HIPPOC'EATES (Lat., from Gk. 'Irroxprirlc, Ilippokruffs)(e.460-357 n.c.). A Greek physician, the most celebrated of antiquity, anti justly called 'the father of medicine.' Ile was the son of lieraelides, also a idlysiehtn, and belonged to the family of the Aselepiadw, being either the nineteenth or seventeenth in descent front .-Esen Inputs. His mother, Ph:en:trete, was said to be descended from Hercules. lIe was born in the island of t'os. lie is said to have been instructed in medicine by his father and by Herodicus, and in philosophy by Georgias of Leontini, the soph ist, and Dentocritus of Allera, whom lie after •ards cured of insanity. After spending some time in traveling through different parts of Greece, he sealed and practiced his profession at Cos, and finally died at Larissa, in Thessaly. Ile is said to have passed the age of a handred. NVe know little more of his personal history Omit that lie was highly esteemed as a physician and an author, and that lie raised the medical school of Cos to a very high retaliation. His works were studied and quoted by l'iato. Various stories are recorded of hint by Greek writers, W Ili eh are undoubtedly fabulous; and legends re garding him are found in works of Arabic writers, who term hint ltukrat. while tile Euro pean story-tellers of the INliddic Ages celebrate him under the name of Ypocras. The works bearing the name of Hippocrates, and termed the llippoeratie collection, are 72 in number, and in clude many treatises by his sons, Thessalus and Draco, by his son-in-law, Polyleas, and by others. The following are considered authentic; ier; licainien in Diseases on Air, Water, and. Places; On Wounds of the dead; parts of the ..lphorisms; and parts of flee Prognostics; the work on ancient Medicines; Joints; Fracture5; The ('se of the Lever; Law; Ulcers; Illentor rhoids; The Raered Disease; Fistula.; and On the INN of the Physician, as well as the Oath. Hippocrates divides the causes of disease into two principal classes—lite first consisting of the inlInenee of seasons, climates, water, situa tion, etc.. and the second of more personal (muses, such as the food and exercise of the in dividual patient. llis belief in the influence
which different climates exert on the human constitution is very strongly expressed. He ascribes to this influence both the conformation of the body and the disposition of the mind, and hence accounts for the difference between the Greek and the Asiatic. The four fluids or humors of the body (blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile) were regarde-i by him as the primary seats of disease; health was the result of the due combination (or crisis) of these, and illness was the consequence of a disturbance of this crasis. When a disease was proceeding fa vorably, these humors underwent a certain change (or coction), which was the sign of returning health, as preparing the way for the expulsion of morbid matter, or crisis, these crises having a tendency to occur at definite periods, which were hence called 'critical days.' His treatment of diseases was cautious, and what we now term expectant; it consisted chiefly and solely in at tention to diet and regimen. Thus he was the inventor of the humoral pathology, so long in vogue in medical schools. He must be judged by the standards of his day. A most careful and keen observer and exact chronicler of symptoms, he was also possessor of a remarkable mental equipment and a man of great nobility and morality.
The works of Hippocrates were translated at an early period into Arabic. They were first printed in a Latin translation in 1525 at Rome, Galen's commentaries on his works being of special value. The first Greek edition (the Aldine) appeared the following year at Venice; an edition by Mercurialis appeared in 1588, one by Foesius in 1595, and one by Van der Linden (still much esteemed) in 1665. An edition under the editorship of Kuhn appeared in three vol umes at Leipzig, in 1825-27. The best French edition is that of Littre, in 10 volumes, the first of which appeared in 1839, and the last in 1861. An excellent English translation of The Genuine Works of Hippocrates was published in 1849 in 2 vols. by Dr. Adams.