The Popes and Science Part 22

APPENDIX V.

PAPAL PHYSICIANS.

To make many sources of information with regard to this vexed question of the relation of the Popes to Science more readily available, a series of authoritative references to Papal Physicians so far as we know them and their work during the past seven centuries has seemed to me especially needed. Physicians at all times have been interested in phases of science besides medicine and have not infrequently made important discoveries in the non-medical sciences. Their constant occupation with scientific subjects in their professional capacity has always given them an open mind for scientific advances. As the Papal Physicians were at all times men chosen because they had reached distinction in medicine, they were usually scholars who thought for themselves and were ready to recognize the new in science in any department from which it might be presented. Many of the Papal Physicians made important contributions to other sciences and not a few of them laid important foundations, especially in the biological sciences. The fact that the Popes constantly had near them, in the confidential capacity so inevitable between a man and his physician, scientists of prestige in their chosen profession, so often the teachers of their generation in medicine and almost as a rule interested in the sciences related to medicine and not infrequently in physical science generally, is the best possible evidence not only that there could not be opposition, but on the contrary that there must have been, so far as human a.s.sumption may go, a constant favorable att.i.tude of mind of the Popes toward science.

In my chapter on Papal Physicians in the first edition of this volume I gathered such references as would enable me to bring out the valuable services of many of the medical attendants of the Popes to medical and physical science. I was not aware then that a more or less complete list of Papal Physicians for some five centuries at least had been published, giving an excellent idea of what they had done and written in scientific matters. There was no copy of the work in this country so far as I could learn and it was only after considerable difficulty that I was able to secure the volumes through the kind offices of Rev. Father Hagan, S.J., who is the Papal Astronomer in Rome at the present time. From that {432} work the History of the Papal Physicians, originally written by Mandosio at the end of the seventeenth century and extended and annotated by Marini at the end of the eighteenth, [Footnote 50] it has seemed worth while to present such abstracts as will supply ample material for the consultation of those interested in Papal relations to science yet who have not the longer work available for reference. This will show that many of the Papal Physicians were, as I have said, leaders in the science of their time, not only in medicine and also the biological sciences generally, but in all departments of physical science.

[Footnote 50: _Degli Archiatri Pontifici_, Roma, Pagliarini, 1784.]

Nicholas I the Great (858-67).--Almost needless to say the available list of the Papal Physicians does not go back much beyond the thirteenth century, though we have the name of one Ursus who is mentioned in a very old ma.n.u.script, No. 5696 (Fol. 184) of the Vatican Library. The author of this ma.n.u.script work is Anastasius the Abbot and he dedicates it to Ursus, Physician, Domestic Prelate of Pope Nicholas I. Beyond a mention of Ursus by Fioravante Martinello in his work, _Roma ex Ethnica Sacra_, (p. 414), nothing else is known of this old-time physician. Even this mention, however, seems to make it clear that there was a physician formally attached to the Papal See thus early in the Middle Ages.

Sylvester II (999-1003), Victor III (1086-87).--In the tenth century Gerbert, who became Pope under the name of Sylvester II, was famous for his knowledge of medicine as well as other sciences and the close personal friend of men who did much for medical education in France, as we have noted in the body of the book. Before the end of the eleventh century the Abbot Desiderius, as we have said, became Pope after having been for years the intimate friend of Constantine Africa.n.u.s, to whom we owe the earliest serious development of the medical school of Salerno and the first important medical writings in modern Europe. We owe much of Constantine's writing to Desiderius'

inspiration.

Innocent III (1198-1216), Gregory IX (1227-41), Martin IV (1281-85).--With the beginning of the thirteenth century the doc.u.ments for the history of culture in Europe are better preserved and the list of Papal Physicians begins to be more complete. Guy of Montpellier was summoned to Rome to establish the Hospital of Santo Spirito by Innocent III just at the opening of the thirteenth century. Richard the Englishman was the physician to the famous Pope Gregory IX, one of Innocent's successors in the first half {433} of this century. Another Englishman, Hugo Atratus or Atractus, said to have been from Evesham, became the physician of Pope Martin II, 1281. Oldoino in his _Athenaeo Romano_ mentions a series of books written by this Hugh of Evesham, as he is called in English. They bear the t.i.tles _Medicinales Canones_, Medical Canons, and _De Genealogiis Humanis_ and there is besides an _opusculum_ by him on the work of Isaac the well-known Jewish physician of the Middle Ages "On Fevers." The physicians of Pope Honorius IV, Taddeo the Florentine, and of Nicholas IV, Simon a Corde, or as he is better known, Simon Januensis, are mentioned in the body of the book.

