what if i brought modern medicine to medieval times

What kind of medicines did people employ in the Eye Ages?

The ointment used on Yvain is a good example of what Medieval medicine was like. It comes from a 'wise-woman', Morgan le Fay, rather than a dr., and has probably been made from herbs, like most medicine of the fourth dimension. This is a medieval recipe for an ointment to cure headaches and pains in the joints:

• Have equal amounts of radish, bishopwort, garlic, wormwood, helenium, cropleek and hollowleek.
• Pound them upward, and boil them in butter with celandine and red nettle.
• Continue the mixture in a brass pot until information technology is a dark crimson colour.
• Strain it through a material and smear on the forehead or agonized joints.

_{This man'southward leg wound is existence treated, while herbs for a soothing ointment or healing drink are being prepared}

Almost people in Medieval times never saw a doctor. They were treated by the local wise-woman who was skilled in the use of herbs, or by the priest, or the barber, who pulled out teeth, set broken bones and performed other operations. Their cures were a mixture of superstition (magic stones and charms were very popular), religion (for example driving out evil spirits from people who were mentally ill) and herbal remedies (some of which are still used today). Monks and nuns also ran hospitals in their monasteries, which took in the sick and dying.

_{Monks weighing out herbs}

Morgan le Fay means Morgan the Fairy, and curing people was often connected in people's minds with magic. In a village, the wise-woman (or human) often had cognition which had been passed on from the generations before, and many years of experience working with herbs. Oft, the 'wise-adult female' delivered babies too, and her skills were highly valued.

In the earlier office of the Middle Ages, most people accustomed magic and witchcraft (skillful and bad) as part of life. In the 14th and 15th Centuries, however, they were told that witches were servants of the devil. Many 'wise-women' were accused of beingness witches and put to expiry.

At that place were doctors too, of course - although they treated only the rich. Some of these had fifty-fifty received medical qualifications from the first European medical school at Salerno in Italy, or from those set up subsequently at Bologna (Italia) or Montpellier in French republic. Through these medical schools, the doctors of Europe began to larn about the ideas of Standard arabic and ancient Greek medicine. Compared to the knowledge of the Arabs, for case, European medicine was not very advanced. A Syrian author of the time describes how an Arab doctor and a European 1 argued well-nigh how to treat and abscess, an infected lump on a knight'due south leg. The Arab prepared a dressing with ointment to open the lump and describe out the infection. The European insisted the simply affair to practise was to cut off the leg!

_{Doctors giving medicine}

Perchance information technology is not surprising, then, that fifty-fifty among their rich patients, doctors were not much trusted. Medieval doctors were specially addicted of bleeding their patients using leeches, which probably fabricated them even weaker. Information technology is possible that the peasant with his magic stones, herbal drinks and prayers was more probable to recover from his illness than the rich man. Barbers as well every bit doctors performed all kinds of operations, and in this area of Medieval medicine - surgery - it seems they were rather successful.

_{Removing an arrow and a lance}

Archaeologists looking at skeletons of people who died in the Middle Ages have found that many had broken bones which had healed perfectly. They found evidence to show that although some people had died of sword-wounds, others had wounds which must have been well looked later on, since the people did not die until many years afterward of something completely different.

_{Archaeologists at a Medieval grave site in London}

Doctors and barber-surgeons had enough of practice treating wounds and cleaved bones because of the many wars of the time. They knew how to set cleaved bones in plaster and how to seal wounds using egg whites or old wine to stop them getting infected. They knew how to use alcohol or plants like mandragora to ship people to sleep or tedious the pain of operations. They could even remove diseased parts of the trunk, for example the gall-bladder, and deliver babies by Caesarean section (where a cut is made and the baby is taken straight out of the mother'south womb).

_{A woman surgeon performs a Caesarean operation}

There were dentists in the Middle Ages as well, chosen dentatores, who had too learnt a great deal from Arab specialists. They had files and forceps and many other tools, and could remove decay, fill holes, strengthen loose teeth with metal wires or even fit false teeth fabricated of ox-bone. Holes were idea to exist caused by small worms in the teeth. This isn't very dissimilar from the modern idea virtually bacteria.

Still, only the rich could afford the services of the dentatores. Anyone else with a loose or aching tooth went to have information technology pulled out at a booth in the fair or marketplace, or by the barber.

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Source: https://www.abdn.ac.uk/sll/disciplines/english/lion/medicine.shtml

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