188G.] on Anatomical and Medical Knowledge of Ancient Egypt. 381 



Of the ancient medical literature of Egypt, two nearly complete 

 treatises are still extant, and six or seven fragments of others. These 

 vary in date and in perfection. The most complete are the Papyrus 

 Ebers, and the Medical Papyrus of Berlin. The fragments which 

 are noteworthy are: — The British Museum Pa|)yrus, formerly the 

 property of the Royal Institution, the Papyrus VI. of Boulaq, the 

 Magical Papyri of Turin and Paris, the Coj^tic Medical Manuscript 

 in the Borgia Library, and the Greek Papyri 383 and 384 of Leyden. 



In the very brief sketch which the time at our disposal allows of the 

 contents of these works, I cannot enter into the analysis of all these 

 works, nor into discussion of disiDuted points of translation, but I hope 

 soon to be in a position to publish a detailed and critical study of this 

 medical literature at fuller length. We shall confine ourselves prin- 

 cipally in our survey to the first and second. 



The most complete of all these papyri is that which is known by the 

 name Papyrus Ebers, said to have come from a tomb at El Assassif ; 

 and this is not improbable, as the Medical Papyrus VI. of Boulaq is 

 from that place. It is in good preservation, written in a clear hieratic 

 script, the characters resemble those of the earlier manuscript of the 

 18th dynasty ; and its text presents few difficulties to the reader excej)t 

 those arising from the difficulty of ascertaining the precise diseases 

 referred to, and the exact nature of the remedies prescribed. Unlike 

 the Berlin PajDyrus, it is perfect at its begiiming, and it consists of 110 

 pages, each of twenty-one or twenty-two lines. A fac-simile copy has 

 been 23ublished by Prof. Ebers, with a short synopsis of his reading of 

 the contents. A brief notice of its contents has been published by 

 Chabas, and it has partly been translated into Norwegian by Prof. 

 Lieblein, but no complete translation has as yet been made public. 



The work is really a series of treatises on difierent branches of me- 

 dicine, and from its introductory paragraph seems to be the embodiment 

 of Heliopolitan medical lore, probably dating from about 1550 B.C. 



The first page, and the first five lines of the second, consist of an 

 introductory preface and prayer : — " Beginning of the treatise on the 

 administration of medicine to all parts of a person. I have come from 

 Heliopolis, from the authorities of the great Temple, from the rulers 

 of thought, the eternal governors of safety. I come from Sais with 

 the mother goddesses as a protector to me ; I speak for them ; I do it 

 from the Lord of the assembly conquering evil, the god slaying the 

 slayers, whose several sections are from this my head, from this my 

 neck, from these my arms, from these my limbs, from these my organs, 

 to destroy the magical power of the ruler who influences my flesh, 

 who sickens in these my limbs, and penetrates into my flesh, into my 

 head, into my arms, into my body," &c. 



After this prefatory adjuration follows a section on hygienic 

 measures, cathartics, diuretics, and other remedies of the kind, which 

 occupies the following sixteen pages. This is followed by a short section 

 on the effects of the j^arasite Bilharzia haematobia, still a very common 

 cause of disease in the Nile valley, and the pages from this to the 



