Part 178

"The Mayor of the Palace is met with in all the Frankish kingdoms. … The mayors were at first merely the first superintendents, the first administrators of the interior of the palace of the king; the chiefs whom he put at the head of his companions, of his leudes, still united around him. It was their duty to maintain order among the king's men, to administer justice, to look to all the affairs, to all the wants, of that great domestic society. They were the men of the king with the leudes; this was their first character, their first state. Now for the second. After having exercised the power of the king over his leudes, his mayors of the palace usurped it to their own profit. The leudes, by grants of public charges and fiefs, were not long before they became great proprietors. This new situation was superior to that of companions of the king; they detached themselves from him, and united in order to defend their common interests. According as their fortune dictated, the mayors of the palace sometimes resisted them, more often united with them, and, at first servants of the king, they at last became the chiefs of an aristocracy, against whom royalty could do nothing. These are the two principal phases of this institution: it gained more extension and fixedness in Austrasia, in the family of the Pepins, who possessed it almost a century and a half, than anywhere else."

_F. Guizot, History of Civilization, volume 2 (France, volume 1), lecture 19._

ALSO IN: _W. C. Perry, The Franks, chapter 5._

See, also, FRANKS: A. D. 511-752.

MAYORUNA, BARBUDO, The.

See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: ANDESIANS.

MAYPO, Battle of (1818).

See CHILE: A. D. 1810-1818.

MAZACA.

"Mazaca [the capital city of ancient Cappadocia] was situated at the base of the great volcanic mountain Argaeus (Argish), about 13,000 feet high. … The Roman emperor Tiberius changed the name of Mazaca to Caesareia, and it is now Kaisariyeh on the Kara Su, a small stream which flows into the Halys (Kizil Ermak)."

_G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 5, chapter 22._

MAZARIN, Ministry of.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1642-1643, to 1659-1661.

MAZARINE BIBLE, The.

See PRINTING: A. D. 1430-1456.

MAZARQUIVER, Siege of (1563).

See BARBARY STATES: A. D. 1563-1565.

MAZES.

See LABYRINTHS.

MAZOR.

See EGYPT: ITS NAMES.

MAZZINI, Joseph, and the revolutionary movements in Italy.

See ITALY: A. D. 1831-1848.

MEADE, General George G.: Command of the Army of the Potomac. Battle of Gettysburg, and after.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1863 (JUNE-JULY: PENNSYLVANIA); and (JULY-NOVEMBER: VIRGINIA).

MEAL-TUB PLOT, The.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1679 (JUNE).

MEANEE, Battle of (1843).

See SCINDE.

MEAUX, Siege of.

The city of Meaux, on the Marne, in France, was vigorously besieged for seven months by Henry V. of England, but surrendered on the 10th of May, 1422.

_Monstrelet, Chronicles, book 1, chapters 249-259._

MECCA: Start--------

MECCA: Rise of Mahometanism.

See MAHOMETAN CONQUEST: 609-632.

MECCA: A. D. 692. Siege by the Omeyyads.

See MAHOMETAN CONQUEST: A. D. 715-750.

MECCA: A. D. 929. Stormed and Pillaged by the Carmathians.

See CARMATHIANS.

MECCA: End--------

MECHANICSVILLE, Engagements at.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1862 (MAY: VIRGINIA) THE PENINSULAR CAMPAIGN; and (JUNE-JULY: VIRGINIA).

MECHLIN: Start--------

MECHLIN: A. D. 1572. Pillage and massacre by Alva's troops.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1572-1573.

MECHLIN: A. D. 1585. Surrender to the Spaniards.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1584-1585.

MECHLIN: End--------

MECKLENBURG: The Duchy bestowed on Wallenstein (1628).

See GERMANY: A. D. 1627-1629.

MECKLENBURG DECLARATION, The.

See NORTH CAROLINA: A. D. 1775 (MAY).

MEDAIN.

Medain, "the twin city," combined in one, under this Arabic name, the two contiguous Persian capitals, Seleucia and Ctesiphon. The name Medain signifies "cities," and "it is said to have comprised a cluster of seven towns, but it is ordinarily taken to designate the twin cities of Seleucia and Ctesiphon."

_Sir W. Muir, Annals of the Early Caliphate, chapters 10 and 17._

{2120}

MEDIA: Start--------

MEDIA AND THE MEDES.

