the reign of that monarch that the Babylonian
surgeons operated in case of cataract; that they were entitled to twenty
silver shekels (half the sum for which Joseph was sold into slavery, and
equivalent to seven or eight dollars) for a successful operation; and
that in case the patient lost his life or his sight as the result of an
unsuccessful operation, the surgeon was condemned to have his hands
amputated.The Babylonian records of medicine like those of astronomy reveal the
prevalence of many superstitious beliefs. The spirits of evil bring
maladies upon us; the gods heal the diseases that afflict us. The
Babylonian books of medicine contained strange interminglings of
prescription and incantation. The priests studied the livers of
sacrificial animals in order to divine the thoughts of the gods--a
practice which stimulated the study of anatomy. The maintenance of state
menageries no doubt had a similar influence on the study of the natural
history of animals.The Babylonians were a nation of agriculturists and merchants. Sargon of
Akkad, who founded the first Semitic empire in Asia (3800 B.C.), was
brought up by an irrigator, and was himself a gardener. Belshazzar, the
son of the last Babylonian king, dealt in wool on a considerable scale.
Excavation in the land watered by the Tigris and Euphrates tells the
tale of the money-lenders, importers, dyers, fullers, tanners,
saddlers, smiths, carpenters, shoemakers, stonecutters, ivory-cutters,
brickmakers, porcelain-makers, potters, vintners, sailors, butchers,
engineers, architects, painters, sculptors, musicians, dealers in rugs,
clothing and fabrics, who contributed to the culture of this great
historic people. It is not surprising that science should find its
matrix in so rich a civilization.The lever and the pulley, lathes, picks, saws, hammers, bronze
operating-lances, sundials, water-clocks, the gnomon (a vertical pillar
for determining the sun's altitude) were in use. Gem-cutting was highly
developed as early as 3800 B.C. The Babylonians made use of copper
hardened with antimony and tin, lead, incised shells, glass, alabaster,
lapis-lazuli, silver, and gold. Iron was not employed before the period
of contact with Egyptian civilization. Their buildings were furnished
with systems of drains and flushes that seem to us altogether modern.
Our museums are enriched by specimens of their handicraft--realistic
statuary in dolerite of 2700 B.C.; rock crystal worked to the form of a
plano-convex lens, 3800 B.C.; a beautiful silver vase of the period 3950
B.C.; and the head of a goat in copper about 4000 B.C.Excavation has not disclosed nor scholarship interpreted the full record
of this ancient people in the valley of the Tigris and the Euphrates,
not far from the Gulf of Persia, superior in religious inspiration, not
inferior in practical achievements to the Egyptians. Both these great
nations of antiquity, however, failed to carry the sciences that arose
in connection with their arts to a high degree of generalization. That
was reserved for another people of ancient times, namely, the Greeks.REFERENCES F. H. Garrison, _An Introduction to the History of Medicine_. H. V. Hilprecht, _Excavations in Assyria and Babylonia_. Max Neuburger, _History of Medicine_. A. H. Sayce, _Babylonians and Assyrians_.