Medicine In The Past

Since the beginning of time, people have had illnesses and doctors have tried to cure the. In the days when people knew very little about medicine, some very strange and horrible cures were tried. Here are some of the worst!

1. Toothache

Ancient Egyptians who had toothache didn't use to go to the dentist because there weren't any dentists in those days. So they used to find a dead mouse and put it in their mouth. They left it there for a few hours. Did it take the toothache away? Who knows?! but aren't you happy that there's a dentist near you?

2. Backache

Backache is no fun at all - people who suffer from it have a lot of pain. Sometimes it's because a vertebra (a bone in the back_ is out of position. In ancient Greece, doctors used to cure backache like this: they tied the patient to a ladder, pulled the ladder up high and then let it fall to the ground. BANG! The vertebra went back into place. Well, that was the idea, but this'cure' probably just made the backache worse!

3. Baldness

OK, it's not really a disease at all. But men whose hair is falling out are never happy about it, are they? The ancient Egyptians had the solution. What did they use to do? They took the fat of a lion, a hippopotamus, a cat and a snake, mixed them together - and then rubbed the mixture into the man's head. Maybe it stopped baldness, maybe not - but the man's head certainly didn't smell too good afterwards!

4. Scrofula

The Middle Ages was a time when there was a common skin disease called scrofula. (We won't go into the details, OK?) People who had scrofula could easily get rid of it - they just had to get the king or queen to touch them! The question is: why would a king or queen want to touch a person who had a skin disease?