The country of the Medes, in its original extent, coincided very nearly with the northwestern part of modern Persia, between Farsistan and the Elburz mountains. "The boundaries of Media are given somewhat differently by different writers, and no doubt they actually varied at different periods; but the variations were not great, and the natural limits, on three sides at any rate, may be laid down with tolerable precision. Towards the north the boundary was at first the mountain chain closing in on that side the Urumiyeh basin, after which it seems to have been held that the true limit was the Araxes, to its entrance on the low country, and then the mountain chain west and south of the Caspian. Westward, the line of demarcation may be best regarded as, towards the south, running along the centre of the Zagros region; and, above this, as formed by that continuation of the Zagros chain which separates the Urumiyeh from the Van basin. Eastward, the boundary was marked by the spur from the Elburz, across which lay the pass known as the Pylæ Caspiæ, and below this by the great salt desert, whose western limit is nearly in the same longitude. Towards the south there was no marked line or natural boundary. … We may place the southern limit with much probability about the line of the thirty-second parallel, which is nearly the present boundary between Irak and Fars."

_G. Rawlinson, Five great Monarchies: Media, chapter 1._

"The nation of the Medes belongs to the group of the Arian tribes, which occupied the table-land of Iran. This has been already proved by the statement of Herodotus that in ancient times the Medians were called Areans by all men, by the religion of the Medes, and by all the Median words and names that have come down to us. According to Herodotus the nation consisted of six tribes: the Arizanti, Busae, Struchates, Budii, Paraetaceni, and Magi. … The Magians we have already found to be a hereditary order of Priests."

_M. Duncker, History of Antiquity, book 8, chapter 1._

The Medes, who seem to have been long without any centralizing authority among them, became, at last, united under a monarchy which grew in power, until, in the later part of the seventh century B. C., it combined with Babylonia against the decaying Assyrian kingdom. Nineveh was destroyed by the confederates, and the dominions of Assyria were divided between them. The Median empire which then rose, by the side of the Babylonian, endured little more than half a century. It was the first of the conquests of Cyrus (see PERSIA: B. C. 549-521), or Kyros, the founder of the Persian empire (B. C. 549).

_A. H. Sayce, Ancient Empires of the East, appendix 5._

ALSO IN: _F. Lenormant and E. Chevallier, Manual of the Ancient History of the East, book 5, chapters 1-4._

MEDIA: The ancient religion.

See ZOROASTRIANS.

MEDIA: End----------

MEDIA ATROPATENE.

See ATROPATENE.

MEDIÆVAL, Belonging to the.

See MIDDLE AGES.

MEDICAL SCIENCE: Start--------

MEDICAL SCIENCE: Chronology of Development.

Renouard, in his "History of Medicine," arranges the chronology of the development of medical knowledge in three grand divisions or Ages, subdivided into eight periods. "The First Age commences with the infancy of society, as far back as historic tradition carries us, and terminates toward the end of the second century of the Christian era, at the death of Galen, during the reign of Septimus Severus. This lapse of time constitutes, in Medicine, the Foundation Age. The germ of the Healing Art, concealed, at first, in the instincts of men, is gradually developed; the basis of the science is laid, and great principles are discussed. … The Second Age, which may be called the Age of Transition, offers very little material to the history of Medicine. We see no longer the conflicts and discussions between partisans of different doctrines; the medical sects are confounded. The art remains stationary, or imperceptibly retrogrades. I can not better depict this epoch than by comparing it to the life of an insect in the nympha state; though no exterior change appears, an admirable metamorphosis is going on, imperceptibly, within. The eye of man only perceives the wonder after it has been finished. Thus from the 15th century, which is the beginning of the third and last Age of Medicine, or the Age of Renovation, Europe offers us a spectacle of which the most glorious eras of the republics of Greece and Rome only can give us an idea. It would seem as if a new life was infused into the veins of the inhabitants of this part of the world; the sciences, fine arts, industry, religion, social institutions, all are changed. A multitude of schools are open for teaching Medicine. Establishments which had no models among the ancients, are created for the purpose of extending to the poorer classes the benefits of the Healing Art. The ingenious activity of modern Christians explores and is sufficient for everything. These three grand chronological divisions do not suffice to classify, in our minds, the principal phases of the history of Medicine; consequently, I have subdivided each age into a smaller number of sections, easy to be retained, and which I have named Periods. The first Age embraces four periods, the second and third ages, each, two. … The first period, which we name Primitive Period, or that of instinct, ends with the ruin of Troy, about twelve centuries before the Christian era. The second, called the Mystic or Sacred Period, extends from the dissolution of the 'Pythagorean Society' to about the year 500 A. C. The third period, which ends at the foundation of the Alexandrian Library, A. C., 320, we name the Philosophic Period. The fourth, which we designate the Anatomic, extends to the end of the first age, i. e., to the year 200 of the Christian era. The fifth is called the Greek Period; it ends at the destruction of the Alexandrian Library, A. D. 640. The sixth receives the surname of Arabic, and closes with the 14th century. The seventh period, which begins the third age, comprises the 15th and 16th centuries; it is distinguished as the Erudite. Finally, the eighth, or last period, embraces the 17th and 18th centuries [beyond which the writer did not carry his history]. I call it the Reform Period."

