1881J Early Practice of Medicine by Women. 61 
The practice of medicine by women obtained to some 
extent during the Middle Ages. Under the influence of 
Mohammedan rule women were placed in excessive isola- 
tion, and it is not surprising to find under these circum- 
stances that certain women were skilled in attending to the 
requirements of their own sex. Thus Albucasis, of Cordova, 
one of the most skilful surgeons of the twelfth century, 
secured the services of properly instructed women for 
assistance in operations on females in which considerations 
of delicacy intervened. Avicenna, also, writing of remedies 
for diseases of the eyes, mentions a collyrium compounded 
by a woman well versed in medical science. On the whole, 
however, the number of women instructed in medicine 
among the Arabs was very small, owing possibly to the 
inferiority to which women were condemned by Eastern 
usages. 
In Christian countries the nuns as well as the priests 
attended to the healing of the sick as an aCt of charity and 
piety. Abelard, in the twelfth century, permitted the prac- 
tice of surgery to those of the convent of the Paraclete, 
over which Heloise presided. The most celebrated of the 
learned nuns was Hildegarde (A.D. 1098 to 1180), abbess of 
the convent of Rupertsberg, near Bingen on the Rhine. 
She compiled a sort of Materia Medica, which comprises a 
variety of superstitious remedies. Radegonde, of France, 
the founder of a convent at Poitiers (died 587), the pious 
ascetic Elizabeth of Hungary (died 1231), Hedwigia, wife 
of Henry the Bearded, and other women who devoted them- 
selves to the care of the sick, may be properly regarded as 
praiseworthy exemplars of Christian benevolence rather 
than educated practitioners of medicine. 
In the famous school of medicine established at Salernum 
by Benedictine monks, in the eleventh century, we find 
women taking an important part. Ordericus Vitalis, in his 
“ Ecclesiastical History” (written about 1130), relates that 
an abbot eminent in natural sciences, and especially distin- 
guished in medicine, visited Salernum in the year 1059 for 
the purpose of discussing medical topics, and found no one 
erudite enough to reply to his propositions save a certain 
woman of great learning. This woman he does not name, 
but she is supposed to be the same as Trotula of Ruggiero, 
whose reputation at that period was world-wide. At Saler- 
num women were engaged in the preparation of drugs and 
cosmetics, and in the practice of medicine among persons 
of both sexes : such were Abella, author of two medical 
poems ; Costanza Calenda, the talented and beautiful 
