imbalances in the body and called health viriditas,
meaning the “green life force of the flesh.” Her
medical observations are still recognized; her heal-
ing techniques included physical ministration,
herbalism, laying on of hands, prayer, blessed
waters, amulets, and exorcism.
1322
The itinerant healer Jacoba Felice de Almania is
convicted in Paris of practicing medicine, including
laying on of hands and examining urine, without a
license.
Pre-Columbian cultures in Mesoamerica combine
magic, religion, and science in a medical system.
The pre-Columbian native believes the cause of
disease is imbalance of favorable and unfavorable
forces. Shamans are relied upon as healers. In the
Mayan culture, for example, hemenes, or priests, are
members of a respected organized medical society,
and hechicerosare individuals designated to perform
bleeding, treating wounds, lancing abscesses, and
reducing fractures.
11th, 12th, and 13th centuries
During the Crusades medical care orders and hos-
pitals are established, and soldiers recognize and
trade in the Islamic East’s array of pharmacologi-
cal treasures, new to the West. The practice of
medicine during the Middle Ages draws upon
both science and mysticism, concepts that sur-
vived into the 1800s.
15th century
During the 1600s in Scotland women healers and
herbalists such as Bessie Paine and Margaret
Provost are persecuted for witchcraft.
16th century
The German-Swiss physician and alchemist
Paracelsus (1493-1541) favors holistic treat-
ment of patients. In 1536 he writes Der grossen
Wundartzney (Great Surgery Book), which
includes what was to become known later as
homeopathy.
The Swiss physician Barbara von Roll (1502–71)
pioneers treatment of mental illness now known as
psychosomatic medicine.17th century
The period known as “the age of the Scientific Rev-
olution,” in which Aristotle, Galen, and Paracelsus
are still influential, but under the attack that marks
the beginning of the idea of separation of mind and
body, and that disease exists only on a physical
level. The iatromechanist Giorgio Baglivi
(1669–1707) describes each bodily organ as though
it were a specific type of machine. And Antony van
Leeuwenhoek (1632–1723) uses a microscope to
discover male spermatozoa and establish embryol-
ogy. With each stride in anatomical and physiolog-
ical science, holistic approaches to medical practice
seem to fade or to be scorned as quackery.1737
The New York physician and obstetrician Elizabeth
Blackwell writes the Curious Herbal.1810
The German physician and chemist Samuel Hah-
nemann founds homeopathy, a system of medical
practice based on holistic and scientific principles
including the approach favoring the “like cures
like” theory, used in immunization and vaccination
therapies.mid-1800s
Naturopathic medicine develops from the Euro-
pean practice of using natural springs and spas as
therapy. Early naturopaths include Dr. John
Kellogg, who establishes the Battle Creek Sani-
tarium in Michigan, and his brother, Will Kel-
logg, who operates a health-food factory along
with C. W. Post.Chinese immigrants introduce the practice of
acupuncture to the United States.Vincenz Priessnitz (1799–1851) becomes known as
a major proponent of all types of hydrotherapy.246 The Encyclopedia of Complementary and Alternative Medicine