A complete dictionary of the Greek and Roman antiquities explaining the obscure places in classic authors and ancient historians relating to the religion, mythology, history, geography and chronology of the ancient Greeks and Romans, their ... rites and customs, laws, polity, arts and engines of war : also an account of their navigations, arts and sciences and the inventors of them : with the lives and opinions of their philosophers / compiled originally in French ... by Monsieur Danet ; made English, with the addition of very useful mapps.

MEDICUS,

a Physician, is one who pra∣ctises the Art of Physich in Curing of Diseases and Wounds, for of old, Physicians practised Chyrurgery; some Authors pretend, that Phy∣sick

was practised by no other than Slaves and Freedmen; but Causabon in his Comments upon Suetonius refutes this, and so does Drelincourt, Professor of Physick at Leyden; and the same may be farther justified by old Inscriptions. Dio∣scorides, a Grecian of Anazarba, coming to Rome, was made a Citizen thereof, and became the in∣timate Friend of Licinius Bassus, an illustrious Roman. The Physician who view'd the Wounds of Julius Caesaer, was called Antistius, and conse∣quently was a free Citizen of Rome; for Slaves had only a Surname, without any Name for their Family. Pliny who seems not to treat well of Physick, says, That the Quirites, as much as to say, the Romans, practised it; and 'tis well known that no Roman Citizens were Slaves: Those who are acquainted with History, must know what Esteem Physicians were in of old at Rome, and elsewhere, since Princes themselves disdained not the Study of it. Mithridates, King of Pon∣tus, did himself prepare a Remedy against Poy∣son. Juba, King of Mauritania, writ a Book of Plants; and Evax, King of Arabia, according to the Testimony of Pliny, dedicated a Book to Nero concerning the Medicinal Vertues of Simples.

Its true, Suetonius in the Life of Caligula speaks of a Slave that was a Physician: Mitto tibi praeterea cum eo ex servis meis Medicum; I al∣so send you one of my Slaves, who is a Physician with him. There might have been some Slaves who were Physicians; but it does not follow that there were no other but Slaves that were Phy∣sicians. Its farther pretended, that they were banish'd out of Rome in the Time of Cato the Censor, according to the Sentiments of Agrippa, in his Book concerning the Vanity of Sciences; but for this there is no other Foundation than the Misunderstanding of the following Passage in Pliny:

This Art of Physick is subject to a Thousand Changes, and a Thousand Additions, so lyable are our Minds to change upon the first Wind that blows from Greece; and there is no∣thing more certain among such as practise it than that he who abounds most in Words, be∣comes uncontroulably the Arbiter of Life and Death, as if there were not a Multitude of People who live without Physicians, tho' indeed they should not be without Physick, and this may be observed concerning the Romans them∣selves, who lived above 600 Years without them; tho' otherwise, they were not a People flow to receive good Arts, but manifested the Inclination they had for Physick, till having had Experience thereof, they condemned it, ex∣pertam damnarunt.

However, they did not condemn the Art of Physick it self, but the Male Practice thereof, non rem, sed artem.

Cassius Hemina, an old Author, says, That the first Physician who came from Peloponesus to Rome, was Archagatus, the Son of Iysanias, when L. Aemilius and M. Livius were Consuls, in the Year DXXXV, after the Building of Rome; that they made him a Citizen, and that the Govern∣ment bought him a Shop in the Cross-street of Acilius: 'Tis said they gave him the Title of Healer of Wounds, and that he was at first very much made of; but soon after, his cruel Ope∣rations which went so far, as to the Cutting off and Burning of some Parts of the Patient's Body, procured him the Nickname of Hangman, and made the People out of conceit both with Phy∣sick and Physicians. And to go a little farther with this Matter, take the Words of Marcus Cato the Censor to his Son; says he,

I'll tell thee now, my dear Son Mark, what my Thoughts are of these Greeks, and what I desire you to learn during your Stay at Athens: Take care to inform your self of their Customs, but learn them not: They are a wicked and indocible People, which I cannot endure. Believe it, as if it came from a Prophet, that when this Na∣tion communicates her Sciences to others, she corrupts the whole, and especially if she should send her Physicians hither to us: They are bound to one another by Oath to kill all Bar∣barians with their Physick..... They call us Barbarians, nay, and give us more opprobri∣ous Names: I forbid you therefore above all Things to have to do with the Physicians.

