Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230077
Aurélien Robert
Antonio da Parma (d. 1327) was a philosopher and physician, active in Bologna in the early fourteenth century, and associated with so-called “Bolognese Averroism.” His philosophical works are increasingly better documented. While his medical works are much less studied, his commentary – written between 1310 and 1323 – on the first book of Avicenna’s Canon, had a considerable influence on later commentators. This paper presents his analysis of the notion of ‘complexion’, a notion central to his anthropology for the philosophical issues it seeks to address: the possibility, for example, of defining the specific nature of the human body – as compared with other natural species – or of conceiving a scientific and universal discourse when confronted with the extreme variability of individual bodily complexion, which is at the heart of medical practice. Taking from Galen and Avicenna their ‘relativistic’ analysis of the well-balanced complexion, Antonio uses the idea of a latitude of individual complexion within the limits set by the natural species, to thereby make this picture of the human body coherent with the principles of Aristotelian natural philosophy. In so doing, he addresses the relationship between matter and form in a human body, the individuation of human bodies, or the principle of identity of a singular body. The paper concludes with a transcription of the relevant passages from Antonio’s commentary on Avicenna’s Canon.
{"title":"The Concept of Complexion in Antonio da Parma’s Medical Anthropology","authors":"Aurélien Robert","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230077","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230077","url":null,"abstract":"Antonio da Parma (d. 1327) was a philosopher and physician, active in Bologna in the early fourteenth century, and associated with so-called “Bolognese Averroism.” His philosophical works are increasingly better documented. While his medical works are much less studied, his commentary – written between 1310 and 1323 – on the first book of Avicenna’s <jats:italic>Canon</jats:italic>, had a considerable influence on later commentators. This paper presents his analysis of the notion of ‘complexion’, a notion central to his anthropology for the philosophical issues it seeks to address: the possibility, for example, of defining the specific nature of the human body – as compared with other natural species – or of conceiving a scientific and universal discourse when confronted with the extreme variability of individual bodily complexion, which is at the heart of medical practice. Taking from Galen and Avicenna their ‘relativistic’ analysis of the well-balanced complexion, Antonio uses the idea of a latitude of individual complexion within the limits set by the natural species, to thereby make this picture of the human body coherent with the principles of Aristotelian natural philosophy. In so doing, he addresses the relationship between matter and form in a human body, the individuation of human bodies, or the principle of identity of a singular body. The paper concludes with a transcription of the relevant passages from Antonio’s commentary on Avicenna’s <jats:italic>Canon</jats:italic>.","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438802","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230080
Tommaso Alpina
According to Avicenna, the perfect (or complete) disposition (istiʿdād kāmil/tāmm) turns prime matter, which is potentially receptive to every form (or power, or quality), into complected matter, which is endowed with uniform quality. The latter, i.e., complexion (mizāǧ) or complexional form (ṣūra mizāǧiyya), is suitable to receive some particular form (or power, or quality) and not another. The question arises as to how matter acquires its specific complexion. Is it the result of celestial influence, or does it emerge from chemical, elemental interactions within matter? This paper tries to answer this question with textual evidence from Avicenna’s natural philosophy and metaphysics. Together with soul/form, complected matter represents the other constituent of organic, living substances. The paper then attempts to determine which science is proper to its investigation. I argue that the investigation of organic matter, that is, the specific complexion characterizing the animal body (or its parts), pertains to zoology. Zoology is crucial to grounding medical practice, which operates on those specific complexions to preserve or restore health.
