Marija-Ana Dürrigl

The Sacred Disease and Its Patron Saint

Although the Hippocratic natural theory of epilepsy as a brain disorder originated around 400 bc , it did not begin to take root until the 18th and 19th centuries, leaving the intervening centuries dominated by mostly supernatural concepts. This article provides historical insight into human behavior when afflicted with disease: supplication to a patron saint, Saint Valentine, a cult that spread throughout Europe.

Kalokagathia - beauty is more than just external appearance

Summary  Notions of beauty have evolved through history and are culture‐specific. In the Western world one concept which has been linked to beauty is that of kalokagathía, an ideal that unites physical beauty and moral value in a human being. This notion was inherited from Antiquity and was modified during the Middle Ages, when much more attention was paid to the fate of the soul, and further modified during the Renaissance, when concepts of beauty and of moral responses, utility and good gradually became separated. A glance at an ancient notion, such as kalokagathía, has its value in trying to understand modern perceptions of beauty.

Two Unconventional Testimonies of Urolithiasis in the 18th Century on the 1600th Anniversary of St. Liborius' Death (397-1997)

Urolithiasis can be traced back to periods long past, and its pathological substrate was well known from the beginning. This knowledge motivated rational, empirical measures of healing, which included a variety of recipes against stones. The paper presents two unconventional testimonies of urolithiasis in the 18th century. The Croatian Glagolitic prayerbook from the 18th century is a valuable source for identification of therapeutical approaches. On the other hand, a votive painting of Saint Liborius, patron saint against lithiasis, reflects theurgical views of disease and healing. On the occasion of the 1600th anniversary of his death, this paper aims to illustrate how his cult was revitalized in the 18th century.

Beauty: soul or surface?

It is proposed that beauty can be external or internal or both. External or physical beauty is immediately visible. Internal or inner beauty is not always immediately visible. Ideally both types of beauty are connected and spring from one another.

Deafness as self-representation of a 16th century poet.

In his best poems, the Renaissance poet Sabo Bobaljević Glusac emphasizes his hearing impairment, placing his deafness at the centre of attention. These works are not only a poignant expression of an individual artists suffering, but they may also add to our understanding of the situation of deaf persons. This self-reflection can be seen as a detail that will enhance our ability to communicate with deaf people in order not only to help them hear us, but also to make us hear them as well.

O you young and old, be happy to suffer during your lifetime, rather than be punished eternally: Commentary

This article is based on a medieval sermon by R. Caracciolo, translated into Old Croatian and printed in Senj in 1508. It deals with the meaning of suffering and reflects medieval views on disease, health, body and soul. It is iconic in the representation of gout and of the stress on the fate of the soul in eternity, which can be cleansed through bodiliy suffering.

Looking at a 14th-century recipe against skin disease.

Accessible online at: www.karger.com/journals/drm In the vaults of the archive of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Zagreb, a fairly large collection of Glagolitica is kept, i.e. manuscripts and early printed books in the Glagolitic alphabet. That alphabet was created by St. Cyrill of Thessaloniki in the 9th century and intended to be used by the newly Christianized Slavic peoples. The alphabet was soon replaced in the East by the Cyrillic script and in the West by the Latin script – only in parts of Croatia did the Glagolitic alphabet survive in liturgy, law and literature well into the 19th century. Several Glagolitic monuments with specific medical subjects have also been preserved. We have singled out a clipped 14th-century recipe against skin disease, which poses a challenge for philological and medicohistorical analysis [1]. The recipe is short; it was not written by a member of the learned elite, but most likely by a practitioner who had not even been a trained physician, probably a monk or priest. However ‘unimpressive’ this source may be, it is an illustration of what kinds of medical texts came down to us from the Middle Ages, and what kind of ‘medical practice’ and ‘therapeutic procedure’ they reflect. The 14th-Century Recipe against Skin Disease