Galen: On Problematic Movements

In this forgotten treatise, preserved largely in medieval translations into Arabic and Latin, the greatest medical scientist of antiquity investigates the relationship between conscious and unconscious movements. He looks at the structure of the tongue and the oesophagus, and asks why mental perceptions can have physical effects on the body. Some of his questions still trouble modern scientists, although they would not accept most of his answers. The extensive Introduction and Commentary explain the medical background for non-medical specialists, and discuss the place of this treatise and of anatomy in medieval medicine down to Leonardo da Vinci. As well as being the first English translation of this important work, this is also the first comparative study of medieval translations of the same ancient text, and is based on new editions and collations of all three. The Commentary pays special attention to the linguistic elements involved in making these translations.

Vivian Nutton is Emeritus Professor of the History of Medicine at University College London. One of the world's leading experts on Galen, he has published editions of and commentaries on Galen's On Prognosis (1979) and the editio princeps of On my Own Opinions (1999), and is preparing an annotated English translation of the recently discovered Avoiding Distress. He has also edited two collections of essays on Galen, while his Ancient Medicine (2004) is a major synthesis of the history of medicine in classical antiquity from the Greeks to the sixth century CE.

Gerrit Bos is Chair of the Martin-Buber-Institute for Jewish Studies at the University of Cologne, and has published widely in the fields of Jewish studies, Islamic studies, Judeao-Arabic texts and medieval Islamic science and medicine. In addition to preparing The Medical Works of Moses Maimonides, Professor Bos is also involved with a series of medical-botanical Arabic-Hebrew-Romance synonym texts written in Hebrew characters, an edition of Ibn al-Jazzar's Zad al-musafir (Viaticum), and an edition of Averroes' commentary on the zoological works of Aristotle, extant only in Hebrew and Latin translations. He received the Maurice Amado Award for his work on Maimonides' medical texts.