There are many recoverable aspects and indications concerning medicine and
healing in the ancient past - from the archaeological evidence of skeletal remains,
grave-goods comprising medical and/or surgical equipment and visual
representations in tombs and other monuments thorough to epigraphic and literary
sources. The 42 papers presented here cover many aspects medicine in the
Mediterranean world during Antiquity and early Byzantine times, bringing together
both internationally established specialists on the history of medicine and
researchers in the early stages of their career.
The contributions are grouped under a series of headings: medicine and
archaeology; media (online access to electronic corpus); the Aegean; medical
authors/schools of medicine; surgery; medicaments and cures; skeletal remains; new
research in Cyprus; Asklepios and incubation; and Byzantine, Arab and medieval
sources. These subject areas are addressed through a combination of wide ranging
archaeological and osteological data and the examination and interpretation of
philosophical, literary and historiographical texts to provide a comprehensive suite
of studies into early practices in this fundamental field of human experience.