Scientists at the Biomedical Egyptology Research Center at the University of Manchester are examining ancient Egyptian mummies. In the tomb of a pharaoh who lived almost five thousand years ago, near the sarcophagus, the skeleton of a young man was found. Scientists have found that it was a doctor who treated his master during his lifetime and followed him to the afterlife. From the deciphered text on the papyrus scrolls, it became clear with what drugs the ancient Egyptian doctors treated patients.
To the underworld - with Pharaoh
The young man lived at the court of the pharaoh, who ruled Ancient Egypt at the turn of the fourth and third millennia BC. At that time, the Egyptians did not yet make special figurines of ushabti - symbolic images of helpers and servants, which were later placed in the graves of wealthy deceased. Therefore, together with the pharaoh, all his servants were sent to the next world, without whom he could not do during his lifetime.
However, the servants of the deified rulers of Egypt hardly grieved that they had to leave earthly life early, because they believed that in the next world they were provided with a privileged position. They believed that they would be with their master in eternal life.
Only spells?
In the Research Center for Biomedical Technology, dozens of skeletons and mummies are stored in special rooms at a certain temperature. Scientists take a series of X-rays, cut hairs from the body of mummies, and make scrapings of dried soft tissue, bone tissue, teeth, in order to make immunological tests and DNA samples.
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“Classical archeology, literature, art represent the ancient Egyptians as harmonious, youthful and beautiful. The result is a picture that does not fully correspond to reality."
To understand how people actually lived and looked in Ancient Egypt, it is necessary to study their remains and study the information that has come down to us about the methods of ancient Egyptian medicine. This work will also help correct some historical misconceptions.
It is considered established that the Egyptians healed the sick exclusively with spells, and only the ancient Greeks invented modern scientific medicine. Professor David argues that this is not the case:
"The Greeks learned a lot from the Egyptians and borrowed from them the foundations of medical science."
On twelve scrolls of papyrus, which are at the University of Manchester, the "teachers of Hippocrates" wrote down their medical wisdom. Hieroglyphic texts were created between 1820 and 250 BC. e. Although these writings contain all kinds of spells, for example, from a cold, there are also detailed descriptions of specific cases of diseases, therapeutic recommendations and more than two thousand recipes for preparing medicines. Papyri with medical records have been found in ancient Egyptian temples, tombs and city archives.
Decoding hieroglyphs
This treasury of the historical heritage of ancient Egyptian physicians has long remained an insoluble mystery for Egyptologists. Scientists translated the hieroglyphs in the usual way: words, as is customary among Egyptologists, were deciphered based on the context and comparing with other similar texts. But when decoding medical texts, it is extremely difficult to do this, since many concepts, in particular the names of medicinal plants or mineral substances, were mentioned in ancient Egyptian sources only once, and there was simply nothing to compare with. In addition, they were often mentioned not in coherent sentences, but in enumerations. It is not surprising that almost a third of medicines from hieroglyphic inscriptions are deciphered very approximately, and scientists translate the hieroglyphs denoting them in different ways.
Professor Rosalie David and her collaborators have studied thousands of ancient Egyptian recipes and checked every controversial meaning of the translation of the names of substances and plants. It was important to find out whether this or that plant grew in Ancient Egypt? Were there trade links at that time, thanks to which these substances were available to the Egyptians? The next step was to check the composition of drugs in terms of their therapeutic effect. Experts managed to decipher the hieroglyphs denoting 284 substances of plant, animal and mineral origin. 706 drug prescriptions have been translated in whole or in part. The end result of meticulous work was unexpected for scientists: half of the ingredients are still used in medicine, although, for the most part, in the form of synthetic substances.
The world's first dentures
The ancient Egyptians, obviously, knew well how to prepare extracts of biologically active substances, which substances dissolve better in water, which ones in oil, how to take and dispense medicinal drugs. Two thirds (!) Of the formulations of Egyptian medicines turned out to be really healing.
What did the Egyptian physicians prescribe to their patients? To heal wounds, they advised applying ointments made from resin, honey and metals. For rheumatism, healers gave the sick saffron and celery, for constipation - castor oil obtained from the castor bean plant, for flatulence (bloating) - cumin and coriander. An extract from the roots of a pomegranate tree was used against tape worms. And for some reason, doctors recommended to patients suffering from migraines to keep a dead catfish on their heads. It is also unclear why the Egyptian doctors believed that applying bunches of green lettuce to the head helped with baldness and stimulated hair growth.
Although Egyptian healers did not know pain relievers, they even tried their hand at surgery - amputated limbs. The researchers found confirmation that the artificial toes found on the mummy were worn by a person during his lifetime. This means that the world's first prostheses were made in Ancient Egypt.
And something else important was invented in the Nile Valley four thousand years ago - a contraceptive. The thick, viscous substance, which really killed sperm due to its acidic reaction, was mixed with honey and dried along with cotton, giving the lump a certain shape. The analysis of the contraceptive showed that this is nothing more than crocodile droppings …