_P. V. Renouard, History of Medicine, introduction._

MEDICAL SCIENCE: Egyptian.

"Medicine is practised among them [the Egyptians] on a plan of separation; each physician treats a single disorder, and no more: thus the country swarms with medical practitioners, some undertaking to cure diseases of the eye, others of the head, others again of the teeth, others of the intestines, and some those which are not local."

_Herodotus, History, translated by Rawlinson, book 2, chapter 84._

{2121}

"Not only was the study of medicine of very early date in Egypt, but medical men there were in such repute that they were sent for at various times from other countries. Their knowledge of medicine is celebrated by Homer (Od. iv. 229), who describes Polydamna, the wife of Thonis, as giving medicinal plants 'to Helen, in Egypt, a country producing an infinite number of drugs … where each physician possesses knowledge above all other men.' 'O virgin daughter of Egypt,' says Jeremiah (lxvi. 11), 'in vain shalt thou use many medicines.' Cyrus and Darius both sent to Egypt for medical men (Her. iii. 1, 132): and Pliny (xix. 5) says post mortem examinations were made in order to discover the nature of maladies. Doctors received their salaries from the treasury; but they were obliged to conform in the treatment of a patient to the rules laid down in their books, his death being a capital crime, if he was found to have been treated in any other way. But deviations from, and approved additions to, the sacred prescriptions were occasionally made; and the prohibition was only to prevent the experiments of young practitioners, whom Pliny considers the only persons privileged to kill a man with impunity. Aristotle indeed says 'the Egyptian physicians were allowed after the third day to alter the treatment prescribed by authority, and even before, taking upon themselves the responsibility' (Polit. iii. 11). Experience gradually taught them many new remedies; and that they had adopted a method (of no very old standing in modern practice) of stopping teeth with gold is proved by some mummies found at Thebes. Besides the protection of society from the pretensions of quacks, the Egyptians provided that doctors should not demand fees on a foreign journey or on military service, when patients were treated free of expense (Diod. i. 82); and we may conclude that they were obliged to treat the poor gratis, on consideration of the allowance paid them as a body by government. … Poor and superstitious people sometimes had recourse to dreams, to wizards, to donations to sacred animals, and to exvotos to the gods. … Charms were also written for the credulous, some of which have been found on small pieces of papyrus, which were rolled up and worn as by the modern Egyptians. Accoucheurs were women; which we learn from Exodus i. 15, and from the sculptures, as in modern Egypt. … The Egyptian doctors were of the sacerdotal order, like the embalmers, who are called (in Genesis l. 2) 'Physicians,' and were' commanded by Joseph to embalm his father.' They were of the class called Pastophori, who, according to Clemens (Strom. lib. 6), being physicians, were expected to know about all things relating to the body, and diseases, and remedies, contained in the six last sacred books of Hermes. Manetho tells us that Athothes, the second king of Egypt, who was a physician, wrote the anatomical books; and his name, translated Hermogenes, may have been the origin of the tradition that ascribed them to Hermes, the Egyptian Thoth. Or the fable may mean that they were the result of intellect personified by Thoth, or Hermes."

_Herodotus, History, translated by Rawlinson, Note._

"The ancient Egyptians, though medical science was zealously studied by them, also thought that the efficacy of the treatment was enhanced by magic formulæ. In the Ebers Papyrus, an important and very ancient manual of Egyptian medicine, the prescriptions for various medicaments are accompanied by the forms of exorcism to be used at the same time, and yet many portions of this work give evidence of the advanced knowledge of its authors."

_G. Ebers, Egypt, volume 2, pages 61-62._

"Works on medicine abounded in Egypt from the remotest times, and the great medical library of Memphis, which was of immemorial antiquity, was yet in existence in the second century before our era, when Galen visited the Valley of the Nile. … Ateta, third king of the First Dynasty, is the reputed author of a treatise on anatomy. He also covered himself with glory by the invention of an infallible hair-wash, which, like a dutiful son, he is said to have prepared especially for the benefit of his mother. No less than five medical papyri have come down to our time, the finest being the celebrated Ebers papyrus, bought at Thebes by Dr. Ebers in 1874. This papyrus contains one hundred and ten pages, each page consisting of about twenty-two lines of bold hieratic writing. It may be described as an Encyclopædia of Medicine as known and practised by the Egyptians of the Eighteenth Dynasty; and it contains prescriptions for all kinds of diseases—some borrowed from Syrian medical lore, and some of such great antiquity that they are ascribed to the mythologic ages, when the gods yet reigned personally upon earth. Among others, we are given the recipe for an application whereby Osiris cured Ra of the headache. The Egyptians attached great importance to these ancient medical works, which were regarded as final. The physician who faithfully followed their rules of treatment might kill or cure with impunity; but if he ventured to treat the patient according to his own notions, and if that patient died, he paid for the experiment with his life. Seeing, however, what the canonical remedies were, the marvel is that anybody ever recovered from anything. Raw meat; horrible mixtures of nitre, beer, milk, and blood, boiled up and swallowed hot; the bile of certain fishes; and the bones, fat, and skins of all kinds of unsavory creatures, such as vultures, bats, lizards and crocodiles, were among their choicest remedies."

