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Pedanius Dioscorides

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Pedanius Dioscorides
ViennaDioscoridesAuthorPortrait.jpg
Dioscorides receives a mandrake root, an illumination from the 6th century (c. 512) Greek Juliana Anicia Codex
Bornc. 40 AD[1]
Diedc. 90 AD
Other namesDioscurides
Occupation(s)Army physician, pharmacologist, botanist
Known forDe Materia Medica

Pedanius Dioscorides (Greek: Πεδάνιος Διοσκουρίδης, Pedánios Dioskourídēs; c. 40–90 AD), “the father of pharmacognosy”, was a Greek physician, pharmacologist, botanist, and author of De materia medica (Περὶ ὕλης ἰατρικῆς, On Medical Material) —a 5-volume Greek encyclopedia about herbal medicine and related medicinal substances (a pharmacopeia), that was widely read for more than 1,500 years. For almost two millennia Dioscorides was regarded as the most prominent writer on plants and plant drugs.[2][3]

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Greek language

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece, Cyprus, southern Italy, southern Albania, and other regions of the Balkans, the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor, and the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet, which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic, and many other writing systems.

Pharmacognosy

Pharmacognosy

Pharmacognosy is the study of crude drugs obtained from medicinal plants, animals, fungi, and other natural sources. The American Society of Pharmacognosy defines pharmacognosy as "the study of the physical, chemical, biochemical, and biological properties of drugs, drug substances, or potential drugs or drug substances of natural origin as well as the search for new drugs from natural sources".

De materia medica

De materia medica

De materia medica is a pharmacopoeia of medicinal plants and the medicines that can be obtained from them. The five-volume work was written between 50 and 70 CE by Pedanius Dioscorides, a Greek physician in the Roman army. It was widely read for more than 1,500 years until supplanted by revised herbals in the Renaissance, making it one of the longest-lasting of all natural history and pharmacology books.

Life

A native of Anazarbus, Cilicia, Asia Minor, Dioscorides likely studied medicine nearby at the school in Tarsus, which had a pharmacological emphasis, and he dedicated his medical books to Laecanius Arius, a medical practitioner there.[a][5][6] Though he writes he lived a "soldier's life" or "soldier-like life", his pharmacopeia refers almost solely to plants found in the Greek-speaking eastern Mediterranean, making it likely that he served in campaigns, or travelled in a civilian capacity, less widely as supposed.[7][5] The name Pedanius is Roman, suggesting that an aristocrat of that name sponsored him to become a Roman citizen.[8]

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De materia medica

Blackberry from the 6th-century Vienna Dioscurides manuscript
Blackberry from the 6th-century Vienna Dioscurides manuscript

Between AD 50 and 70 [9] Dioscorides wrote a five-volume book in his native Greek, Περὶ ὕλης ἰατρικῆς (Perì hylēs íatrikēs), known in Western Europe more often by its Latin title De materia medica ("On Medical Material"), which became the precursor to all modern pharmacopeias.[10]

Cover of an early printed version of De materia medica, Lyon, 1554
Cover of an early printed version of De materia medica, Lyon, 1554

In contrast to many classical authors, Dioscorides' works were not "rediscovered" in the Renaissance, because his book had never left circulation; indeed, with regard to Western materia medica through the early modern period, Dioscorides' text eclipsed the Hippocratic corpus.[11]

In the medieval period, De materia medica was circulated in Greek, as well as Latin and Arabic translation.[12]

While being reproduced in manuscript form through the centuries, it was often supplemented with commentary and minor additions from Arabic and Indian sources. Ibn al-Baitar's commentary on Dioscorides' De materia medica, entitled Tafsīr Kitāb Diāsqūrīdūs: تفسير كتاب دياسقوريدوس, has been used by scholars to identify many of the flora mentioned by Dioscorides.[13]

