Neurological Concepts in Ancient Greek Medicine by Thomas M. Walshe (review)

This book offers a survey of neurological concepts from the Homeric epics to the Hellenistic period. Six of the eleven chapters deal with neurological themes in the Hippocratic corpus. The final chapter (“The Hippocratic Oath and a Modern Digression”) is a critical and salutary contemplation of aspects of contemporary medicine, especially its relationship with technology (p. 187). Each chapter ends with a bibliography, which adds to the self-contained nature of this book, since each is an essay in its own right. Indeed, the contents are revised versions of material that has had, in some cases, a gestation period of thirty years, which runs the risk that certain parts remain dated. The intended audience is a medical one, seeking to give a “summary from a neurological viewpoint of the information that has been published by professional classicists and historians” (p. xi). This aim is laudable, for Walshe is intending not a comprehensive history of neurology in antiquity, but rather a description of “various ancient Greek ideas that pertain to our own ideas of neurology” (p. xi). Chapter 1, on neurological trauma in the Iliad and Odyssey, is competently handled, and the conclusion, that the observations are “purely descriptive” (p. 9) and not based on any awareness of the role of the encephalon and nerves, correct. Chapter 2 is an overview of those works that cohere under the name of Hippocrates. Walshe avoids engaging with the “Hippocratic Question,” but does venture to state that a “reasonable view sees the thoughts and the teaching of Hippocrates embedded in many of the books … but not necessarily coming from his own hand” (p. 16). This is arguable. Given its importance in the history of neurology, chapter 3 discusses The Sacred Disease, and chapter 4 provides Walshe’s translation. To state that its author identified the encephalon “as the key organ that caused the seizures and … that controlled cognition” (p. 30) goes too far. The encephalon does have a role in perception, but as a mediator or interpreter for the external air (or pneuma) that reaches it. Chapter 5 introduces chapter 6 (being Walshe’s translation of the Hippocratic On Head Wounds). Chapter 7 is an account of neurological conditions in the Hippocratic Corpus. Perhaps more could have been written (p. 99) on discussing contralateral effects of head injuries. Walshe avoids the trap of reading contemporary conditions into such descriptions, as Woollam (in a reference not noted by Walshe) presciently noted.¹ Chapter 8 reviews various theories of ancient cognition, although Alcmaeon’s role in understanding perception (pp. 117–18) is exaggerated. That Aristotle was “wrong” regarding the brain, and Plato “right,” is a lapse into positivism (p. 132). Likewise the notion that the Hellenistic physicians “settled the question” regarding the encephalon as cognitive organ (p. 132) takes no account of the argumentative strengths of the rival cardiocentric position, whose influence extended well into Galen’s era, and informed Galen’s own encephalocentric arguments. Chapter 9 examines the development of the concept of the nerves, acknowledging Solmsen’s groundbreaking 1961 study. Chapter 10 is a summary of the substantive Hellenistic contribution to neurology. The claim that the “rete mirabile” (the arterial retiform plexus) exists “only in animals” (p. 167) is a little misleading. It is not found in all animals.

The volume is marred by misprints. Greek is garbled and accents missed (p. 15n21, p. 25n13, p. 26n43, p. 59nn9–10, where epikatarreô is meant, and n. 12). The neuter form encephalon is preferred to enkephalos. There are also numerous typographic errors: “André,” not “Andre” (p. 24n9); “Littré, É.,” not “Littre, E.” (p. 25n10, p. 190n11); “Wellmann,” not “Wellman” (p. 25n21); “Regimen,” not “Regimin” (p. 38, p. 85, p. 42n24, p. 104nn3–4, p. 105n43, and in the Index, but correctly spelled on p. 24); “De Lacy,” not “DeLacy” (p. 132n1, p. 152n38, p. 175n82); “Theaetetus,” not “Theaetus” (p. 134nn72–74, 80); “Onians,” not “Onions” (p. 151n16, but earlier spelled correctly); “Argonautika,” not “Argonautica” (p...