When the Doctor Is Not Around

doi:10.1017/9781009389792.010

Chapter 9 - When the Doctor Is Not Around

Arabic-Islamic Self-Treatment Manuals As Cultured People’s Guides to Medico-pharmacological Knowledge. The Mamluk Period (1250–1517)

from Part II - The Borders of Pharmacology

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 October 2023

Paulina B. Lewicka

Edited by

Petros Bouras-Vallianatos and

Dionysios Stathakopoulos

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Petros Bouras-Vallianatos: Affiliation:
National and Kapodistrian University of Athens
Dionysios Stathakopoulos: Affiliation:
University of Cyprus

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Summary

As a subgenre of the Arabic medical literature of the Islamic Middle Period, the self-treatment compendia seem to have escaped the notice of contemporary scholarship. Meant for domestic use by Arabic-speaking, cultured urbanites, the compendia dealt with the cure and prevention of diseases. As such, they promoted a well-defined set of concepts and, at the same time, reflected medicine-related convictions, knowledge, and intellectual tradition prevailing not only among physicians, but also among educated non-professionals. While taking into consideration a number of Arabic-Islamic self-treatment compendia, the chapter focuses on two specific texts, one of which was written in fourteenth-century Cairo. The provenance of the other cannot be securely defined. The analysis of the manuals’ texts is focused, above all, on investigating cultural and intellectual influences which, through the transfer and assimilation of drugs and drug-related ideas, contributed to shaping the overall medico-pharmaceutical culture of the Mamluk Near East.

Keywords

Arabic-Islamic medical literature self-treatment manuals medico-pharmaceutical culture medical pluralism humoral theory occult-magical therapy Muḥammad Ibn al-Akfānī al-Sinjārī Abū al-Ḥasan Muḥammad al-Qurashī

Type: Chapter
Information: Drugs in the Medieval Mediterranean
Transmission and Circulation of Pharmacological Knowledge
, pp. 291 - 319

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009389792.010 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2023

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Chapter 9 - When the Doctor Is Not Around

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