FROM AYURVEDA TO GALEN: Ancient Hindu, Greek, and Roman Medicine (Medical Publications for lay people Book 9)

Long before hospitals, microscopes, antibiotics, and modern laboratories, healers across India, Greece, and Rome confronted enduring questions: Why do people suffer? How can pain be relieved? How can health be protected? And what responsibilities accompany the knowledge and power to care for the human body?
From Ayurveda and Hippocrates to Galen traces the development of ancient medicine across three influential civilizations. From Ayurveda’s emphasis on balance, prevention, and whole-person care, the narrative moves through Sushruta’s surgical tradition, Hippocratic observation, Alexandrian anatomy, Roman public health and military medicine, and the commanding syntheses of Celsus and Galen.
Written for general readers, this second edition presents ancient medicine with both respect and critical clarity. It explores how ritual, philosophy, observation, practical skill, pharmacy, surgery, ethics, and infrastructure shaped healing, while distinguishing historically important achievements from theories and treatments that modern evidence has corrected or rejected.
Ideal for readers interested in medical history, ancient civilizations, and the long development of healing traditions, the book shows how knowledge survives through observation, teaching, writing, translation, institutions, and debate. Its central message is timeless: the history of medicine is not only a history of cures, but also a history of curiosity, responsibility, compassion, and the persistent human effort to make suffering intelligible.