_A. B. Edwards, Pharaohs, Fellahs and Explorers, chapter 6._

"In Egypt … man does not die, but some one or something assassinates him. The murderer often belongs to our world, and can be easily pointed out. … Often, though, it belongs to the invisible world, and only reveals itself by the malignity of its attacks: it is a god, a spirit, the soul of a dead man, that has cunningly entered a living person, or that throws itself upon him with irresistible violence. … Whoever treats a sick person has therefore two equally important duties to perform. He must first discover the nature of the spirit in possession, and, if necessary, its name, and then attack it, drive it out, or even destroy it. He can only succeed by powerful magic, so he must be an expert in reciting incantations, and skilful in making amulets. He must then use medicine to contend with the disorders which the presence of the strange being has produced in the body; this is done by a finely graduated régime and various remedies. The cure-workers are therefore divided into several categories. {2122} Some incline towards sorcery, and have faith in formulas and talismen only; they think they have done enough if they have driven out the spirit. Others extol the use of drugs; they study the qualities of plants and minerals, describe the diseases to which each of the substances provided by nature is suitable, and settle the exact time when they must be procured and applied: certain herbs have no power unless they are gathered during the night at the full moon, others are efficacious in summer only, another acts equally well in winter or summer. The best doctors carefully avoid binding themselves exclusively to either method."

_G. Maspéro, Life in Ancient Egypt and Assyria, chapter 7._

"The employment of numerous drugs in Egypt has been mentioned by sacred and profane writers; and the medicinal properties of many herbs which grow in the deserts, particularly between the Nile and Red Sea, are still known to the Arabs, though their application has been but imperfectly recorded and preserved. … Homer, in the Odyssey, describes the many valuable medicines given by Polydamna, the wife of Thonis, to Helen, while in Egypt, 'a country whose fertile soil produces an infinity of drugs, some salutary and some pernicious, where each physician possesses knowledge above all other men'; and Pliny makes frequent mention of the productions of that country, and their use in medicine. He also notices the physicians of Egypt; and as if their number was indicative of the many maladies to which the inhabitants were subject, he observes that it was a country productive of numerous diseases. In this, however, he does not agree with Herodotus, who affirms that, 'after the Libyans, there are no people so healthy as the Egyptians, which may be attributed to the invariable nature of the seasons in their country.' In Pliny's time the introduction of luxurious habits and excess had probably wrought a change in the people; and to the same cause may be attributed the numerous complaints among the Romans, 'unknown to their fathers and ancestors.' The same author tells us that the Egyptians examined the bodies after death, to ascertain the nature of the diseases of which they had died; and we can readily believe that a people so far advanced in civilization and the principles of medicine as to assign each physician his peculiar branch, would have resorted to this effectual method of acquiring knowledge and experience for the benefit of the community. It is evident that the medical skill of the Egyptians was well known even in foreign and distant countries; and we learn from Herodotus, that Cyrus and Darius both sent to Egypt for medical men. … The Egyptians, according to Pliny, claimed the honour of having invented the art of curing diseases."

_Sir J. G. Wilkinson, Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, chapter 10 (volume 2)._

"The Ptolemies, down to the very termination of their dominion over Egypt, appear to have encouraged the curative art, and for the purpose of restoring declining health, surrounded themselves with the most illustrious physicians of the age. … The science of medicine of the period was fully represented at the Museum by distinguished professors, who, according to Athenæus, restored the knowledge of this art to the towns and islands of the Grecian Archipelago. … About the period of the absorption of the Egyptian kingdom into the expanding dominion of the Romans, the schools of Alexandria still continued to be the centre of medical studies; and notwithstanding the apparent dissidence between the demands of a strict science and public affairs, its professors exhibited, equally with their brother philosophers, a taste for diplomacy. Dioscorides and Serapion, two physicians of Alexandria, were the envoys of the elder Ptolemy to Rome, and at a later date were bearers of dispatches from Cæsar to one of his officers in Egypt."

_G. F. Fort, Medical Economy During the Middle Ages, chapter 3._

MEDICAL SCIENCE: Babylonian.

The Babylonians "have no physicians, but when a man is ill, they lay him in the public square, and the passers-by come up to him, and if they have ever had his disease themselves or have known anyone who has suffered from it, they give him advice, recommending him to do whatever they found good in their own case, or in the case known to them. And no one is allowed to pass the sick man in silence without asking him what his ailment is."

_Herodotus, History, translated by G. Rawlinson, book 1, chapter 197 (volume 1)._