GALENO, CLAUDIO. — Physician and philosopher, born at Pergamum in A.D. 129, died there in 201. He travelled to Smyrna, Corinth, and Alexandria, and in 162 was in Rome. He was court physician to Marcus Aurelius, whose young son Commodus he treated.
A follower of Hippocrates in medicine, his most original contribution to this discipline was physiological, through his studies on the functioning of the nervous system and on the brain, heart, and liver, for which he made use of the vivisection of animals, monkeys, goats, and pigs. He adopted the doctrine of the four temperaments: phlegmatic, sanguine, choleric, and melancholic, whose proper humoral function (eucrasia) produces health, whereas defective function produces disease.
G.’s anatomy is always united with physiology and very often comparative, and its teleological purpose is exceedingly evident, insofar as it is subject to the end for which each organ is intended. This characteristic, although well suited to the Christian spirit in the Middle Ages, was also the source of numerous errors. He had a clear conception of both the central and peripheral nervous systems; in particular, he described the septum lucidum, the corpus callosum, and the quadrigeminal eminences. He also studied the larynx, discovering the superior laryngeal and recurrent nerves. G., however, wished to apply to humans the anatomy learned from the autopsies of animals. He stands out above all in physiology proper, although here too there are numerous errors. G. had of experiment the exact conception that a modern clinical scientist might have today. He had a conception of the movement of the blood, but not of blood circulation. He was the first to demonstrate that both arteries and veins contained blood, which, in a wave-like movement, was drawn toward the organs, where it was exhausted. He also distinguished venous from arterial blood, the latter supposedly having that colour because it came into contact with air. For G., the liver was the centre of nutritive venous blood, whereas the heart was the centre of nutritive arterial blood; the right and left hearts were connected with one another by means of pores in the septum; the pulmonary veins supposedly had a double course, carrying blood laden with soot to the lungs and returning purified blood to the heart; and this blood was ultimately exhausted in the organs, even though arteries and veins were connected by means of communicating vessels. G. also carried out experiments on the kidneys and the nervous system.
As a pathologist, G. rests on the concept that every disease corresponds to an organic lesion and that the perceptible effects of disease are its symptoms. There were three types of disease: diseases of simple parts, of instrumental parts—that is, of organs—and, finally, traumatic diseases. His therapy
is based on Contraria contrarii, and he attributed a humoral characteristic to every medicine.
His writings number 400, of which the most important among the 108 that have survived to the present day are the Anatomical Investigations, in 15 books; the Functions of the Organs of the Human Body, in 17 books; the Teachings of Hippocrates and Plato, in 6 books; and On Natural Forces, in 3 books. Also important are the Art of Medicine and the Therapeutic Method, called respectively in the Middle Ages the «Microtechnum» and the «Macrotechnum».
He also had philosophical concerns; he was a convinced teleologist. He saw in nature the concatenation of causes that leads upward to a generating intelligence, though not one completely detached from matter: the very study of the human body makes evident the excellence of the spirit that rules the world.
His orientation may be defined as an eclectic Aristotelianism. Aristotle’s influence is evident especially in his logic—the fourth figure of the syllogism is well known, which G. derived from the analysis of the modes of the first figure by Theophrastus and Eudemus—in physics and metaphysics; whereas in psychology (for example, in the question of the division of the soul) he inclines toward Platonism. Philosophy, identified with religion, is for him the highest of goods.
G. knew Christianity and speaks of it in two passages of the work On the Pulse, concerning the tenacity with which certain physicians assert their opinions without justifying them, after the manner of those who place themselves in the school of Moses and Christ (De pulis, VIII, 579 Kühn); indeed, he adds, it would be easier to change the opinions of the disciples of Moses and Christ than those of physicians and philosophers faithful to their own factions (ibid., p. 657).
He praises the Christians in a passage that is not found in G.’s works but is cited as his by the Arab writer Ibn al-Ajir, quoted in turn by Abū 'l Fidā' (Historia Anteislamica, ed. Fleischer, p. 109). Referring to the usefulness of parables for understanding concepts and noting the use Christians make of them, he states that they «act from time to time as true philosophers. We have before our eyes their contempt for death. A kind of modesty inspires them to abstain from the use of love. Among them there are women and men who have abstained throughout their entire lives from sexual union. And there are others who, thanks to the direction and discipline of the soul and rigorous application, yield nothing to true philosophers».
This passage, whose authenticity there is no reason to deny, demonstrates G.’s fairness of judgment concerning the new religion, which had been made the object of such unjustified and violent attacks. — Vedi tav. CXXVI.
BIBLI: The works are published in the Corpus medicorum Graecorum (vols. 1–20). Leipzig 1821–33, edited by C. G. Kühn, with a facing Latin translation. E. Clauvet, La psychologie de G., Caen 1867; id., La théologie de G., there 1873; Th. Meyer-Steineg and K. Sudhoff, Geschichte der Medizin in Überblick, Jena 1921, pp. 135–45; M. Meyerhof, Über echte und unechte Schriften Galens nach arabischen Quellen, in Berichte, Ab. Berlin, 28 (1928); G. Bilancini, G., Milan 1930; A. Castiglioni, Storia della medicina, there 1936, p. 168 ff.; A. Pazzini, Storia della medicina, I, there 1947, p. 68 ff. Extensive bibliography in Überweg, I, pp. 558 and 177–78.