Boniface VIII (1294-1303), Benedict XI (1303-04), Clement V (1305-14).--In the preface of his great text-book of surgery, written in the first half of the fourteenth century, Henry of Mondeville, whose work represents an important landmark in the history of surgery that has been reissued in our own generation in at least two editions, one in Germany, the other in France, declares that "I began to write this work ... on the proposal and request of Master William of Brescia, distinguished professor in the science of medicine and formerly physician to Pope Boniface VIII, and Benedict XI, and Clement V, the present Pope." This is almost all that we know of William, and he is not mentioned in Mandosio's list of Papal Physicians nor in Marini's additions to Mandosio. This is not so hard to understand because no printed edition of Mondeville, who died untimely from tuberculosis and whose work was left unfinished, was issued until our time. If William had done nothing else, however, than stimulate his younger colleague Mondeville to write his great book, which Pagel thought it worth while to edit in our generation and to which Gurlt, in his History of Surgery, devotes some forty pages, he would have a right to a distinctive place in the history of surgery. As it is we have Mondeville's praise of him and as the French professor of surgery was himself one of the most scholarly men of that important period, his opinion is of great value.

Another of the physicians of Pope Boniface VIII, Angelus Camerinensis, is called by Oldoino "a most learned doctor of medicine (medicus absolutissimus) who made a fortune out of his profession and for many years not only pleased but benefited the students who crowded to hear him." The two books from him that we know are on "The Regimen for Preservation from the Pest" and on "Protection against Poisons."

One of the most distinguished of the Papal Physicians was Arnold {434} of Villanova, who, after having been protected by Pope Benedict XI from enemies who insisted that his scientific writings were heretical, afterwards became the friend and physician of Pope Clement V at Avignon. He is the author of a great many writings which have gone through a number of editions. His works have proved a treasure house of quotations from a number of his colleagues in medicine and surgery who lived before his time, from whom nothing has been preserved except these quotations in Villanova. The edition of his works published at Lyons in 1504 contains some fifty-five different treatises.

One of the physicians of Pope Clement V, at least he seems to have been summoned in consultation when the Pope was suffering from a severe illness, the cure of which was attributed to him, was Petrus Aichspadius. He appears to have been a very Admirable Crichton of various learning, for Mandosius says of him that "he was distinguished for his knowledge of the best literature, and as a theologian as well as for his virtues, an excellent physician whose reputation had made medicine respected in his time." With all this he was the Bishop of Basel and after Pope Clement's recovery he was transferred to the See of Moguntum by the Pope, who declared that as he was such a happy curer of bodies it seemed only appropriate that he should be given a larger cure of souls.

Pope John (XXI) XXII (1314-16).--Gentilis Gentilis, said to have been the son of another Papal Physician of the name of Gentilis, was the medical attendant of John (XXI) XXII. His death was due to his faithful devotion to the citizens of Perugia during a time of pestilence. He is the author of a volume of Commentaries on Avicenna, of "The Best Councils for every Form of Disease of the Whole Body," of a volume "On Fevers," of a treatise "On Leprosy," a monograph "On Baths," and of a book that went through many editions after printing was introduced on "The Proportions of Medicine and the Method of Investigating their Composition and of Knowing the Appropriate Dose of Each Medicine." This was printed at Padua more than a century after his death and later at Lyons, and there seems to have been another edition in the Low Countries. He wrote a series of smaller medical treatises on "The Activity of Medicines," on "Phthisis" and on "Medical Dosage." He also wrote "On the Pulse and on Urine" in a volume of which editions were issued at Venice and at Lyons.

