Hippocrates of Cos, or simply Hippocrates (from the Greek Ἱπποκράτης / Hippokrátês), born around 460 BC. on the island of Cos and died in 377 BC. AD in Larissa, is a Greek doctor from the century of Pericles, but also a philosopher, traditionally considered the “father of medicine”.

He founded the Hippocratic school which intellectually revolutionized medicine in ancient Greece. It makes medicine distinct and autonomous from other areas of knowledge, such as theurgy and philosophy, to make it a profession in its own right.

Very little is known about Hippocrates' life, thoughts and writings. Nevertheless, Hippocrates is commonly described as the paragon of the ancient physician. He is the initiator of a style and method of clinique observation, and the founder of ethical rules for doctors, through the Hippocratic Oath and other texts of the Hippocratic Corpus.

According to most historians, Hippocrates was born in 460 BC. on the Greek island of Kos, which was part of the Athenian confederation. He was a renowned doctor and a famous master of medicine. His family, of aristocratic origin, transmitted medical knowledge and claimed, like the other Asclepiades families, to be descended from Asclepius through his son Podalire1.

The first part of his career took place in Cos, this is not the current city of Cos, the ancient city was located at another end of the island, on the current location of a small seaside resort , Kamari2.

Then his life took place in northern Greece, Thessaly and Thrace, notably in Abdera and the island of Thasos. According to Hippocratic texts mentioning the geographical location of the sick, the most distant city to the north is Odessos (present-day Varna in Bulgaria), and to the south Athens and the islands of the Aegean Sea, Syros and Delos3.

Many biographical elements are apocryphal and subject to discussion4. In general, historians give more weight, as a matter of principle, to the testimonies from Hippocrates' lifetime, notably those of Plato (in Protagoras, Phaedrus) and Aristotle (in Politics). According to these testimonies, Hippocrates was already, during his lifetime, a physician of great reputation, whose logical method and precise use of terms had exemplary value5.

Next come Greek and Roman texts about their own past. The Greco-Romans had the habit of composing, as exercises or conferences, letters and imaginary speeches attributed to their celebrities of the past, from which it is difficult to disentangle the truth from the falsehood.

Galen refers to Hippocrates, and makes numerous allusions to his life. Soranos of Ephesus, a 2nd century Greek gynecologist, was the first biographer of Hippocrates and his writings, incorporating these letters and speeches, are the source of the main information we have about his person5. These sources therefore date from almost five centuries after the death of Hippocrates, in 377 BC.

The collection of Hippocratic texts (authentic, anonymous, and hypothetical) took place gradually during the first millennium, until 1526, the date of the first printed edition of the complete works of Hippocrates in Greek. On the basis of the information contained in these different texts, many authors have sought to reconstruct, or imagine, a biography of Hippocrates5. Starting with that of the 10th century Souda (“Hippocrates” article), and the scholar Jean Tzétzès who wrote a biography of Hippocrates in his Chiliades in the 12th century AD. 6,7.
Picture

    “Hippocrates is the greatest physician and founder of medicine. »

— Seneca, Letters to Lucilius 95.20
Conventional image of a Roman “portrait” bust (19th century engraving).

According to Aristotle's testimony, Hippocrates is known as "the Great Hippocrates8". Concerning his appearance, Hippocrates was first described as a "dignified and compassionate old country doctor", then as "arrogant and inaccessible9". He is certainly considered a wise man, a man of great intelligence and, above all, a good practitioner. Francis Adams, doctor and translator from Greek, described him as a true “physician, a man of experience and common sense10”.

This image of a wise man, an old doctor, is reinforced by the busts we have of him which represent him with a wrinkled face and a large beard. Many doctors of the time had their hair cut short in the style of Jupiter and Asclepius. Consequently, the busts of Hippocrates that have come down to us are perhaps just another version of the portraits of these deities11.

Hippocrates and the beliefs attributed to him are considered those of the medical ideal. Fielding Garrison, an authority on the history of medicine, said: "He is, above all, an example of that attitude of critical thinking, ever searching for sources of error which is the essence of the scientific spirit12”. “His figure… stands tall for future times as that of the ideal doctor,” according to A Short History of Medicine, which has inspired the medical profession since his death13.

According to Vivian Nutton: “In the 21st century, with the exception of the Bible, no text and no author from Antiquity surpasses the authority of Hippocrates of Cos and the Hippocratic Oath.” Regularly cited in scholarly journals and the popular press, Hippocrates remains a familiar figure, considered by everyone, doctors and non-doctors, as the Father of Western medicine, dictating the ethical conduct of doctors5.
Facts or legends

There are several historical trends addressing the life of Hippocrates. A skeptical and positivist current, inaugurated by Émile Littré in the 19th century, dismisses most of the texts on this subject as legend. In the 21st century, Vivian Nutton points out that almost nothing is known about Late Legends
Hippocratic tree under which Hippocrates is said to have worked, in the city of Kos31.

A whole pseudo-Hippocratic literature developed in the Middle Ages. The forgery is distinguished by chronological impossibility. Thus, a letter from Hippocrates On the constitution of man is addressed to King Ptolemy Soter. It was a great success, since we know of around thirty medieval manuscripts preserving this work32.

