JACOBUS PSYCHRISTUS lived in the time of Leo I. Thrax (A.D. 457-474), was a very famous physician of Constantinople, who was called “the Saviour,” on account of his successful practice.
ADAMANTIUS OF ALEXANDRIA, an Iatrosophist, was a Jewish physician, who was expelled, with his co-religionists, from Alexandria, A.D. 415. He embraced Christianity at Constantinople. He wrote on physiognomy.
Iatrosophista was the ancient title of one who both taught and practised medicine.
Archiater (chief physician) was a medical title under the Roman Empire, meaning “the chief of the physicians,” and not “physician to the prince,” as some have explained.[515]
MELETIUS (4th cent. A.D.), a Christian monk, wrote on physiology and anatomy.
NEMESIUS, Bishop of Emissa (near the end of the fourth century), wrote a treatise on the _Nature of Man_, which is remarkable for a proof that the good Churchman came very near to two discoveries which were made long after his time. He says that the object of the bile is to help digestion, to purify the blood, and impart heat to the body. Freind says[516] that in this we have the foundation of that which Sylvius de la Boë with so much vanity boasted he had invented himself. He adds that “if this theory be of any use in physic, Nemesius has a very good title to the discovery.”
The Bishop described the circulation of the blood in very plain terms considering the state of physiology at that time.
“The motion of the pulse takes its rise from the heart, and chiefly from the left ventricle of it; the artery is, with great vehemence, dilated and contracted by a sort of constant harmony and order. While it is dilated it draws the thinner part of the blood from the next veins, the exhalation or vapour of which blood is made the aliment for the vital spirit. But while it is contracted it exhales whatever fumes it has through the whole body and by secret passages. So that the heart throws out whatever is fuliginous through the mouth and the nose by expiration.”[517]
LUCIUS wrote on pharmacy in the first century.
MARCELLUS EMPIRICUS (4th cent.) wrote a work on pharmacy, in Latin, which contains many charms and absurdities.
ÆTIUS was a Greek medical writer, who probably was a Christian of the sixth century. He was a native of Amida in Mesopotamia, and studied medicine at Alexandria. He wrote the _Sixteen Books on Medicine_, one of the most valuable medical treatises of antiquity; though containing little original matter, it includes numerous extracts from works which have since perished.[518]