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  • Chapter 5 - The Empirical, Art and Science in Hippocrates’ On Joints

  • from Part II - The Technological Body
  • Edited by Maria Gerolemou, Center for Hellenic Studies, Washington, George Kazantzidis, University of Patras, Greece
  • Book:
    Body and Machine in Classical Antiquity
    Published online:
    13 July 2023
    Print publication:
    27 July 2023, pp 126-154

  • Summary

    This chapter presents the several modes of reduction of the shoulder described by Hippocrates in On Joints 2–7 and evaluates them in relation to the phenomenon of leverage and the ancient tool, the lever (mochlos). It argues that Hippocrates’ understanding of leverage is a feature of his expertise as iētros and did not derive from any separate mechanical or scientific knowledge. This is especially interesting, since Hippocrates knew of the lever and some of its uses, but he describes techniques involving the reciprocal forces exerted between the patient’s dislocated bones and the physician’s own body. The chapter makes use of the analytic distinction between ostension and ostensive definition to characterize this expertise. It distinguishes among experience of physical forces, art that arises from such experience, and the physical principles of leverage that emerged a century or more later. There are references to On Fractures and On the Art.