Health, Sickness, Medicine and the Friars in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries (review)

Health, Sickness, Medicine and the Friars in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries addresses a gap in the study of medieval medicine and, for the most part, acts as a worthy complement to such excellent studies on monastic involvement in the medieval medical sphere as Barbara Harvey's Living and Dying in England 1100-1540: the Monastic Experience (1993). Angela Montford draws on a variety of early Franciscan and Dominican sources but centres her study on the Orders in Bologna, making particular use of '[t]wo account books [which] make up the documents Ms. 238/7573 (1331-43) and 239/7574 (1350-57) [and which] record[ ] some of the receipts and the expenditure of the Dominican convent of S. Domenico, Bologna, in the mid-fourteenth century' (p. 16).

The concentration on mendicant involvement, which Montford handles convincingly in the second part of the book, is downplayed in the early chapters in order 'to remind the reader of the original aims and ethos of the Orders of friars, including their intentions toward the sick, and to demonstrate the nature and extent of their interaction with contemporary urban society' (p. 2). Though this tack provides an overview of the mendicant Orders' attitudes to health and sickness, it succeeds in demonstrating only that which commonsense would suggest to most readers. That is, that there was little to differentiate friars' attitudes from those of the general populous. The point, then, is that, whilst providing a reasonable summary of the subject, these chapters offer no surprises for the specialist scholar. Similarly, a later chapter on the plague, although acknowledging records from account books of the convents of S. Francesco and S. Domenico, is too general to be of real use.

The true value of Montford's work is revealed in Chapter Five: 'The Decline of the frater medicus'. Here the author presents an engaging argument that builds on a consideration of the problems that arose when friars interacted with secular patients. Anxiety about conflict between a friar's medical and pastoral duties in the community is shown to have been exacerbated by the rise in university-trained medici and a growing awareness of the harm that could be done by unlicensed practitioners. This resulted in the 'need for fratres physici to have permission [to practice medicine] … from 1273' (p.120). Montford demonstrates that the growing concern over medical friars attending secular patients was, in no small way, associated with the generalized Dominican concern about friars ministering to women. This, of course, says at least as much about sexual attitudes among religious of the time as it does about medical practice but whatever the exact nature of the reasons for the restrictions, Montford establishes an association between the decline in the medical friar and the rise of the secular medical practitioner. The author's argument here, together with the following chapter's focus on 'Secular Medical Practitioners' and their interactions with the friars, provide important insights into the transfer of medical 'power' into the hands of university-trained, secular physicians.

In Chapter Nine, Montford's examination of the account books of the apothecary, Diotaiuti de Cecco da Sassoletta, showing his dealings with both the Dominican and Franciscan friars, results in one of the most interesting sections of the whole book. She demonstrates, for example, that the purchased amounts and combinations of particular herbs were related to specific medicinal applications by the friars. Evidence is given for the way in which the friars used such apothecary-purchased items as resins, sugars, roots, plants, simples and compounds. One of the striking examples of a frequently-purchased compound is manuschristi which included in its constituents, gold and pearls.

The most popular surgical procedures performed at both S. Domenico and S. Francesco convents are the subject of Chapter Ten and the details make intriguing reading. Balneotherapy is also examined and Montford notes the distinction...