{"title":"Between Matter and Form: Complexion (mizāǧ) as a Keystone of Avicenna’s Scientific Project","authors":"Tommaso Alpina","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230080","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230080","url":null,"abstract":"According to Avicenna, the perfect (or complete) disposition (<jats:italic>istiʿdād kāmil</jats:italic>/<jats:italic>tāmm</jats:italic>) turns prime matter, which is potentially receptive to every form (or power, or quality), into complected matter, which is endowed with uniform quality. The latter, i.e., complexion (<jats:italic>mizāǧ</jats:italic>) or complexional form (<jats:italic>ṣūra mizāǧiyya</jats:italic>), is suitable to receive some particular form (or power, or quality) and not another. The question arises as to how matter acquires its specific complexion. Is it the result of celestial influence, or does it emerge from chemical, elemental interactions within matter? This paper tries to answer this question with textual evidence from Avicenna’s natural philosophy and metaphysics. Together with soul/form, complected matter represents the other constituent of organic, living substances. The paper then attempts to determine which science is proper to its investigation. I argue that the investigation of organic matter, that is, the specific complexion characterizing the animal body (or its parts), pertains to zoology. Zoology is crucial to grounding medical practice, which operates on those specific complexions to preserve or restore health.","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438806","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230076
Giouli Korobili
A number of ancient philosophers showed a keen interest in understanding whether moral development and the acquisition of virtue is in any way affected by the material constitution of human bodies. Moral education and socialisation were conceived of as having a significant impact on the resulting behaviours, while individual natures, thanks to their special physiological characteristics, were frequently seen as constantly interacting with acquired traits, eventually determining individual characters. This paper focuses on two key concepts of this wider subject, krasis (blending) and enkrateia (continence), and attempts to trace their philosophical interrelations throughout Greek and Roman Antiquity, especially from the fifth century BCE to the first century CE. An important result of this analysis reveals that during this period, enkrateia is described – often explicitly – as a manifestation of krasis, signifying as it does a well-balanced blending of certain ‘ingredients’.
{"title":"Eukrasia and Enkrateia: Greco-Roman Theories of Blending and the Struggle for Virtue","authors":"Giouli Korobili","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230076","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230076","url":null,"abstract":"A number of ancient philosophers showed a keen interest in understanding whether moral development and the acquisition of virtue is in any way affected by the material constitution of human bodies. Moral education and socialisation were conceived of as having a significant impact on the resulting behaviours, while individual natures, thanks to their special physiological characteristics, were frequently seen as constantly interacting with acquired traits, eventually determining individual characters. This paper focuses on two key concepts of this wider subject, <jats:italic>krasis</jats:italic> (blending) and <jats:italic>enkrateia</jats:italic> (continence), and attempts to trace their philosophical interrelations throughout Greek and Roman Antiquity, especially from the fifth century <jats:sc>BCE</jats:sc> to the first century <jats:sc>CE</jats:sc>. An important result of this analysis reveals that during this period, <jats:italic>enkrateia</jats:italic> is described – often explicitly – as a manifestation of <jats:italic>krasis</jats:italic>, signifying as it does a well-balanced blending of certain ‘ingredients’.","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438786","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230087
Christoph Sander
In medieval natural philosophy and medicine, magnetic attraction was the most commonly invoked example for the effects of so-called ‘occult qualities’ or ‘occult powers.’ According to this conception – which dates back to Galen, Alexander of Aphrodisias, and Avicenna – magnetism was caused by an insensible quality and not, therefore, by one of the four primary qualities (hot, cold, wet, dry). Already disputed in medieval times, however, was whether the magnet’s ‘temperament’, ‘mixture’ or ‘complexion’ might not account for the attraction of iron. In the early modern period, trained physicians above all increasingly refuted ‘occult qualities’ in magnetism, while at the same time retaining a Galenic framework. They argued instead for more elaborate theories invoking the magnet’s and iron’s ‘complexion’ or their single primary qualities, such as ‘humidity’ or ‘heat.’ Medical concepts were often combined with meteorological ideas for causal theories of natural phenomena like magnetism. By telling this unheard story of ‘complexion’ in theories of magnetism, we show not only how medical theories were transferred from medicine into other fields of research, but also that an established narrative in modern historiography is highly questionable: contrary to what was assumed by the contemporary critics (e.g., Descartes) and many modern historians, several Galenic physicians did not subscribe to a theory of occult qualities (in the case of magnetism) in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
{"title":"Tempering Occult Qualities: Magnetism and Complexio in Early Modern Medical Thought","authors":"Christoph Sander","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230087","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230087","url":null,"abstract":"In medieval natural philosophy and medicine, magnetic attraction was the most commonly invoked example for the effects of so-called ‘occult qualities’ or ‘occult powers.’ According to this conception – which dates back to Galen, Alexander of Aphrodisias, and Avicenna – magnetism was caused by an insensible quality and not, therefore, by one of the four primary qualities (hot, cold, wet, dry). Already disputed in medieval times, however, was whether the magnet’s ‘temperament’, ‘mixture’ or ‘complexion’ might not account for the attraction of iron. In the early modern period, trained physicians above all increasingly refuted ‘occult qualities’ in magnetism, while at the same time retaining a Galenic framework. They argued instead for more elaborate theories invoking the magnet’s and iron’s ‘complexion’ or their single primary qualities, such as ‘humidity’ or ‘heat.’ Medical concepts were often combined with meteorological ideas for causal theories of natural phenomena like magnetism. By telling this unheard story of ‘complexion’ in theories of magnetism, we show not only how medical theories were transferred from medicine into other fields of research, but also that an established narrative in modern historiography is highly questionable: contrary to what was assumed by the contemporary critics (e.g., Descartes) and many modern historians, several Galenic physicians did not subscribe to a theory of occult qualities (in the case of magnetism) in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438800","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230086
Craig Martin
The constitution of air served as a key concept for investigations into epidemic disease in sixteenth-century Italy. Its roots stem from the Hippocratic Corpus and Galen’s interpretation of it. In these ancient works, the constitution of air was directly tied to the temperaments of the seasons and winds. Renaissance physicians, such as Giambattista Da Monte and Girolamo Mercuriale, used these texts to justify observing the air to determine if its constitution caused specific outbreaks of disease. At times, these observations called into question whether temperamental differences were sufficient explanations, leading physicians to posit vapors, exhalations, and celestial influences as causes of outbreaks of epidemic disease.
