Another fascinator from the New Books Network: Goldsmith’s academic Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim on her new book ReOrienting Histories of Medicine – “it’s been rarely appreciated how much of the history of Eurasian medicine in the premodern period hinges on cross-cultural interactions and knowledge transmissions along these same lines of contact. Using manuscripts found in key Eurasian nodes of the medieval world”.
We think of Mongol period as of desctruction, but – what a great setting for historical novel, but Yoeli-Tlalim tells of the now Iranian city of Tabriz, the Ilkhanid Mongol court deliberately set up an intellectual hub, drawing in scholars from far afrield, where knowledge from Tibetan medicine was exchanged with “Islamic medicine”, both having been informed by Greek and Roman medicine. The city had active contacts with Byzantium and the Chinese court, and also with India. It was also a centre for astonomers and agronomists.
The author also makes an interesting point about the “mythical” elements in ancient medical texts. Rather than dismissing them, ask “what are they trying to tell us” – lots of understanding of the body, the nature of an individual etc can be gained from taking seriously. And divination or “magic” is a way of making a decision when you don’t have enough “scientific” knowledge to make a choice. And “superfoods” go a long way back – see triphala.
Talks also of Uighur medicine, from a document found in Turfan/Turpan.
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