LEGACY OF ARABIC MEDICINE Medieval Islamic Pharmacy Development of a science and a profession – Written by David W. Tschanz, USA No one knows when the first medicine various effects; natural history more than lost, especially in the field of health. Medical was made in the hopes of curing an illness, ‘pharmacy’ as we understand it today. practitioners were driven by a hadith of the only that it was so long ago the answer By the start of the 7th century CE, Europe Prophet: is lost in the mists of prehistory. What is and much of the Near East was mired “Allah never inflicts a disease unless he known is that the development of medicines in a morass of intellectual stagnation. makes a cure for it” pharmaceuticals has continued without The ravages of the barbarian hordes had This placed the responsibility for interruption, though with many fits and destroyed the libraries and irreplaceable discovering these cures and restoring health starts, since then. manuscripts collected over the centuries. on the skills and development of medical In the pre-Islamic West and Middle East The achievements of a thousand years of practitioners. early medicine was primarily a fusion of Hellenistic civilization in the arts, sciences Greek, Indian, Persian and later Roman and humanities were erased in a paroxysm THE RISE OF PHARMACY STUDIES attention that had slowly progressed over of destruction. Within a century of the death of the the better part of a millennia. Texts on By mid-century the rise of Islam and Prophet, a systematic approach to the medications were common but most of its hallmark thirst for knowledge and study of poisons and some drugs was being these materia medica were simply lists openness to discovery began the saving and undertaken at the Umayyad court. Snake of various plants and minerals and their eventual expansion of what Europe had and dog bites as well as the ill effects of 616 Cordoba Kairouan Damascus Isfahan Kufa Fustat Medina Mecca Above: Map showing the geographical reach of the Umayyad Caliphate. Based upon the work of Gabagool via Wikimedia Commons. scorpions and spiders and other animals Yazid’s son, Khalid bin Yazid (d. 704), was celery, leek, sesame, rocket, olives, mustard were a cause of great concern, while the interested in alchemy, and so he employed and lichen. Important gums such as poisonous properties of various minerals the services of Greek philosophers who were frankincense and acacia were used. Animal and plants, such as aconite, mandrake living in Egypt. He rewarded them lavishly, products included: hair, blood, egg white, and black hellebore were exploited. Galen and they translated Greek and Egyptian milk and sour milk, honey and dung. and Dioscorides were considered ancient books on chemistry, medicine and the stars. ‘Lab equipment’ consisted of pots, pans, authorities on the subject, and many A contemporary of Khalid was the Jabir Ibn tubes, retorts, alembics, crucibles and var- spurious treatises on the subject were Hayan (Geber), who promoted alchemy as ious distilling apparatus, covering platters, attributed to them. Numerous Islamic a profession laying early foundations for ceramic jars, tumblers, mortars and pestles writers discussed poisons and particularly chemical and biochemical research though (often made of glass or metals), tripods, theriacs, the antidotes for poisons. for reasons other than pharmacy. scales and medicinal bottles. The range and Sudden death was not an uncommon scope of alchemical operations included occurrence in royal courts and was SCIENTIFIC ALCHEMY AS FOUNDATION distillation, sublimation, evaporation, often, usually erroneously, attributed to The role of scientific alchemy cannot be pulverisation, washing, straining, cooking, poison. Not surprisingly, fear of poisoning over-emphasised. The trend, approach and calcination and condensation (thickening of convinced Umayyad leaders of the need to type of information circulated in 9th century liquid compounds). study them, detect them and cure them. As Arabic alchemical manuals represent some The key names in scientific alchemy a result much of early Islamic pharmacy of the best work in this field. The careful during the early Abbasid period were was done by alchemists working in methodology they developed would serve Abu al-Fa’id Ohun-Nun (d. 861) of Egypt toxicology. all fields, including pharmacy. and Ibn Wahshiyyah (fl. ca. 900) who The first of these was Ibn Uthal, the In the process of experimenting in the wrote on a variety of topics including Christian physician to the first Umayyad making of amalgamations and elixir, several alchemy, toxicology, magic and astrology. caliph, Mu’awiyah. He was a noted important mineral and chemical substances Rational alchemical activities, however, alchemist and had conducted a systematic were used such as sal ammoniac, vitriols, reached a climax in the works of ar-Razi, a study of antidotes and poisons. A number of sulphur, arsenic, common salt, quicklime, contemporary of Ibn Wahshiyah, and a far suspicious deaths at court led to his eventual malachite, manganese, marcasite, natron, more original writer. Ar-Razi’s works are of execution. Another Christian physician- impure sodium borate and vinegar. much higher calibre both in their relevance pharmacist, Abu al-Hakam al-Dimashqi, Among simples of botanical origin they to alchemy, as well as to pharmacy and served the second Umayyad caliph, Yazid. used fennel, saffron, pomegranate rinds, medicine. 