{"title":"The Constitution of Air: Observation and the Limits of Temperament in Italian Renaissance Medical Writing","authors":"Craig Martin","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230086","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230086","url":null,"abstract":"The constitution of air served as a key concept for investigations into epidemic disease in sixteenth-century Italy. Its roots stem from the Hippocratic Corpus and Galen’s interpretation of it. In these ancient works, the constitution of air was directly tied to the temperaments of the seasons and winds. Renaissance physicians, such as Giambattista Da Monte and Girolamo Mercuriale, used these texts to justify observing the air to determine if its constitution caused specific outbreaks of disease. At times, these observations called into question whether temperamental differences were sufficient explanations, leading physicians to posit vapors, exhalations, and celestial influences as causes of outbreaks of epidemic disease.","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438801","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230081
Chiara Beneduce
By focusing on the concept of ‘complexion’ in the major medieval Latin commentaries on Aristotle’s so-called De animalibus, this paper identifies and analyzes a case of the use of the concept of ‘complexion’ outside the medical context or, more precisely, at the intersection of natural philosophy and medicine. The preliminary survey undertaken in this paper suggests that ‘complexion’ was a key concept of the De animalibus tradition, i.e., the principle used to explain, in a unified manner, the issues at stake in the medieval scientia de animalibus. The paper further reflects on the reasons why the notion of ‘complexion’ could have served as an organizational principle of the themes treated in the De animalibus commentaries and on the role that the earliest medieval commentaries on the De animalibus themselves could have played in shaping some of the prominent features of the medieval conceptualization of ‘complexion.’
{"title":"Complexio in the Late-Medieval Latin De animalibus","authors":"Chiara Beneduce","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230081","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230081","url":null,"abstract":"By focusing on the concept of ‘complexion’ in the major medieval Latin commentaries on Aristotle’s so-called <jats:italic>De animalibus</jats:italic>, this paper identifies and analyzes a case of the use of the concept of ‘complexion’ <jats:italic>outside</jats:italic> the medical context or, more precisely, at the intersection of natural philosophy and medicine. The preliminary survey undertaken in this paper suggests that ‘complexion’ was a key concept of the <jats:italic>De animalibus</jats:italic> tradition, i.e., the principle used to explain, in a unified manner, the issues at stake in the medieval <jats:italic>scientia de animalibus</jats:italic>. The paper further reflects on the reasons why the notion of ‘complexion’ could have served as an organizational principle of the themes treated in the <jats:italic>De animalibus</jats:italic> commentaries and on the role that the earliest medieval commentaries on the <jats:italic>De animalibus</jats:italic> themselves could have played in shaping some of the prominent features of the medieval conceptualization of ‘complexion.’","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438803","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230084
Viktoria von Hoffmann
This article uses Galen’s De complexionibus and its reception as a thread to examine the part played by the sense of touch in the assessment of bodily mixtures. According to Galen, complexions were assessed by touching patients with the skin of the palm of the hand because it is “at the precise midpoint between all the extremes” and, thus, well-mixed. This article examines how this extraordinary claim about the discriminative power of touch was received from the late Middle Ages up to the early modern period, with a special focus on Renaissance thought. By following Galen’s text and its various forms and appropriations, the aim is to illuminate the fluid understanding of the Galenic notion of ‘complexion’ (complexio) in relation to changing epistemologies of touch in Renaissance medicine, notably by shedding light on the anatomical concept of ‘substance’ (substantia).
