Epilepsy in Babylonia

Download or read book Epilepsy in Babylonia written by Marten Stol and published by BRILL. This book was released on 1993-01-01 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Stol's comprehensive exploration of the Babylonians' conception and treatment of epilepsy adds a new chapter to the history of this ancient disease. The author presents the sources, examines the terminology and places epilepsy in context among kindred illnesses. A full edition (transliteration, translation, commentary and cuneiform copy) of the relevant parts of the Diagnostic Handbook is included. According to the Ancients, epileptics are 'struck by the moon'. An examination of the relationship between epilepsy and the moon yields surprising results. This volume deals with material that was unavailable to O. Temkin, author of the classic "The Falling Sickness; A history of epilepsy from the Greeks to the beginning of modern neurology," (1971). It show that traditional views of the Ancient Near East lived on among the Greeks and Romans.