Medicine and Mongols

Spiritual Causes

Spiritual Cures (prayer)

Natural Causes

Natural Cures (hospital, surgeries)

Islamic Golden Age destroyed by

Mongols—now faith over science in Islamic World

Chinese methods

Traditional Chinese Medicine (accupuncture) and Qi

Miasma Theory

Bad luck and Bad air (malaria)

• natural theory

Humor Theory

• four elements (earth, air, water, fire)

• four humors (blood, phlegm, black bile (stomach), yellow bile(stomach))

  • sick from imbalance of these

• until 1700s

Melancholy

Too much black bile

• sad

Phlegmatic

Too much phlegm now you’re slow

Choleric

Too much yellow bile and angry

Sanguine

Lots of blood and confident

Remedies of 4 humors

• too much blood—take it out

  • cut you and drink some blood

    • george Washington

  • leeches

• too much phlegm—make you sneeze and cough

• too much yellow bile—make you throw up

• too much black bile—make you poo

Types of Practicioners

• folk/faith healers

  • cheapest and most common

  • pray for you and herbal concoction

• Doctor

  • most expensive and most respected

  • expert in humor theory

  • prescribe blood-work

• Surgeon/surgeon barber

  • blood letting and tumor cutters

  • least respected

• Apothecaries

  • pharmacies—all sorts of medicines; mercury

• Midwives

  • delivered babies

4 beans

will kill you

Results of their medicinal methods

Childhood Mortality

• 50% kids died before age 5

  

lwk 60 not 30 cause 50% died?

Mongol Empire

• largest

• overthrew Abassid and Song

• Japan was chilling unconqured

• leave almost nothing behind except connection between east and west

China Dynasty Order

• Song

  • overthrown by mongol

• Yuan

  • Mongol weak from plague

• Ming

China Yuan to Ming

2 big emperors

• Hongwu

  • founder of ming

• Yongle

  • most powerful ming emperor

Zheng He

• Chinese admiral

• sent to explore the world

  • largest naval expedition in history

  • 28,000 sailors and 300 ships

• shut down program after Young La died

Portugal vs China

• China—center of world, technology, population

• Portugese—after 100s of years are buying asian products

  • hella expensive

• both sailors

What Portugese Find

• gold

• islands where you can grow sugar 

• slave market

1488

Sailor Dias reached end of Africa and encounters Indian Ocean

• get goods themselves so they don’t have to pay high taxed prices (world changes after 1450)

Melaka

• Leading city in southeast asia

• indianized

• arabized

• islamicized

• 1480s—portugese