The Byzantine Empire and the Plague Quotes

“Needless to say, these treatments were not effective, but that didn’t stop the Western world from using techniques like bloodletting for another 1,300 years,”
― Charles River Editors, The Byzantine Empire and the Plague: The History and Legacy of the Pandemic that Ravaged the Byzantines in the Early Middle Ages

“Thus, when blood, which was believed to be stagnant in the body, would swell to excess, physicians would lance or stab boils to release it.”
― Charles River Editors, The Byzantine Empire and the Plague: The History and Legacy of the Pandemic that Ravaged the Byzantines in the Early Middle Ages

“Galen expounded upon Hippocrates’s theory by teaching that excess humors needed expelling from the body, typically via bloodletting, vomiting, sneezing, or urination.”
― Charles River Editors, The Byzantine Empire and the Plague: The History and Legacy of the Pandemic that Ravaged the Byzantines in the Early Middle Ages

“Hippocrates’s theory of the humors, which was perpetuated by Galen. The theory held that the body possessed four fluids, or humors, which corresponded to the four elements from which all material being was composed: earth (black bile), fire (yellow bile), water (phlegm), and air (water). A predominance of one humor affected an individual’s temperament, so a warm, happy, extroverted personality was associated with blood. A choleric, fiery temperament indicated a predominance of yellow bile (khole in Greek), while a melancholic or dark disposition was caused by the predominance of black bile. Finally, a phlegmatic temperament was due to an excess of phlegm. It was believed that an individual in good health enjoyed a balance of the four humors and that illness was an expression of imbalance.”
― Charles River Editors, The Byzantine Empire and the Plague: The History and Legacy of the Pandemic that Ravaged the Byzantines in the Early Middle Ages