Tasting the Humors?

The ancient Greeks are regarded as the founders of modern medicine. However, their belief that illness was a punishment and that health and healing were gifts from the gods is not exactly modern. Scientists believe that by the fifth century, however, the Greeks began using actual science, i.e., cause and effect, to advance their medical prowess.

While ancient Greeks did begin to see diet, drugs, and surgery as a critical part of medicine and their comprehensive approach to it, they did not entirely separate the spiritual world from the physical—enter the “humors.” The humors included black bile, yellow or red bile, blood, and phlegm.

The Greek Hippocrates was fundamental to the advancement of medicine, and in fact, many physicians still take a form of the Hippocratic oath. He believed that the humors were fundamental to determining an individual’s cause of illness, and as such, routinely tasted his patient’s urine, pus and earwax.

While audiologists are all too familiar with the look, and unfortunately, smell, of cerumen, tasting what they see daily from a human’s ear is not really in their repertoire. Even more unfortunate, audiologists have all seen those patients who apply their saliva to their hearing instruments. Thank you, Hippocrates, for advancing the study and thank you to those who came after and changed the way audiologists diagnose and treat medical problems!

Reference

Dunnell T. (2024) 7 shocking medical beliefs from ancient Greece. History Facts (accessed September 3, 2024).