A number of illustrated manuscripts of De materia medica survive. The most famous of these is the lavishly illustrated Vienna Dioscurides, produced in Constantinople in 512/513 AD. Densely illustrated Arabic copies survive from the 12th and 13th centuries, while Greek manuscripts survive today in the monasteries of Mount Athos.[14]

De materia medica is the prime historical source of information about the medicines used by the Greeks, Romans, and other cultures of antiquity. The work also records the Dacian,[15] Thracian,[16] Roman, ancient Egyptian and North African (Carthaginian) names for some plants, which otherwise would have been lost. The work presents about 600 plants in all,[17] although the descriptions are sometimes obscurely phrased, leading to comments such as: "Numerous individuals from the Middle Ages on have struggled with the identity of the recondite kinds",[18] while some of the botanical identifications of Dioscorides' plants remain merely guesses.

De materia medica formed the core of the European pharmacopeia through the 19th century, suggesting that "the timelessness of Dioscorides' work resulted from an empirical tradition based on trial and error; that it worked for generation after generation despite social and cultural changes and changes in medical theory".[11]

The plant genus Dioscorea, which includes the yam, was named after him by Linnaeus. A butterfly, the Bush hopper, Ampittia dioscorides which is found from India southeast towards Indonesia and east towards China, is named after him.[19]

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De materia medica

De materia medica

De materia medica is a pharmacopoeia of medicinal plants and the medicines that can be obtained from them. The five-volume work was written between 50 and 70 CE by Pedanius Dioscorides, a Greek physician in the Roman army. It was widely read for more than 1,500 years until supplanted by revised herbals in the Renaissance, making it one of the longest-lasting of all natural history and pharmacology books.

Blackberry

Blackberry

The blackberry is an edible fruit produced by many species in the genus Rubus in the family Rosaceae, hybrids among these species within the subgenus Rubus, and hybrids between the subgenera Rubus and Idaeobatus. The taxonomy of blackberries has historically been confused because of hybridization and apomixis, so that species have often been grouped together and called species aggregates. For example, the entire subgenus Rubus has been called the Rubus fruticosus aggregate, although the species R. fruticosus is considered a synonym of R. plicatus.

Vienna Dioscurides

Vienna Dioscurides

The Vienna Dioscurides or Vienna Dioscorides is an early 6th-century Byzantine Greek illuminated manuscript of an even earlier 1st century AD work, De materia medica by Pedanius Dioscorides in uncial script. It is an important and rare example of a late antique scientific text. After residing in Constantinople for just over a thousand years, the text passed to the Holy Roman Emperor in Vienna in the 1500s, a century after the city fell to the Ottomans.

Lyon

Lyon

Lyon, also spelt in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of the French Alps, 391 km (243 mi) southeast of Paris, 278 km (173 mi) north of Marseille, 113 km (70 mi) southwest of Geneva, 50 km (31 mi) northeast of Saint-Étienne.

Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas and achievements of classical antiquity. It occurred after the Crisis of the Late Middle Ages and was associated with great social change. In addition to the standard periodization, proponents of a "long Renaissance" may put its beginning in the 14th century and its end in the 17th century.

Mount Athos

Mount Athos

Mount Athos is a mountain in the distal part of the eponymous Athos peninsula and site of an important centre of Eastern Orthodox monasticism in northeastern Greece. The mountain along with the respective part of the peninsula have been governed as the monastic community of Mount Athos, an autonomous region within the Hellenic Republic, ecclesiastically under the direct jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, while the remainder of the peninsula forms part of the Aristotelis municipality. Mount Athos has been inhabited since ancient times and is known for its long Christian presence and historical monastic traditions, which date back to at least 800 AD during the Byzantine era. Because of its long history of religious importance, the well-preserved agrarian architecture within the monasteries, and the preservation of the flora and fauna around the mountain, Mount Athos was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1988.

Dacian language

Dacian language

Dacian is an extinct language, generally believed to be a member of the Indo-European family, that was spoken in the Carpathian region in antiquity. In the 1st century, it was probably the predominant language of the ancient regions of Dacia and Moesia and possibly of some surrounding regions. The language was extinct by the 4th century AD.

