Medicine Of The Gods: Egyptian Secret Book Of The Physician
As in many other areas of endeavor, the Egyptians had a very good reputation for their medical skills - diplomatic letters often made requests for remedies, including the seemingly miraculous, when even the Egyptians saw the joke as in the surviving reply of Ramses the Great to the Hittite king Hattusili who had requested a doctor with a drug to help his 50-something sister become pregnant. Fertility treatments were an Egyptian thing, but in this case, Ramses suggests a miracle worker might be more appropriate.
Ancient Egyptian surgical tools (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Egyptians formulated the first disease theory in history, predating traditional Chinese medicine and Ayurveda by at least a 1,000 years, perhaps more, referring to the Pyramid age and before. A most important contribution to world medicine is its pain-substance theory, which was hugely influential on subsequent medical systems, or could even be regarded as their origin. Egyptian medicine operates on a detoxification model, integrated into other aspects of old pharaonic culture, especially in the techniques of mummification, where the impure substance that causes decay or pain must be eradicated. Egyptian medicine, like many traditional systems, has an important pharmacopoeia of plants and minerals, which can be exploited in modern therapies. Basically, Egyptian medicine lives on in other systems that came after.
