Hippocrates of Kos was an ancient Greek physician traditionally called the father of Western medicine. The body of work attributed to him and his school, the Hippocratic Corpus, treats disease as a natural process to be observed and reasoned about rather than a matter of divine punishment, and its clinical case histories, surgical treatises and the ethical Hippocratic Oath associated with his name shaped medical practice for over two thousand years. This atlas records what the historical record supports and is not medical advice.
Facts
Disputed
Birth YearTraditionally dated to about 460 BC, but ancient biographical sources disagree and no contemporary record fixes the year precisely. Death YearTraditionally dated to about 370 BC, on the same uncertain ancient biographical basis as his birth year. Connections
Associated With
Bloodletting, Treatments Hippocratic writings document bloodletting as established medical practice, grounded in humoral theory.
Source The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of HumanityRoy Porter
Specialist In
His treatise Airs, Waters, and Places, correlating disease with environment and season, is widely cited as a foundational text for epidemiological thinking.
Source The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of HumanityRoy Porter
Hippocratic treatises including On Fractures and On the Articulations are among the earliest systematic surgical texts.
Source The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of HumanityRoy Porter
Sources
1. The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of Humanity
Roy Porter, W. W. Norton and Company, 1997
Encyclopaedia Britannica
Essays About This Entity (1 essay)
Cupping Therapy Across Three Medical Traditions
Hippocrates, cited for the earliest documented use in this essay
Read the EssayFrequently Asked Questions
Did Hippocrates actually write the Hippocratic Oath?
Modern scholars do not regard the Oath as written by Hippocrates himself.
Probably not. The Oath is traditionally attributed to him and is usually printed within the Hippocratic Corpus, but modern scholars do not regard it as having been written by Hippocrates himself. It was composed in Ancient Greek sometime between the fifth and third centuries BC, so it reflects the ethical tradition of his school more than a text from his own hand. This atlas records what the historical record supports and is not medical advice.
Reader Challenges (0)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.
Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.