very little is known with certainty of
the life of Hippocrates, who was called with affectionate veneration by
his successors "the divine old man," and who has been justly known to
posterity as "the Father of Medicine."

He was probably born about 470 B.C., and, according to all accounts,
appears to have reached the advanced age of ninety years or more. He
must, therefore, have lived during a period of Greek history which was
characterized by great intellectual activity; for he had, as his
contemporaries, Pericles the famous statesman; the poets AEschylus,
Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, and Pindar; the philosopher
Socrates, with his disciples Xenophon and Plato; the historians
Herodotus and Thucydides; and Phidias the unrivalled sculptor.

In the island of Cos, where he was born, stood one of the most
celebrated of the temples of AEsculapius, and in this temple--because he
was descended from the Asclepiadae--Hippocrates inherited from his
forefathers an important position. Among the Asclepiads the habit of
physical observation, and even manual training in dissection, were
imparted traditionally from father to son from the earliest years, thus
serving as a preparation for medical practice when there were no written
treatises to study.[1]

Although Hippocrates at first studied medicine under his father, he had
afterwards for his teachers Gorgias and Democritus, both of classic
fame, and Herodicus, who is known as the first person who applied
gymnastic exercises to the cure of diseases.

The Asclepions, or temples of health, were erected in various parts of
Greece as receptacles for invalids, who were in the habit of resorting
to them to seek the assistance of the god. These temples were mostly
situated in the neighbourhood of medicinal springs, and each devotee at
his entrance was made to undergo a regular course of bathing and
purification. Probably his diet was also carefully attended to, and at
the same time his imagination was worked upon by music and religious
ceremonies. On his departure, the restored patient usually showed his
gratitude by presenting to the temple votive tablets setting forth the
circumstances of his peculiar case. The value of these to men about to
enter on medical studies can be readily understood; and it was to such
treasures of recorded observations--collected during several
generations--that Hippocrates had access from the commencement of his
career.

Owing to the peculiar constitut