In September 1940, four

French teenagers
stumbled upon one of
the most famous and
astounding collection of
Paleolithic art in the
world: the cave of
Lascaux in the Pyrennes
mountains.
●It is the world’s oldest example
of medicine in art, dating back
15,000 years.
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● The lone human figure among all the

animals is the man with a head of a
bird, who appears to be in a
confrontation with a bull and beside
him is a staff.
● It is believed that the
human figure is some
sort of shaman
(medicine man).
● Shaman were in charge of the
knowledge of health, of life and of
death.
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Trepanning
● Primitive man believed that headaches was
the work
of evil spirits who invaded the body of
unfortunate
individuals.
● Letting the spirits out of the skull would
bring relief.
Thus, the ‘surgical’ procedure trepanning was
born.
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Imhotep
● Imhotep lived in Egypt ~
2900 BC;
● He seems to have been a
successful physician.
● He is one of the first
medical men whose name
is on record and became
known as the God of
Medicine.
● He began using simple
surgery instead of just
magic.
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Ebers papryus – oldest collection of medical
writings ~1600 BC
•covered 200 diseases
•extracted medicine from plants
•knew position of vital organs
•circulation of blood
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The Two Great Names in the

History of Greek Medicine
Hippocrates and Galen
● Hippocrates - dominated the
beginning of scientific creativity, lasted
more than 700 years.
● He was the first to attempt to separate
the practice of medicine from religion
and superstition.
● Hippocrates taught against such
improper conduct. He told his
students to treat everyone the same.
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The Hippocratic
Oath
● A statement describing proper
conduct.
● It was a pledge and is a
guideline for honorable
standards of action.
● “I will use treatment to help the
sick according to my ability and
judgment, but never with the
view to injury and wrong
doing…Into whatsoever houses
I enter, I will enter to help the
sick.”
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Galen Described wounds

as “Windows to the Body”
● Galen, the great 2nd century
physician and anatomist, spent
his early medical career as a
surgeon to the gladiators.
● He employed as many as 20
scribes to write down all that he
said in during his work.
● He dissected animals in his
medical research.
● He thought that infections were
caused by clouds of poisonous
gases.