Humorism

Humorism is an ancient medical theory that attributed health and temperament to the balance of blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile.

Four humors: The four bodily fluids—blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile—thought in ancient medicine to govern health and temperament. These fluids are the substances whose relative balance defines humorism.
Hippocrates: An ancient Greek physician traditionally regarded as a foundational figure in Western medicine. Texts associated with Hippocrates helped establish naturalistic explanations of illness.
Bloodletting: The deliberate removal of blood as a treatment for illness. Practitioners used it to reduce an excess of blood within a humoral diagnosis.
Galen: A Greek physician of the Roman Empire whose writings shaped medicine for centuries. His synthesis made humoral explanations authoritative across later medical traditions.
Germ theory of disease: The theory that many diseases are caused by microorganisms that invade or multiply within the body. It replaced humoral imbalance with infectious agents as an explanation for many illnesses.
Humoral theory: A family of medical systems explaining health through the balance and qualities of bodily fluids. Humorism is the influential Western form of this broader medical framework.
On the Nature of Man: An ancient Greek medical treatise that presents a four-humor account of human health. This work is a key early source for the specific four-fluid scheme.
Purging: The forced evacuation of bodily contents through vomiting or bowel movements as medical treatment. Purging was used to remove humors believed to be excessive or harmful.
Medieval medicine: Medical knowledge and practice in Europe and the Mediterranean during the Middle Ages. Humorism became a central framework for diagnosis and treatment in medieval Europe.
Anatomical pathology: The study of disease through structural changes in organs and tissues. It located disease in observable lesions rather than shifts in bodily fluids.

Linked from 15 pages