In the French novel Lancelot-Grail (early 13th century), Hippocrates hears of the resurrection of Lazarus by Jesus Christ. He no longer treats the lovesickness of King Perdiccas, but that of Augustus' nephew, the Roman emperor. The latter had two life-size statues of Hippocrates erected in gratitude in the highest place in Rome32.

Hippocrates is also the victim of a Gaulish woman with whom he fell in love. Under the pretext of a gallant encounter, she succeeds in hanging him from her window, prisoner in a basket, where he is the laughing stock of passers-by. Medieval artists often depicted the scene on ivory tablets, the victim being either Hippocrates or Virgil32.

According to an Arab legend, the wise Lokman succeeded in extracting from Hippocrates his medical secrets, which he jealously guarded, and Hippocrates died of spite33. According to another Arab legend, Hippocrates, feeling his death approaching, had his secrets engraved on a tablet and placed in an ivory casket which he took to the tomb. The short text supposed to be the transcription of this tablet is translated into Latin under the title of Secreta Hippocratis or Capsula eburnea34.
Legendary genealogy and family

The legendary genealogy of Hippocrates traces his paternal ancestry directly to Asclepius (Plato specifies that he is an “Asclepiades”) and his maternal ancestry to Heracles from the Greeks. According to the biographies, which overlap overall but diverge in detail, Hippocrates is the 17th, 18th or 19th descendant from Asclepius35.
Main article: Asclepius.

The most complete family tree is that of Tzétzes. This is a lineage whose historicity cannot be controlled: Asclepius, Podalire, Hippoloque, Sostratos, Dardanos, Crisamis, Cleomyttades, Theodore, Sostratos II, Crisamis II, Theodore II, Sostratos III, Nébros, Gnosidicus, Hippocrates, Heracleidas, Phenaretes, Hippocrates II who is the great Hippocrates36.

    An illustration of Hippocrates in the Asclepieion of Kos, with Asclepius appearing center stage.

    Another illustration in the Asclepieion of Kos.

Biographers have not preserved the name of Hippocrates' wife, but her ancestor was Cadmus of Cos, tyrant of the island during the first Persian war. Three children were born from this marriage; two boys Thessalos and Dracon who will be doctors, and a girl wife of Polybius, another doctor. This Polybius, son-in-law and disciple of Hippocrates, is considered the author of the Hippocratic treatise On the Nature of Man37. This daughter of Hippocrates inspired a Byzantine legend, reported by the crusaders, and which is found in a story by Jean de Mondeville. Transformed into a dragon by an enchantment, the daughter of Hippocrates is locked in a castle, where only the kiss of a knight will allow her to regain her original form37. The treatise Nature of Man is attributed to Polybius, disciple and son-in-law of Hippocrates (not to be confused with the historian Polybius of Megalopolis); and De la superfétation is attributed to Léophanès by Émile Littré38.
Works: the Hippocratic corpus
Mural depicting Galen and Hippocrates. 12th century, Anagni, Italy.

Hippocrates is widely considered the “Father of Medicine”39,40. His school gave great importance to the clinical doctrines of observation and documentation. These doctrines are based on a clear and objective writing practice. It is the first medical literature that has been preserved, presenting itself without a clear separation between technique and aesthetics41.

This is the appearance of a founding medical style of clinique medicine: “the patient becomes the object of the gaze, the source of signs. Writing and semeiology are absolutely linked”42. This medical style combines, among others, brachylogy (ellipsis or laconic style), parataxis (the facts are recorded in successive accumulation), asyndeton (sublime style), metaphorical style, aphoristic style43…

These processes would not be a matter of rhetorical intention, but of conscious, reasoned, technical reflection44. From then on, the name Hippocrates actually has two meanings: it is firstly the historical character, but also the work (the set of texts) bequeathed under his name, the Hippocratic collection or Hippocratic corpus45.
Main article: Hippocratic Corpus.
12th-century Byzantine manuscript of the Hippocratic Oath in the form of a cross.

The Hippocratic Corpus (from Latin: Corpus hippocraticu reveals the maxim “Have two things in view in illnesses: to be useful or at least not to harm”41, probable source of the famous Latin phrase Primum non nocere “First not to harm” .

Here the Hippocratic doctor affirms that the aim of medicine is not the success of the doctor, but the interest of the patient. In the Hippocratic treatises, the patient is designated by the term anthrôpos “the human being”, all other distinctions (sex, social status, people or race) being secondary, which gave rise to talk of a Hippocratic humanism41.

However, medicine remains a technê art, that is to say a profession, a technique which has its limits: "asking of art what is not art, or of nature what is not is not nature, it is being ignorant” (On art). We must know not to intervene when any action is vain or harmful “What medicines do not cure, iron cures; what iron does not cure, fire cures; what fire does not cure must be considered incurable” (Aphorism 7)61.

There is therefore also in Hippocratic medicine a refusal to treat in cases considered hopeless, for fear of leaving one's reputation (for example, in Fractures, cases of open fractures of the femur or humerus on the internal side of the limb) . The theoretical basis of this refusal (the beyond the resources of art cannot go against the natural course) has become foreign to modern consciences41.