Dioscorides and the Materia Medica Tradition

Who was Dioscorides?

The National Library of Medicine (NLM) describes Dioscorides of Anazarbus as a Greek physician born in southeast Asia Minor, in the Roman Empire, in the first few decades CE. [1] He traveled widely seeking medicinal substances from across the Roman and Greek world, helped by the ease of travel under Roman rule. [1] Another source adds that he may have served in the Roman army. [2] Little else about his life is certain.

What the book is

Between about 50 and 70 CE he wrote "De materia medica". The NLM describes it as a five-book study of "the preparation, properties, and testing of drugs." [1] It became the most central pharmacological work in Europe and the Middle East for the next sixteen centuries. [1]

A modern research team counted what the text contains, using the sixteenth-century edition with commentary by Matthioli. They recorded 5,314 unique therapeutic uses of 536 plant taxa and 924 herbal drugs. [3] They noted patterns, such as frequent recommendation of seeds from the Fabaceae (legume) family for skin conditions and of seeds from the Apiaceae (carrot) family as antidotes, and heavy use of underground plant parts as drugs. [3] The researchers interpreted the ancient ailment descriptions in biomedical terms themselves, which is a judgment call and not a certainty. [3]

The Vienna Dioscorides

The oldest surviving copy is an illuminated Byzantine manuscript made in Constantinople about 512 CE. [2] It has 491 folios and almost four hundred color illustrations, each facing a description of a plant's pharmacological properties. [2] In this copy the chapters were rearranged and plants were alphabetized, with descriptions expanded by observations from Galen and Crateuas. [2] See Galen and Galenic medicine.

How the tradition traveled

The NLM's catalogue of Islamic manuscripts shows the same kind of work continuing: the second book of Avicenna's Canon of Medicine covers simple drugs and materia medica in alphabetical order. [4] A review of the origins of Western herbal medicines for kidney disease says Dioscorides' work had a deep influence on later centuries, up to the birth of modern pharmaceutical chemistry. [5] For the Islamic-world side, see Avicenna and the Canon of Medicine, and for the Unani tradition see Unani medicine.

Why the book stopped being treated as final

Like other Greek medical texts, "De materia medica" was treated as dogma for many years. [1] The NLM says that by the mid-sixteenth century the message that investigation and experimentation are crucial to pharmacology began to emerge, and modern research into medicines began. [1]

Traditional use versus testing

A text listing a plant for a complaint is a record of historical use. It is not a clinical trial. The authors of the plant survey put it carefully: they suggest that drugs which lost importance, or were used for diseases now controlled by prevention and industrial drugs, may be starting points for research. [3] The same authors say a documented tradition of use can matter for regulatory approval of certain herbal products. [3] Neither point says the old uses work.

Proper evidence not found for "Dioscorides' remedies" as a group. We looked for trials of the book's recommendations as a whole and found none; evidence has to be assessed plant by plant and use by use. See historical use vs clinical evidence and the Western herbal traditions guide. For individual plants, use the herb guides on this site and not this history page.

Related pages

Hippocratic medicine and the four humors, Traditional medicine: product quality, interactions and clinical care.