The famous “Almagest” of Ptolemy, the most important work of ancient astronomy, was translated from a Greek manuscript, as early as 1160, by a medical student of Salerno.(5)

     (5) Haskins and Lockwood:  Harvard Studies in Classical
     Philology, 1910, xxi, pp. 75-102.

About thirty miles southeast of Naples lay Salernum, which for centuries kept alight the lamp of the old learning, and became the centre of medical studies in the Middle Ages; well deserving its name of “Civitas Hippocratica.”  The date of foundation is uncertain, but Salernitan physicians are mentioned as early as the middle of the ninth century, and from this date until the rise of the universities it was not only a great medical school, but a popular resort for the sick and wounded.  As the scholar says in Longfellow’s “Golden Legend”: 

     Then at every season of the year
     There are crowds of guests and travellers here;
     Pilgrims and mendicant friars and traders
     From the Levant, with figs and wine,
     And bands of wounded and sick Crusaders,
     Coming back from Palestine.

There were medical and surgical clinics, foundling hospitals, Sisters of Charity, men and women professors—­among the latter the famous Trotula—­and apothecaries.  Dissections were carried out, chiefly upon animals, and human subjects were occasionally used.  In the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the school reached its height, and that remarkable genius, Frederick ii, laid down regulations for a preliminary study extending over three years, and a course in medicine for five years, including surgery.  Fee tables and strict regulations as to practice were made; and it is specifically stated that the masters were to teach in the schools, theoretically and practically, under the authority of Hippocrates and Galen.  The literature from the school had a far-reaching influence.  One book on the anatomy of the pig illustrates the popular subject for dissection at that time.(6) The writings, which are numerous, have been collected by De Renzi.(7)

     (6) “And dissections of the bodies of swine
     As likest the human form divine.”—­Golden Legend.

     (7) S. de Renzi:  Collectio Salernitana, 5 vols., Naples,
     1852-1859; P. Giacosa:  Magistri Salernitani, Turin, 1901.

The “Antidotarium” of Nicolaus Salernitanus, about 1100, became the popular pharmacopoeia of the Middle Ages, and many modern preparations may be traced to it.

The most prominent man of the school is Constantinus Africanus, a native of Carthage, who, after numerous journeys, reached Salernum about the middle of the eleventh century.  He was familiar with the works both of the Greeks and of the Arabs, and it was largely through his translations that the works of Rhazes and Avicenna became known in the West.