{"title":"Can Mixtures Be Identified by Touch? The Reception of Galen’s De complexionibus in Italian Renaissance Medicine","authors":"Viktoria von Hoffmann","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230084","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230084","url":null,"abstract":"This article uses Galen’s <jats:italic>De complexionibus</jats:italic> and its reception as a thread to examine the part played by the sense of touch in the assessment of bodily mixtures. According to Galen, complexions were assessed by touching patients with the skin of the palm of the hand because it is “at the precise midpoint between all the extremes” and, thus, well-mixed. This article examines how this extraordinary claim about the discriminative power of touch was received from the late Middle Ages up to the early modern period, with a special focus on Renaissance thought. By following Galen’s text and its various forms and appropriations, the aim is to illuminate the fluid understanding of the Galenic notion of ‘complexion’ (<jats:italic>complexio</jats:italic>) in relation to changing epistemologies of touch in Renaissance medicine, notably by shedding light on the anatomical concept of ‘substance’ (<jats:italic>substantia</jats:italic>).","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438805","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230083
Joseph Ziegler
This article surveys the long story of complexio in physiognomic discourse, from Galen’s De complexionibus (De temperamentis) to the great physiognomic manuals of the fifteenth century by Rolandus Scriptoris and Michele Savonarola. We linger, along the way, on various physiognomic texts, most notably the contributions to learned physiognomic discourse of Michael Scotus, William of Aragon, and John Buridan. The emerging story moves from the absence of complexio to omnipresence, with a sudden leap forward in the importance of the idea in the thirteenth century. The agents of this change were natural philosophers as well as physicians – possibly via medical intermediaries (most notably Rhazes), whose texts became available to Latin readers in the twelfth century; they borrowed the term and assimilated it into their texts, which now included the missing causal explanations that linked the physiognomic sign to its meaning. The distinctions between various kinds of complexions, most notably the growing use of the concept of radical complexion (around 1300), played a key role in this development, which provided a more stable foundation for the physiognomic judgement.
这篇文章调查了面相话语中复杂的漫长故事，从盖伦的De complexionibus (De temperamentis)到15世纪Rolandus Scriptoris和Michele Savonarola的伟大面相手册。一路上，我们流连于各种面相学文本，最引人注目的是迈克尔·司各特、阿拉贡的威廉和约翰·布里丹对面相学话语的贡献。在13世纪，随着思想重要性的突飞猛进，新兴故事从缺乏复杂性走向无所不在。这种变化的推动者是自然哲学家和医生——可能是通过医学中介(最著名的是雷泽斯)，他的文本在12世纪为拉丁读者所知;他们借用了这个术语，并将其融入到他们的文本中，现在他们的文本中包括了缺失的将面相符号与其含义联系起来的因果解释。各种肤色之间的区别，最值得注意的是渐次使用的肤色概念(大约1300年)，在这一发展中发挥了关键作用，为面相判断提供了更稳定的基础。
{"title":"Complexio and the Transformation of Learned Physiognomy ca. 1200–ca. 1500","authors":"Joseph Ziegler","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230083","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230083","url":null,"abstract":"This article surveys the long story of <jats:italic>complexio</jats:italic> in physiognomic discourse, from Galen’s <jats:italic>De complexionibus</jats:italic> (<jats:italic>De temperamentis</jats:italic>) to the great physiognomic manuals of the fifteenth century by Rolandus Scriptoris and Michele Savonarola. We linger, along the way, on various physiognomic texts, most notably the contributions to learned physiognomic discourse of Michael Scotus, William of Aragon, and John Buridan. The emerging story moves from the absence of <jats:italic>complexio</jats:italic> to omnipresence, with a sudden leap forward in the importance of the idea in the thirteenth century. The agents of this change were natural philosophers as well as physicians – possibly via medical intermediaries (most notably Rhazes), whose texts became available to Latin readers in the twelfth century; they borrowed the term and assimilated it into their texts, which now included the missing causal explanations that linked the physiognomic sign to its meaning. The distinctions between various kinds of complexions, most notably the growing use of the concept of radical complexion (around 1300), played a key role in this development, which provided a more stable foundation for the physiognomic judgement.","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438789","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230085
Elisabeth Moreau
According to the medical tradition, the temperament of bodies came from the balance of their primary qualities – hot, cold, dry, and moist. However, physicians associated additional sensory properties with temperament in the field of pharmacology. These sensations included taste, color, and odor, which allow an appraisal of the constitution and active powers of drugs. The present paper examines this theme in late-Renaissance medicine, through the accounts of the French physician Jean Fernel (ca. 1497–1558) and the Italian physician Andrea Cesalpino (1519–1603). As will be shown, their respective interpretations of drug “faculties” offered original views on the relationship between temperament, sensory properties, and matter theories. Such discussions, in turn, revealed the Renaissance reception of Arabic-Latin pharmacology, Galenic medicine, and the Aristotelian physics of matter and form.
