Author(s):
Nutton, Vivian (London)
[German version] In Babylonian, Egyptian and also Greek medicine, blood-letting was part of standard medical practice. This procedure was carried out either by directly opening a vein, by scarification or by using a cupping vessel. Considering how often the latter are depicted on monuments connected with physicians, cupping may have been the most common method [1]. Two notions seem to have favoured phlebotomy: on the one hand, it supposedly prevented the stagnating of the blood and its transformation into a harmful substance, on the other, it followed nature's example in removing an excess of blood by bleeding, be it haemorrhoidal, menstrual or nasal. In that way, it relieved swelling and pressure and counteracted the seasonal spring-time increase in the amount of blood as described in Hippocratic doctrine. Under exceptional circumstances, as e.g. in cases of polycythaemia and of diseases in which the pathogenic agent is to be deprived of iron, even modern medicine still recommends a reduction of the blood volume [3. 158-172]. Provided that the patient had not been unduly weakened, the very act of intervention might have caused a feeling of well-being and in some cases, e.g for headaches, brought temporary relief of pressure. However, there were some who did not consider the therapeutic benefit of this widely used proce…