Medical Summaries in Antiquity
Summaries in Greek literature
Arabic Galen summaries are part of a continuous tradition of 鈥渁uxiliary鈥� texts (Dubischar 2010, 39, 43) stretching back to antiquity. While more frequent in other fields such as history, philosophy and grammar, they also played a role in Greek medicine (Opelt 1962; Raible 1995, 58–61; G盲rtner and Eigler 1997; van der Eijk 2010, 526, 534–535). Medical summaries were more than mere recastings of their source texts, they afforded authors the opportunity to add their own views about practice and shape readers鈥� expectations (van der Eijk 2010, 521, 553).
The 鈥楽chool of Alexandria鈥� and the 鈥楢lexandrian Summaries鈥�
The link between summaries and medical teaching became particularly prominent in the late antique 鈥榮chool of Alexandria鈥�, the most important centre of medical teaching and writing in antiquity. In the sixth century CE its medical curriculum focussed on a core set of sixteen books by Galen, the so-called 鈥淪ixteen Books鈥�. Students were to read these in the form of commentaries and digests to make medicine more accessible and to help them deal with Galen鈥檚 difficult writings (Gutas 1999, 174). The ninth-century physician al-Ruh膩w墨, a younger contemporary of 岣nayn ibn Is岣ツ乹, explained the introduction of the Sixteen Books and the teaching texts based on them as follows:
鈥淲hen the virtuous, learned physicians of Alexandria came together, gathering the students of medicine, they realized that the events of their time did not permit most of them to read all of those books, especially those which Galen composed. In order to bring the medical art to the students, they organized the books of Galen as sixteen books, and the collectors gathered them in order to abridge them.鈥� (Levey 1967, 84a)
The new curriculum proved so successful that it was soon exported to other centres of medical teaching (Overwien 2012, 161).
The Alexandrian teaching texts offer several different types of summaries, including three series of summaries of the Sixteen Books. Key for the subsequent Arabic tradition are the 鈥楢lexandrian Summaries鈥�, originally written in the sixth century in Greek but only extant in Arabic translation (B眉rgel 2016, 140–162; Garofalo 2003; Overwien 2013). They present teachings systematically, often using material from other texts, and were read alongside lecture courses (Overwien 2013, 190; 202–203).
Representative of another type of Alexandrian teaching text are the 鈥楾abulae Vindobonenses鈥� (Gundert 1998; Overwien 2013), Greek diagrammatic tables that are related to the Alexandrian Summaries and were created around the same time. These tables define and explain Galenic concepts and ideas by division into subconcepts from the general to the specific to aid memorisation (Overwien 2015, 330; Gundert 1998, 106–108).