Avicenna Natural Products Inc.

The Dark Ages 300AD to 10Th Century

During this time, Europe was plunged into a depression. It is not totally clear as to why such ignorance followed on from the relatively advanced and enlightened Roman times. Although conquerors and patriarchs, the Romans at least encouraged the Arts and scientific endeavour. Read more

Learning Outcome: Understand the contribution to Western Herbal Medicine made by the Greek philosophers/physicians, in particular Galen and Hippocrates. Read more

The Colonists

The early settlers of the 17th Century arrived weakened by the long voyage, often suffering fevers or scurvy. If the settlers set out in late spring to avoid bad weather on the crossing they arrived too late in summer to prepare and plant crops, and had to endure hard New England winters ill prepared. Read more

Empedocles was important because he argued that nature consisted of 4 elements: Earth, Air, Fire and Water. Each particular thing in nature was composed of a combination of these 4 elements. The elements were further divided into 2 pairs of opposites, with fire opposed to water and earth to air. The formation of anything was dependent on dynamic equilibrium involving the right proportion of each element. Read more

Hippocrates was the most important of the early Greek practitioners. He learned much from the Egyptians but overall, developed his own approach to medicine. This included: Read more

Galen was the personal physician of Emperor Marcus Aurelius. “He adopted the Hippocratic teaching of the four humours and made it the corner stone of an elaborate and rigid system of medicine, which effectively paralysed European medical thinking for the next 1500 years; for centuries the mere words ‘Galen says…’ were enough to halt any daring attempts at medical free thinking”. Read more