The Chirurgen

M edicine in our time is multi-faceted, relying on the skills of several classes of practitioners. The ill and aged be treated by university trained physicians, monks or folk healers, depending on the patient's economic class. Though medical practices and procedures are generally perceived as obsolete and relying on herbal remedies, prayer, spells and incantations, there be also surgeries performed and cures perfected.

T he first medical university was founded in the tenth century in Salarno, Italy where Greek manuscripts written by such physicians as Hippocrates were studied. Physicians followed the Greek belief that the body was made up of four humors - sanguine (blood), choler, phlegm and melancholia. They believe that the primary cause of illness be an imbalance of the humors, each of which be given qualities of heat and moistness. Sanguine be hot and moist, choler be hot and dry, phlegm, cold and moist, melancholy, cold and dry. They worke to diagnose which humor be at fault then balance out or purged the humor with herbal remedies and often by bloodletting or by the administration of laxatives.

T he physicians also believe, in what be known as the Doctrine of Signatures, that the color of flowers and other properties of plants indicated their usefulness in treating particular diseases. For example, plants which bear yellow flowers, such as dandelion and fennel, be linked to the liver’s yellow bile and be recommended to treat jaundice.

W hat few physicians there be stay mainly in the cities where they receive substantial rewards and privileges. The physicians’ services be expensive and afforded only by the very wealthy. As a result, most formal medicine be practiced and governed by the church, which think illness be divine retribution. Due to this belief, many of the sick take pilgrimages in the hopes of recovering by making peace with God.

T his belief, however, stop not the monks, who be the most literate of the general population, from applying what they have learned from making copies of the ancient medical texts. Each monastery be an infirmary where treatment be available with herbal remedies, based on those prescribed by Hippocrates and others, made from plants cultivated in their gardens. The earliest hospitals be established by monasteries and be primarily refuges for the old and disabled and traveling pilgrims.

M ore practical medicine for the commoner, usually performed by women, be folk remedies passed down by elders. Herbal remedies be only one of the resources available. Healing wells, stones, and charms play a part as well, often in combination . Incantations and spells be also practiced. These be forbidden by the church, and as a result, over time many archaic spells be given a Christian flavor. Instead of invoking the pagan gods, the Christian God and patron saints be called upon.

T hus, on one side there be the university trained physicians, all men, who be in towns and cities and serve the wealthy nobles. On the other side there be the folk healers, usually women, in the rural Shires. In the middle be healers in the religious orders, who incorporated both aspects of healing into practice. All use many of the same plant remedies but operate in distinctly separate economic groups and with great distrust and contempt for each other. The situation be amplified over the centuries resulting in religious persecution and witch hunting which ultimately led to the execution of thousands of folk healers who be so skilled, that they be thought to have pact with the devil.

P ersonally, when sickness befalls mine flesh, I consult with my love, Poisonbelladonna, The Empress of the Essence. She holds the skills of the ages within her hands. That of laughter, herbs, and pleasing to the eye. Huza!