Thracian language

Thracian language

The Thracian language is an extinct and poorly attested language, spoken in ancient times in Southeast Europe by the Thracians. The linguistic affinities of the Thracian language are poorly understood, but it is generally agreed that it was an Indo-European language with satem features.

Dioscorea

Dioscorea

Dioscorea is a genus of over 600 species of flowering plants in the family Dioscoreaceae, native throughout the tropical and warm temperate regions of the world. The vast majority of the species are tropical, with only a few species extending into temperate climates. It was named by the monk Charles Plumier after the ancient Greek physician and botanist Dioscorides.

Yam (vegetable)

Yam (vegetable)

Yam is the common name for some plant species in the genus Dioscorea that form edible tubers. The tubers of some other species in the genus, such as D. communis, are toxic. Yams are perennial herbaceous vines cultivated for the consumption of their starchy tubers in many temperate and tropical regions, especially in West Africa, South America and the Caribbean, Asia, and Oceania. The tubers themselves, also called "yams", come in a variety of forms owing to numerous cultivars and related species.

Carl Linnaeus

Carl Linnaeus

Carl Linnaeus, also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné, was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming organisms. He is known as the "father of modern taxonomy". Many of his writings were in Latin; his name is rendered in Latin as Carolus Linnæus and, after his 1761 ennoblement, as Carolus a Linné.

Ampittia dioscorides

Ampittia dioscorides

Ampittia dioscorides, the common bush hopper or simply bush hopper, is a butterfly found in India, China, Indochina, Cambodia and on to Borneo, Sumatra and Java belonging to the family Hesperiidae.

Gallery

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Arabic

Arabic

Arabic is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world. Having emerged in the 1st century, it is named after the Arab people; the term "Arab" was initially used to describe those living in the Arabian Peninsula, as perceived by geographers from ancient Greece.

Spain

Spain

Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country primarily located in southwestern Europe with parts of territory in the Atlantic Ocean and across the Mediterranean Sea. The largest part of Spain is situated on the Iberian Peninsula; its territory also includes the Canary Islands in the Atlantic Ocean, the Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean Sea, and the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla in Africa. The country's mainland is bordered to the south by Gibraltar; to the south and east by the Mediterranean Sea; to the north by France, Andorra and the Bay of Biscay; and to the west by Portugal and the Atlantic Ocean. With an area of 505,990 km2 (195,360 sq mi), Spain is the second-largest country in the European Union (EU) and, with a population exceeding 47.4 million, the fourth-most populous EU member state. Spain's capital and largest city is Madrid; other major urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Zaragoza, Málaga, Murcia, Palma de Mallorca, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, and Bilbao.

British Museum

British Museum

The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It documents the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present. The British Museum was the first public national museum to cover all fields of knowledge.

De materia medica

De materia medica

De materia medica is a pharmacopoeia of medicinal plants and the medicines that can be obtained from them. The five-volume work was written between 50 and 70 CE by Pedanius Dioscorides, a Greek physician in the Roman army. It was widely read for more than 1,500 years until supplanted by revised herbals in the Renaissance, making it one of the longest-lasting of all natural history and pharmacology books.

Translations

  • De Materia Medica: Being an Herbal with many other medicinal materials. Translated by Tess Anne Osbaldeston; based on the 1655 translation of John Goodyer. Johannesburg: Ibidis Press. 2000 – via cancerlynx.com.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  • De Materia Medica. Translated by Lily Y. Beck. Olms-Weidmann: Hildesheim. 2005.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  • Gunter, R. T., ed. (1933) [1655]. The Greek Herbal of Dioscorides... Translated by John Goodyer.
  • De Materia Medica : libri V Eiusdem de Venenis Libri duo. Translated by Iano Antonio Saraceno Lugdunaeo (Janus Antonius Saracenus). 1598 – via digitale-sammlungen.de.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)

Source: "Pedanius Dioscorides", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, March 17th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedanius_Dioscorides.

