soaked plasters to assure healing and prevention of inflammation. Significant fragments of
Philagrios’ works emerge from multi-ingredient preparations of invigorating or soothing
potions (po ̄mata) administered in conjunction with phlebotomy, cupping, and precise cautery
(esp. e.g. Masullo, frr. 2 – 7), and substantial passages are quoted with approval and in detail
by Oreibasios ( prominent are melikraton [honey + water], quince-juice, the employment of
the full heads of ripe poppies, and a honey + rose oil mix]). Details of Philagrios’ account
of gout (podagra [Masullo, frr. 8 – 34]) display an accurate clinical picture, as well as detailed
treatment, with a mineral-heavy, multi-ingredient drink made quaffable with large quan-
tities of olive oil and vinegar (Masullo, fr.8c = Aëtios 12.66; cf. fr.29 = Aëtios 12.68: Antidotes
or Remedies for Gouty Conditions). The majority, however, of the texts of Philagrios’ On Gout are
embedded in Rhazes’ Arabic quotations, followed by an important fragment from Phila-
grios’ On Sciatica (Masullo, fr.35) also given by Rhazes. Other Greek, Arabic, and Latin
fragments collected by Puschmann and Masullo are from On Phthisis, Pain in the Chest,
Colic, Sweet-Urine Disease (viz. Diabetes), Dropsy, Cancer, The Spleen, On the Suffocation of the
Womb, Bites of Rabid Dogs, Arthritis, Bladder and Kidney Stones, Jaundice, and others. One also
finds traces of Philagrios’ therapies for ailments of the eyes, ears, migraine headaches,
nocturnal emissions, and the restoration of hair on the head, as well as indications of works
on gynecology and obstetrics. The 10th c. list of Philagrios’ treatises (Fihrist 292 = Dodge
1970: 2.687–688) adds To Those without a Physician, Making an Antidote for Salt, Impetigo (or
Ringworm), and What Befalls the Gums and the Teeth, all lost.
Ed.: Th. Puschmann (with German trans.), Nachträge zu Alexander Trallianus. Fragmente aus Philumenus und
Philagrius nebst einer bischer noch ungedructen Abhandlung über Augenkrankheiten (1887; repr. 1963) 74– 129
[Latin translations of Diseases of the Spleen, The Swollen Spleen, The Inflamed Spleen, The Hardened Spleen];
R. Masullo (with Italian trans.), Filagrio Frammenti (1999).
M. Steinschneider, “Die toxicologischen Schriften der Araber bis Ende des XII. Jahrhunderts,”
Virchows Archiv 52 (1871) 340–503; Wellmann (1895) 63; O. Temkin, “Das ‘Brüderpaar’ Philagrios
und Poseidonios,” AGM 24 (1931) 268–270; Idem (1932) 30–32 and 41; RE 19.2 (1938) 2103–2105,
E. Bernert; R. Masullo, “Prolegomena all’edizione critica di Filagrio,” in A. Garzya and J. Jouanna,
edd., Histoire et ecdotique des textes médicaux grecs/Storia e ecdotica dei testi medici greci. Actes du IIe Colloque
International (Paris-Sorbonne, 24–26 mai 1994) (1996) 319–335; D.R. Langslow, The Latin Alexander
Trallianus (2006) = JRS Monograph 10, pp. 19 and 25–26.
John Scarborough
Philaretos (50 – 300 CE?)
Alchemist listed in Names of Philosophers of the Divine Science and Art (CAAG 1.111). He is the
addressee of an alchemical work ascribed to D (CAAG 2.159). Although the
name is attested elsewhere (LGPN 2.446, 3B.421 and 4.343), Letrouit (1995: 36) has recently
suggested that a discrepancy in the text preserving this fragment indicates that philaretos is
here not a proper name but simply means “lover of virtue” and that no such alchemist ever
existed.
(*)
Bink Hallum
Philaretos (Med.) (700 – 1000 CE)
Byzantine physician, confused in modern scientific literature until the end of the 19th c.
with Theophilos Protospatharios, and also with P, whose name could be
PHILARETOS