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Christianity and the re-emergence of Galen's ideas

Christianity and the re-emergence of Galen's ideas
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Key Info
  • Christianity and the re-emergence of Galen's ideas
  • Duration: 04:15
  • A monk known as Constantine the African from the Monte Cassino monastery in southern Italy spent his life translating Arabic texts he had discovered when he was a Muslim trader, prior to his conversion to Christianity. One book was by Galen, the accomplished Roman physician, surgeon and philosopher, which Constantine translated into Latin so western scholars could read it. The Christian church liked his ideas, which promoted the human body as the best design, as this fitted beliefs that God's creation was perfect. The church passed Galen's ideas to universities, leading to a resurgence of his work.
  • Credits: The Wellcome Trust
  • Subject:

    History

       Topic:

    Medicine Through Time

  • Keywords: medicine through time, Roman, physician, surgeon, Galen, Constantine the African, Arabic, Muslim, christian church, monastery, university, religion
Ideas for use in class
  • Students who have created a timeline/chart showing the progress/regress of medicine through time could use this footage to draw a 'context' on to their graphs (as if it is the stage on which the drama will take place), that in this case would be the factors that allowed or led to medical changes. Or, students could draw lines all over a world map showing the spread and influence of ideas, with annotations explaining what enabled the spread.
Background details
  • Clip language : English
  • Aspect ratio : 4x3
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