Elizabethan Medicine By: Lauren Loewen
Physicians
Medicine was quite simple for an era with so many terrible illnesses. Physicians would treat patients with a peculiar mask on their head. It was shaped like a beak and in the tip of the beak there was begamot oil to block out the smell of sickness. But in reality this odd method probably saved many from contagion. Physician’s belief about illness came from Aristotle and Hippocrates. Physicians paid attention to a patient’s bodily fluid called humors.
Poem by Shakespeare
"Where is but a humour of a worm?Through all thy veins shall run
A cold and drowsy humour.
This is undation of mistemper'd humour
Rests by you only to be qualified;
Then pause not; for the present time's so sick,
That present medicine must be minister'd."
This poem gives you a glimpse at the medical ideas in the Elizabethan era.
A cold and drowsy humour.
This is undation of mistemper'd humour
Rests by you only to be qualified;
Then pause not; for the present time's so sick,
That present medicine must be minister'd."
This poem gives you a glimpse at the medical ideas in the Elizabethan era.
Medicine
Elizabethan methods were almost barbaric. Leeching and cupping were used for the letting of blood. During the bubonic plague epidemic, patients were treated by means of lancing the buboes and applying a poultice of onion, butter, and garlic. Stomach pain was treated by mint, wormwood and balm while rose, sage, bay and lavender were used for headaches.
Life expectancy
The weak state of Elizabethan medicine meant shorter life expectancy for the people. If you were rich you could maybe live to about 35, while lower classes could only expect to live to about 25. Death in infancy and childhood was quite common; most people would die in their teen years. Other causes for this short life expectancy would be poor sanitation, and epidemic illnesses.