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Notes
  1. ^ The dedication, translated by Scarborough and Nutton,[4] began "At your insistence I have assembled my material into five books, and I dedicate my compendium to you in fulfilment of a debt of gratitude for your sentiments towards me".[5]
References
  1. ^ "Pedanius Dioscorides". Encyclopaedia Britannica. September 27, 2013. Retrieved July 4, 2020 – via britannica.com.
  2. ^ Bauer Petrovska, Biljana (2012). "Historical review of medicinal plants' usage". Pharmacognosy Reviews. 6 (11): 1–5. doi:10.4103/0973-7847.95849. PMC 3358962. PMID 22654398.
  3. ^ Osbaldeston, Tess Anne (2008). "De Materia Medica - Pedanius Dioscorides -". Retrieved 11 November 2022.
  4. ^ Scarborough and Nutton, 1982
  5. ^ a b c Stobart, Anne (2014). Critical Approaches to the History of Western Herbal Medicine: From Classical Antiquity to the Early Modern Period. A&C Black. p. 193. ISBN 978-1-4411-8418-4.
  6. ^ Borzelleca, Joseph F.; Lane, Richard W. (2008). "The Art, the Science, and the Seduction of Toxicology: an Evolutionary Development". In Hayes, Andrew Wallace (ed.). Principles and methods of toxicology (5th ed.). Taylor & Francis. p. 13.
  7. ^ Nutton, Vivian. Ancient medicine. Routledge, 2012. p. 178
  8. ^ Tobyn, Graeme; Denham, Alison; Whitelegg, Midge (2016). The Western Herbal Tradition: 2000 Years of Medicinal Plant Knowledge (illustrated ed.). Singing Dragon. p. 4. ISBN 9780857012593.
  9. ^ "Greek Medicine". National Institutes of Health, USA. 16 September 2002. Retrieved 1 July 2013.
  10. ^ Rooney, Anne (2012). The History of Medicine. The Rosen Publishing Group. p. 121. ISBN 9781448873708.
  11. ^ a b De Vos (2010) "European Materia Medica in Historical Texts: Longevity of a Tradition and Implications for Future Use", Journal of Ethnopharmacology 132(1):28–47
  12. ^ Some detail about medieval manuscripts of De Materia Medica at pages xxix–xxxi in Introduction to Dioscorides Materia Medica by TA Osbaldeston, year 2000.
  13. ^ Zohar Amar, Agricultural Produce in the Land of Israel in the Middle Ages (Hebrew title: גידולי ארץ-ישראל בימי הביניים), Ben-Zvi Institute: Jerusalem 2000, p. 270 ISBN 965-217-174-3 (Hebrew); Tafsīr Kitāb Diāsqūrīdūs - commentaire de la “Materia Medica” de Dioscoride de Abū Muḥammad ʻAbdallāh ibn Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Bayṭār de Malaga (ed. Ibrahim Ben Mrad), Beirut 1989 (Arabic title: تفسير كتاب دياسقوريدوس)
  14. ^ Selin, Helaine (2008). Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures. Springer. p. 1077. ISBN 9781402045592.
  15. ^ Nutton, Vivian (2004). Ancient Medicine. Routledge.. Page 177.
  16. ^ Murray, J. (1884). The Academy. Alexander and Shephrard.. Page 68.
  17. ^ Krebs, Robert E.; Krebs, Carolyn A. (2003). Groundbreaking Scientific Experiments, Inventions, and Discoveries of the Ancient World. Greenwood Publishing Group.. Pages 75–76.
  18. ^ Isely, Duane (1994). One hundred and one botanists. Iowa State University Press.
  19. ^ Austin, Daniel F. (2004). Florida Ethnobotany (illustrated ed.). CRC Press. p. 267. ISBN 9780203491881.
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