617 LEGACY OF ARABIC MEDICINE Isalmic Caliphates: 632 – 661 Rashidun Caliphate 750 – 1258 Abbasid Caliphate 661 – 750 Umayyad Caliphate Above: Timeline of the Islamic Caliphates. All of these techniques and methodolo- Qusta ibn Luqa and Mankah the Indian, As was the case in Europe and America gies as well as the attention to methodology who translated from Sanskrit into Arabic, up to modern times, many prominent and experimentation were essential to the and translated a treatise on poisons written physicians in Islam, prepared the necessary development of pharmacy as a science and by the Indian physician Shanaq, were also medications for their patients. Al-Majusi, not a hit and miss exercise. leading figures in this crucial period. az-Zahrawi and Ibn Sina (d. 1037) are good examples, but exceptions. For the typical THE ABBASIDS PHARMACY AS A PROFESSION medical professional, the role of educated The 9th century marked the beginning While Islamic scholars did not invent pharmacists in the medical field and in of the Golden Age of Islamic learning and the idea of medications, they did develop society could not be ignored and was, in fact just as Muslim scholars began to make pharmacy as a separate, co-equal profession , welcomed. Arabic pharmacy (saydanah) progress in the physical sciences, so too did requiring skilled practitioners with their was recognised as a profession and school they learn, master and expand the arts of own training, licensing and standards. of thought separate from medicine, just medicine and the science of pharmacy. The prolific intellectual ferment that as grammar is separate from the art of This early rise and development of fired the Baghdad schools, support at the composition, prose from poetry, and so professional pharmacy in Islam – more than highest levels of government and a craving forth. Its practitioners were recognised as 4 centuries before such development took for intellectual pursuits paved the way for possessing essential skills in a profession place in Europe – was the result of three greater achievement in the next 400 years. meeting high standards. major occurrences: Manuals on materia medica and books of By the beginning of the 9th century 1. the great increase in the demand for instructions circulated in large numbers Baghdad, the centre of learning at the time, drugs and their availability on the throughout the Islamic World and using the saw a rapid expansion of the number of market, methods of alchemy to formulate medicines privately owned pharmacy shops, a trend 2. professional maturity and and experiments. that quickly spread to the suburbs and then 3. an unprecedented intellectual curiosity. Methods of extracting and preparing to other Muslim cities. Initially these were Translation of scientific books into Arabic medicines were brought to a high art unregulated and managed by personnel of had already begun under the short-lived and their techniques of distillation, inconsistent quality, but all that changed. Umayyad Caliphate. It exploded under the crystallisation, solution, sublimation, One of the finest definitions of the Abbasids whose caliphs searched the world reduction and calcination became the pharmacist, his role and his profession, was for books and manuscripts above all else. essential processes of pharmacy and given by Abu ar-Rayhan al-Biruni (d.1048). Hunayn ibn Ishaq, was probably the chemistry. In his work as-Saydanah fit-Tibb, al-Biruni greatest translator in Arab history. He had With the help of these techniques, the defined the pharmacist “as the professional a superlative knowledge of Syriac, Greek saydalanis (pharmacists) introduced new who is specialised in the collection of all and Arabic, and carried out a large number drugs such as camphor, senna, sandalwood, drugs, choosing the very best of each simple of translations from Greek scientific and rhubarb, musk, myrrh, cassia, tamarind, or compound, and in the preparation of philosophical manuscripts into Arabic, nutmeg, alum, aloes, cloves, coconut, good remedies from them following the for which he was paid