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ABSTRACTS
In 1275, sheep pox was imported into England from France and the magnificient
flocks bred by the Cistercian monks were for twenty-eight years decimated or completely
destroyed in all parts of the kingdom, while England's woollen trade was seriously
affected.
In 1301 and 1313, equine influenza had serious hold in Rome. During 1345-50
owing to the Black death (small pox) men, horses, cattle, sheep and goats died in
millions.
The Renaissance.—By the fifteenth century the Renaissance had hold of Europe
and a critical spirit was abroad. The works of the Greeks and Romans including the
Hippiatrica and the Geoponica were being re-edited.
Among the most potent influences responsible for this re-awakening in the vete-
rinary world, was the work of the Arabs in Sicily and Spain. Roger II of Sicily
(d. 1154) was a great patron of the arts and sciences. At his instigation Moses of Palermo
translated into Latin the writings of Ippocras the Hindu. He also prohibited the
practice of medicine by the unauthorized. His work was continued by Frederick
II of Naples and Sicily. He established the great medical school at Salerno and drew
up for it a model constitution and programme of studies. These were to last for five
years including active post mortem work, together with one year's apprenticeship to a
qualified practitioner. He himself studied zoology and anatomy and collaborated
with his Master of the Stables, the famous Jordanus Ruffus, in writing a book on
farriery, " Mareschalerie ". This book promised a new era in veterinary medicine
and shows its author to have been a faithful observer of nature, who wrote from personal
experience and was free from the superstition and scholastics of previous writers. For
the first time we meet a scientific classification of diseases. His work was translated
into Latin, Italian, German and Hebrew.
The Arab influence penetrated to Italy where numerous qualified practitioners
were employed and other veterinary writings undertaken. Paraclesus, Leonardo da
Vinci, Ruini, Rusius, Maurus and Aldrovandi all produced original veterinary works,
while others such as Gessner and Jean Revel were busy translating the classics.
Nevertheless this promise of a new era of veterinary medicine was never fulfilled.
The writings of Ruffus and the others were soon forgotten or distorted out of recogni-
tion.
Why, it may be asked, did veterinary medicine benefit so little from the Renais-
sance ? There are two main reasons. Firstly, theology still reigned supreme in
Europe and the Renaissance did not change men's ideas regarding the soul.
Europe still suppressed such freedom of thought and expression as had been allowed by
the Sicilian kings. Secondly, the veterinary profession could at that time only have
progressed, if the medical profession had been willing to offer it a helping hand. It
was not, but on the contrary opposed animal medicine with disdainful hostility. Doc-
tors, who showed an interest in animals, were ostracised. For example Heroard
was condemned by his colleagues for publishing an anatomy of the horse on the order
of Charles IX. Although for so long the medical profession had recourse to animals
for their study of anatomy, it was not for centuries that the idea of comparative ana-
tomy really developed. [J. F. S.]