Another of the physicians of Pope John XXII was Dino del Garbo, a Florentine, the son of Bruno del Garbo, a skilful surgeon and the disciple of Taddeo of Florence. He is sometimes known as {435} Dino the Expounder because of his successful devotion to the exposition of Galen and Avicenna. Like many of the physicians of his time he had degrees in both medicine and philosophy and was celebrated for his scholarliness. According to Van der Linden, he wrote _De Caena et Prandio Epistola_, which was published by Jerome of Cartularius in 1545; Commentaries on Hippocrates' Nature of the Foetus, Venice, 1502; a treatise on surgery which was published at Ferrara in 1485 and a subsequent edition at Venice in 1536. His Commentaries on Avicenna and the General Practice of Medicine were published at Venice in 1495 and his book on The Virtues of Simple Medicines, a commentary on the Second Canon of Avicenna, was published at Venice the same year. Dino is usually looked upon as one of the most distinguished contributors to medicine in the fourteenth century. His son Thomas is said also to have been in the service of the Popes and has written books on The Reduction of Medicines, a Commentary on Avicenna and a commentary on Galen's work "On Fevers."

John XXII (1316-34), Clement VI (1342-52), Innocent VI (1352-62), St.

Urban V (1362-70).--Of Guy de Chauliac, physician to the Popes at Avignon, enough has been said in the text of this book to make clear how important was his place in the surgery of his time and, indeed, of all the modern time. I have written on him more at length in my Old Time Makers of Medicine (Fordham University Press), and during the ten years that have elapsed since the writing of the original edition of this volume on The Popes and Science, Guy de Chauliac's fame and merits have come to be recognized everywhere.

Gregory XI (1370-78).--One of the well-known physicians of the Popes at Avignon was Jean de Tornemire, known by his Latin name of Tornamira, the physician of Pope Gregory XI, who on the death of that Pope went to Montpellier, where he became Dean and Chancellor of the Medical Faculty. Gurlt, in his History of Surgery, says that he must be "counted among the most learned and expert physicians of his time."

He wrote a commentary on Rhazes and some notes of his on stone in the kidney and bladder show how careful an observer he was. His Rhazes was published at Lyons, 1490. His collected works were published in many editions in the sixteenth century.

Urban VI (1378-89), Innocent VII (1404-06), Martin V (1417-31).--Francis Casinus, the son of a n.o.ble family of Siena, one of the best-known of the physicians of North Italy in the fourteenth century, was chosen physician to Urban VI in 1378. His son {436} Francis was physician to Pope Martin V, 1417. A brother of Francis Casinus, John by name, was Papal Physician to Pope Innocent VII.

Isadoras Ugurgerius in his work _"Le Pompe Sanesi"_ says, "The Casini among the philosophers and physicians of their time held easily the first place. John lectured on the theory of medicine at Siena about the year 1370 and afterwards was summoned to Rome by Pope Innocent VII, by whom he was admitted among his most intimate friends and declared the guardian and conserver of his health." One of John Casinus' sons became Cardinal Antonius Casinus, and another, Bartholomeus, was the Abbot of Valombrosa, while the son of Francis Casinus, his brother, became Bishop of Ma.s.sa and is famous for a collection of ma.n.u.scripts made during the first half of the fifteenth century.

Another of the physicians of Pope Martin V was Andrew Gamuccius, who had also been physician to Pope John XXIII. He was a descendant of a n.o.ble family of San Gemignano, well known for scholars.h.i.+p and for the number of distinguished men who came from it.

Eugene IV (1431-47) chose as his physician John Baptist Verallus, doctor of medicine and philosophy, to whom he gave besides the t.i.tle of archiater to the Pope that of chief physician of the city. Verallus is famous for his work in improving the health of Rome itself and represents one of the pioneers in public hygiene. At various times most of our modern hygienic regulations were antic.i.p.ated at Rome. The ancient Romans had brought in water from a distance, because they had experienced the seriousness of contamination and during the early Renaissance the aqueducts which had fallen out of repair were gradually restored. The contagiousness of tuberculosis began to be suspected at this time and the idea of intimate contact with patients suffering from disease as a definite cause took shape. In a chapter of "The Century of Columbus," Catholic Summer School Press, N. Y., 1914, I reviewed some of these antic.i.p.ations in Italy of our modern hygiene due to thinking physicians, of whom Verallus was one of the pioneers.

