Main description:

Provides a comprehensive survey of the medical world of the European sixteenth century and clearly explains to students what medicine was and the impact of changes in society such as the print revolution, the Reformation, and the opening-up of new worlds had on medical ideas and practices allowing them to see how the history of medicine (and early modern Europe) was shaped over the course of the century.

The chapters in the book explore topics such as new worlds, new drugs and new diseases, urban health, different roles in medicine for men and women, medical communication, the recovery of ancient medicine, religion and medicine and the patient experience providing students with a fascinating overview of medicine, in the broadest sense, in the sixteenth century

By including material from Germany and Spain, as well as from a large range of unfamiliar authors, this book offers many new insights into the way in which European medicine was studied, practised and challenged in the age of Leonardo, Vesalius and Paracelsus.

Contents:

Introduction Part 1: Contexts 1. New Lands, New Drugs and New Diseases 2. Protecting the Health of the City 3. Medical Communications: Print and the Post 4. The Rediscovery of Ancient Medicine Part 2: People 5. The Kaleidoscope of Healing 1: Physicians 6. The Kaleidoscope of Healing 2: Surgeons, Apothecaries and Charlatans 7. On the Margins of Medical History: Women and Patients Part 3: Beliefs 8. Learned Medicine 9. Anatomy - the Touchstone of Modernity 10. Paracelsus and Paracelsianiam 11. Religion and Medicine Conclusion