{"title":"Temperament and the Senses: The Taste, Odor and Color of Drugs in Late-Renaissance Galenism","authors":"Elisabeth Moreau","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230085","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230085","url":null,"abstract":"According to the medical tradition, the temperament of bodies came from the balance of their primary qualities – hot, cold, dry, and moist. However, physicians associated additional sensory properties with temperament in the field of pharmacology. These sensations included taste, color, and odor, which allow an appraisal of the constitution and active powers of drugs. The present paper examines this theme in late-Renaissance medicine, through the accounts of the French physician Jean Fernel (ca. 1497–1558) and the Italian physician Andrea Cesalpino (1519–1603). As will be shown, their respective interpretations of drug “faculties” offered original views on the relationship between temperament, sensory properties, and matter theories. Such discussions, in turn, revealed the Renaissance reception of Arabic-Latin pharmacology, Galenic medicine, and the Aristotelian physics of matter and form.","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438785","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-24DOI: 10.1163/15733823-20230078
Gabriella Zuccolin
Avicenna, in Book I of the Canon, within the context of his general doctrine of complexion, presents the eight modes of equality (modi aequalitatis) that concern specific or individual complexions. There he states quite clearly that each individual within the human species possesses a complexion that belongs to that individual exclusively, and with which it is impossible to associate another individual. In this contribution, after a brief survey of some features of the discussions around the individuality and unrepeatability of complexions in the physiognomic tradition (with particular reference to twins), I will consider two different takes on this Avicennian interdict: the first, which echoes the Persian philosopher and physician, is proposed by Peter of Abano in his Conciliator; the other is by Jacopo of Forlì, who, in his Questiones super primam et secundam fen primi Canonis Avicenne, seems to cautiously distance himself from Avicenna’s authority. The contrast between these two medieval responses allows us to grasp the importance of complexion as a theoretical tool for explaining differences between individuals of the same species – differences which are not merely random or accidental, nor strictly formal.
{"title":"Can There Be Two Perfectly Identical Complexions? Peter of Abano and Jacopo of Forlì on Avicenna’s Interdict","authors":"Gabriella Zuccolin","doi":"10.1163/15733823-20230078","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15733823-20230078","url":null,"abstract":"Avicenna, in Book <jats:sc>I</jats:sc> of the <jats:italic>Canon</jats:italic>, within the context of his general doctrine of complexion, presents the eight modes of equality (<jats:italic>modi aequalitatis</jats:italic>) that concern specific or individual complexions. There he states quite clearly that each individual within the human species possesses a complexion that belongs to that individual exclusively, and with which it is impossible to associate another individual. In this contribution, after a brief survey of some features of the discussions around the individuality and unrepeatability of complexions in the physiognomic tradition (with particular reference to twins), I will consider two different takes on this Avicennian interdict: the first, which echoes the Persian philosopher and physician, is proposed by Peter of Abano in his <jats:italic>Conciliator</jats:italic>; the other is by Jacopo of Forlì, who, in his <jats:italic>Questiones super primam et secundam fen primi Canonis Avicenne</jats:italic>, seems to cautiously distance himself from Avicenna’s authority. The contrast between these two medieval responses allows us to grasp the importance of complexion as a theoretical tool for explaining differences between individuals of the same species – differences which are not merely random or accidental, nor strictly formal.","PeriodicalId":49081,"journal":{"name":"Early Science and Medicine","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138438804","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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