Plants and signs: healing with plants according the iatromathematica science during the Roman and Late Antique Egypt

Andreozzi, Ricardo (2022) Plants and signs: healing with plants according the iatromathematica science during the Roman and Late Antique Egypt. In: Aegyptus et Pannonia VII. Magyar-Egyiptomi Baráti Társaság, Ókori Egyiptomi Bizottság, Budapest, pp. 21-64. ISBN 9786156571014

Preview

Text AePVII_Andreozzi.pdf - Published Version Download (1MB) | Preview

Abstract

During the period between the 1 st to 3rd century AD, the Hermeticis became widespread in the Roman Empire, and the texts of the Corpus Hermeticum took shape. Their attribution to the god Thot, as the contexts and characters of these writings openly recall the Egyptian environment where they grew. Among the treatises of the Corpus, the works on astrological medicine, or iatromathematica, deserve particular attention. The latter discipline aims to explain the disease as the negative influence of a celestial body and to heal the illness by deleting the harmful effects of the star or planet. The iatromathematica constitutes a coherent set of knowledge in which the microcosm and the macrocosm are deeply connected: every part of the body, every plant, every stone, every animal finds its position in a precise pattern of correspondences with the celestial world. Within this frame, the purpose of this contribution is to investigate the reasons for the choice of some of the plants mentioned in the writings of “astrological botany” in the treatment of individual diseases, trying to understand the reason for their connection to individual stars, and, when possible, also highlighting the Egyptian background of the formation of these texts or their link with most recent innovations (such as the introduction of new plants in Egypt during the Graeco-Roman time). Furthermore, it will be underlined the connection, hitherto little or not at all recognized, of this type of writings with the Demotic, Greek, and Coptic herbaria that Roman Egypt has preserved, noting the singular coincidence of the common presence of some plants in both of these genres, and the significance of the iatromathematica in the formation and transmission of late herbaria.

Actions (login required)

Edit Item