Another of the physicians of Pope Eugene IV was Ludovicus Scarampus.

His fame was for surgery rather than medicine, so that it is interesting to learn in spite of the supposed ecclesiastical opposition to surgery that Pope Eugene learned to think so much of him that he made him a Bishop and then Archbishop of Florence, and afterwards Patriarch of Aquilea with the rank of Cardinal. More than one distinguished medieval surgeon in Italy had been a colleague in the episcopal dignity. Practically all the historical {437} writers of Scarampus' time give him a prominent place in their histories.

Nicholas V (1448-55).--One of the physicians of Pope Nicholas V, the Renaissance patron of learning, was Bernard Garzonius, distinguished for his knowledge of philosophy and medicine, who had been professor in the medical school at Bologna before being summoned to Rome.

Alidosio in his volume _I Dottori Bolognesi di Teologia, Filosofia, Medicina, ed Arti Liberali_ (page 29) gives an interesting account of the hours and subjects of his teaching at Bologna. At nine in the morning Garzonius lectured on the Theory of Medicine, and in the afternoon on the Practice of Medicine. Besides there were special lectures on Moral Philosophy probably setting forth the moral principles of medical practice on the festival days. Garzonius died in Rome of the pest in 1454, having devoted himself to the care of those suffering from the disease, though the mortality was so high that most of those who could, including even not a few of his colleagues in medicine, had left the city.

Another of the physicians of Pope Nicholas V was Laurentius Roverella of Ferrara, of whom his contemporaries speak in the highest praise for his erudition, his ability to teach and the piety and charity of his life. He was for a time professor at the University of Ferrara, but afterwards was called to Padua, where his lectures attracted a great deal of attention. He was recalled to Ferrara by the D'Estes in order to secure his prestige for his native city and it was from here that he was summoned to Rome to become the chamberlain and physician of Pope Nicholas V. After the death of Nicholas V he went to Paris, lectured there for a time and was crowned with the doctorate. After this he returned to Ferrara and was frequently sent as amba.s.sador to diverse European princes by the Duke of Ferrara. He was also sent as amba.s.sador for the Popes into France and Hungary. He died at the Monastery of Monte Oliveto in the arms of his brother, who was the Prior of the monastery, but his body was brought for burial to the Church of St. George in Ferrara. Roverella finds a significant place in all the histories of the time.

Calixtus III (1455-58).--The physician of Pope Calixtus III and Pius II was Joannes Serninus. He was a native of Siena, practised for a time in his native city, was offered the position with a good salary of public physician to Citta di Castella, then went to Ancona in a similar position with such success, according to tradition, that his cures were considered almost miracles. From here he was summoned by Pope Calixtus III, and after his death {438} was retained as his physician by Pope Pius II, himself one of the Piccolomini family of Siena. After his death his body was transferred to Siena because the city considered that the remains of so great a son should rest in her soil. It is significant that this physician of wide experience in public health matters, whose successful career in helping various Italian towns to make conditions more healthy for their citizens gave him a wide reputation, should be the chosen physician of Pope Calixtus III, to whom is attributed a famous Bull, that has never been found however, against Halley's comet on its appearance in 1456. The selection of such a man as Serninus as Papal Physician makes it extremely improbable that the Pope should have issued any such doc.u.ment as is attributed to him. Its issue has been accepted only with the thought that in the middle of the fifteenth century the Pope and his court were buried in ignorance of science and above all of medicine and the cause of disease. [Footnote 51]

[Footnote 51: The whole subject of the supposed Papal Bull against the comet is discussed in my sketch of Regiomonta.n.u.s the father of modern astronomy, as he is sometimes called, in "Catholic Churchmen in Science," second series, Phila., Dolphin Press, 1909.]

Another of the physicians of Pope Nicholas V and Calixtus III was Simon Tebaldi, who came of a distinguished family, one of whom was a Cardinal. He is called by the historians of the time an ill.u.s.trious philosopher and physician of the period.

