Ancient Babylonian Medicine

Utilizing a great variety of previously unknown cuneiform tablets, Ancient Babylonian Medicine: Theory and Practice examines the way medicine was practiced by various Babylonian professionals of the 2nd and 1st millennium B.C. Represents the first overview of Babylonian medicine utilizing cuneiform sources, including archives of court letters, medical recipes, and commentaries written by ancient scholars Attempts to reconcile the ways in which medicine and magic were related Assigns authorship to various types of medical literature that were previously considered anonymous Rejects the approach of other scholars that have attempted to apply modern diagnostic methods to ancient illnesses

List of Illustrations viii List of Abbreviations x Acknowledgments xii Introduction to Babylonian Medicine and Magic 1 1 Medicine as Science 11 2 Who Did What to Whom? 43 3 The Politics of Medicine 56 4 Medicine as Literature 89 5 Medicine and Philosophy 118 6 Medical Training: MD or PhD? 130 7 Uruk Medical Commentaries 141 8 Medicine and Magic as Independent Approaches to Healing 161 Appendix: An Edition of a Medical Commentary 168 Notes 177 References 202 Subject Index 211 Selective Index of Akkadian and Greek Words 217 Index of Akkadian Personal Names 220