Overview

Early medieval medicine in Europe saw little change since antiquity. The collapse of the western Roman Empire brought barbarian invasions and the rise of warrior fiefdoms to Europe, both of which hampered civilization and its amenities—including the practice of scientific medicine. Medical care was provided in a practical fashion based upon ancient ideas, with little regard for scientific methods. Religious influences crept into medicine, as those confined to monastic cloisters struggled to keep medical studies alive by copying and preserving the few original medical manuscripts of the Dark Ages. Not until the second millennium, around 1100, would the scholarly pursuit of medicine in western Europe experience a rebirth, when Greek and Arabic medical texts were brought to southern Italy and translated for the Latin-speaking cloistered West.

Background

Medieval European physicians (physics) based their medical care mainly upon the teachings...