Paul II (1464-71).--Christopher of Verona is mentioned by Platina in his life of Paul II as the physician of that Pope, but nothing more is known of him. Jacobus Gottifredus, another of Paul's physicians, is better known. He taught medicine for a time at Rome, which was his native city, and devoted himself particularly to the practice of his profession. According to tradition he became the most sought after physician of the city and made a large fortune. He had many archaeological interests, collected curiosities of all kinds and generally used the fortune which he made in medicine for cultural purposes.

Another of the physicians of Pope Paul II was Joannes Burgius, who was also a bishop. He is highly praised by his contemporaries, and Mandosius describes a huge ma.n.u.script volume by him preserved in one of the libraries in Rome, bearing the t.i.tle _Secreta Verissima ad Varios Curandos Morbos_--The Truest Secrets for Curing Various Diseases.

The fourth of the physicians of Paul II of whom there is record was Sanctes Floccus, whose activities as writer and physician are summed up in the inscription on his tombstone.

{439}

_"Flocca Domus, nomen mihi Sanctes, Patria Firmum, Scriptor eram, et medicus Paule Secunde tuus."_

The fifth of the physicians of Paul II was Sebastia.n.u.s Vetera.n.u.s, who was also the archiater or chief physician of the city of Rome according to the list given in the appendix of the statutes of the Roman College, called _Nomenclatura Medicorum._ He is mentioned by his contemporaries as "well versed in the serious disciplines of philosophy and medicine and as constantly a diligent, fruitful cultivator of them, devoting his life to his studies."

Sixtus IV (1471-84).--One of the physicians of Pope Sixtus IV was Onofrio de Onofriis. Oldoinus declares him "a celebrated physician greatly esteemed for the success which he had in the treatment of patients and the very large practice which he consequently enjoyed."

He had been a professor of philosophy and of medicine--the two nearly always went together in these days, unfortunately they do not so often any more--at the University of Perugia, where he achieved great success. It was from here that he was summoned to be the physician of Pope Sixtus. He wrote a series of books on medicine and some of his lectures were published, though these are not now extant.

Another of the physicians of Pope Sixtus IV, to whom he dedicated his important work on food, was John Philip de Lignamine, who had been professor of medicine at Perugia, where his lectures attracted a large following. His book, which appeared at Rome after his office of Papal Physician secured him the leisure for its completion, is "On Every Kind of Food and Drink Useful and Harmful For Man with a Consideration of Their Prime Qualities" (_De Unoquoque Cibo, et Potu Utili Homini, et Novivo, Eorumque Primis Qualitatibus_). [Footnote 52]

[Footnote 52: Lignamine interested himself in the new art of printing and was the publisher of a well-known series of finely printed _incunabula_.]

One of the important medical scientists of the end of the fifteenth century was Benedict of Nursia, whose book _De Conservatione Sanitatis_ is really an important contribution to medical botany. He is placed in the list of Papal Physicians by Mandosius, whose authority is usually unquestioned. Giacobilli is his authority. Marini in his comments on Mandosius' work declares that Benedict was not a Papal Physician but the ducal physician at Milan, and tells the story of his exile from his native country Nursia. He was so distinguished for his medical learning that he became almost at once one of the most prominent of the physicians in Milan. There is no doubt, however, that Benedict dedicated his book, {440} which is now looked upon as basic in the history of medical botany, to Sixtus IV, and the suggestion that he was a Papal Physician seems to have come from the fact that though remaining in the service of the Duke of Milan he was summoned in consultation to see this Pope during an illness.

Innocent VIII (1484-92).--Petrus Leonius, one of the physicians of Innocent VIII, finds a place among Paul Jovius' "Eulogies of Learned Men" and is the author of a commentary on medicine and mathematics and a treatise, _De Urinis_. He had been a professor of medicine at several of the important Italian universities and was very well known throughout Italy. He was summoned to treat Lorenzo de Medici and the early death of that ill.u.s.trious Florentine gave occasion for a good deal of opprobrium for his physician, though the most careful investigation has shown that there was no reason for criticism of him.

The fact that Petrus Leonius had been called as the consultant in Lorenzo's case shows how thoroughly he was appreciated. One of his biographers suggests of him that he was "a learned rather than a lucky physician." Physicians will probably appreciate that distinction, better than others.