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Medieval Medicine and the Treatment of Wounds

When one thinks of a culture from the past, we may think of it as "unsophisticated" when compared to our own. It's very easy for those of us in the twenty-first century to look at the stomach-churning medical treatments that were available to medical practitioners of the Middle Ages. Leeches plumped-up with a patient's blood, draining the blood of an ill person, cathartics, emetics and doctors and priests reciting prayers over the injured and ill in an effort to have God (or the gods) intervene and heal the loved one. Diseases we hardly see today ran rampant in the Middle Ages. Malaria, liver flukes (which causes liver abscesses), dysentery, tooth abscesses, jaundice (probably caused by hepatitis), pneumonia and anemia were common, everyday diseases that one took in stride in that period. Influenza could be fatal, and even the common cold could be debilitating. This isn't even taking into consideration the injuries sustained during the period. Fractures, lacerations (usually caused by swords and other weapons during the various battles that were fought), eye trauma, poisonings (either accidental or intentional) and childbirth were problems having to be dealt with daily. Throw in the Black Death and it's amazing that the human race survived at all.

All-in-all, considering the knowledge at the time, doctors* did rather well. Their primary role was to comfort the patient and try to encourage the restoration of health...not much different from today's health care providers.

Back in those days, the physician's understanding of the human body was based on the "humoral theory". A theory popularized by Hippocrates, it dominated medicine until the nineteenth century. The theory is based on the fact that all material in the universe, including the human body, was based on four elements: earth, water, fire and air. These humors must be kept in balance; if they are not in harmony, disease results. Even today, with this theory abandoned, the basic ideas are still in our vocabulary. When someone is in a bad mood, he is in "ill humor"; likewise, a person in a good or lighthearted mood is in "good humor".

According to the humoral theory of illness, most health problems could be blamed on an excess of humor; therefore, alleviating this excess would cure the illness. Bloodletting was the most common way of relieving an excess of humor. During the Middle Ages, there were three methods of bloodletting: leeching, venesection and cupping.

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