We ought not to rely upon what Pliny says, in respect to the Romans having no Physicians for above 600 Years, seeing he contradicts him∣self, when he says that Archagatus came thither in the Year 535. So that he misreckons near 100 Years. But to shew you more exactly how he is mistaken; we must observe what Dionysius of Halicarnassus says upon the Year CCCI, Hist. Rom. wherein he shews that a Plague breaking out at Rome, it swept away almost all the Slaves and half the Citizens, there being not Physicians enough to attend so many sick Per∣sons: So that here is at least a Rebate of 300 Years in Pliny's Account, seeing according to the Testimony of the said Dionysius, who was an Author of good Credit, there had been Physici∣ans at Rome from the Year 301. In the succeed∣ing Age, viz. in the Year CCCCLXI, the Plague raged again in the City of Rome, and the Art and Care of the Physicians being not able to withstand the Contagion; the Romans sent De∣puties into Greece to setch Esculasius the God of Physick thither, who at Epidaurus had done Wonders in the Curing of Diseases. In the 6th Century Archagatus was the first that came from Greece to Rome. Terence adapts a Comedy to the Year DLXXXVIII, wherein he brings Phy∣sicians upon the Stage; which he would have taken care not to have done, if they had none of them at Rome, or if they had been banish'd thence. Plautus before him, in his Mercator, brings in a discontented Man, who said, that

he would go for some Poyson to a Physi∣cian:

Ibo ad Medicum, atque me ibi toxico morti dabo.

Herophilus came in the 7th Century, who, as Pliny says, resisted the Principles of Erasistratus, and settled the Differences between Diseases, according to the Rules of Musick. Asclepiades towards the End of the said Century flourished, and after him his Scholar Themiso; and the fa∣mous Craterus, of whom Cicero speaks often in his Epistles to Atticus, and indeed, he was a Person of very great Reputation, as Horace wit∣nesseth:

Non est cardiacus, Craterum dixisse putato, Hic Aeger.

It is of him Porphyric speaks, who having a Per∣son for his Patient that lay ill of an extraordina∣ry Distemper, wherein his Flesh fell away from his Bones, he cured him, by feeding him with Vipers dressed like Fish. In the 8th Age, besides the famous Antonius Musa, Augustus his Physici∣an, and Eudemus; Celsus, Scribonius Largus, and Charicles flourish'd also at Rome in the Reigns of Augustus, Tiberius, and Caligula; Vectius Valens, and Alco lived under Claudius, and so did Cyrus, Livia's Physician. During the 9th Century there flourish'd at Rome Statius Annaeus, Nero's Physician, old Andromachus, the Inventer of the Theriaca An∣dromacha; Thessalus, who got himself the Name of Iatronices, i. e. Conqueror of Physicians, because he boasted he had overthrown their Principles; Crinas of Marseilles, and Charmis of the said City, who being desirous to go beyond their Brethren, condemned the Use of Hot Baths, and made their Patients bath in cold Water, even in Winter time. In the 10th Century, after the Building of Rome, Galen, a Native of Pergamus, was in Request at Rome, he being Physician to the Em∣perors Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus. In the 11th Century there were divers famous Physici∣ans in the Empire and at Rome; but the 12th was fertile in them, among whom were Zeno of Cy∣prus, Ionicus of Sardis, Magnus of Antioch, and Oribassius of Pergamus, who were his Disciples. This was the last Age of the Roman Empire, which according to the Appearance of the 12 Vultures to Romulus, was to last but so many Centuries.