The Modern Medical Science: a Journey Through History

medical schools of Montpellier, Padua and Pisa were founded on the pattern of that of Cordova under Jew doctors trained in Arab schools, and the Qãnün of Ibn Sina and the Surgery of Abu’l-Qasim al-Zahrawi, remained the text books of medical science throughout Europe until the seventeenth century.2
The Arabs had a fair knowledge of anatomy as it is obvious from the names of the internal and external organs of the human and animal bodies, found in the literature of the pre-Islamic Arabia. When they became acquainted with the Greek anatomical descriptions, they made investigations on them, pointed out many errors in the work of their predecessors, and made many fresh discoveries in this field. In order to verify the Greek anatomical ideas prevailing at that time Yuhanna Ibn Mäsawaih made dissection of the apes which were supplied to him by the order of the ‘Abbasi Caliph Mutasim Billah. After this verification he composed his work on anatomy. The works of some Muslim physicians and surgeons, like Tashrih al-Mansuri by Mansur Ibn Muhammad contain illustrations of human organs, which are not found in the Greek works. These illustrations also throw light on the Muslims’ practical knowledge of anatomy.3
In opposition to Galen who thought that the human skull consisted of seven bones, the Muslim scholars held that it had eight. They believed that there were ossicles in the ear, which facilitate the hearing capacity.4 The work of the Muslim physicians in the field of physiology, too, is quite valuable. For instance, Ibn Nafis al-Qarshi of Damascus explained the theory of the minor circulation of blood three centuries before William Harvey to whom this discovery is ascribed. Al-Qarshi also suggested that food is fuel for the

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30