First draft. This English translation was generated by
Claude Sonnet 4.6, critiqued by Claude Haiku 4.5, and adjudicated/corrected
once by Claude Sonnet 4.6. It is published for reading and review, not as a
final scholarly edition. Hippocratic medical recipes and treatments are
historical text, not medical advice.
ON DISEASES OF VIRGINS.
This is my beginning of the composition of the eternal [principles] of healing; for it is not possible to know the nature of diseases — which is what the art must discover — unless one knows what exists in the partless principle of origin, from which it was differentiated.
1
First, concerning the disease called sacred, and concerning those struck by apoplexy, and concerning terrors — all the things people fear so strongly that they lose their minds and seem to see hostile daimones upon them, sometimes by night, sometimes by day, sometimes at both seasons. Then, from such a vision, many have already hanged themselves — more women than men; for the female nature is more prone to despondency and is weaker. As for virgins who are of the age for marriage, when they lack a husband, they suffer this more at the time of the descent of the monthly flow, not having been much afflicted by these things before. For later the blood converges into the womb, as if in readiness to flow out; when, therefore, the mouth of the outlet has not been opened, and the blood flows in more abundantly on account of food and the growth of the body, then the blood, having no means of outflow, rushes upward by reason of its fullness to the heart and to the diaphragm. When these are filled, the heart is stupefied; then from the stupefaction comes numbness; then from the numbness, derangement takes hold. Just as when, after sitting for a long time, the blood pressed out from the hips and thighs into the shins and feet produces numbness — and from the numbness the feet become unable to walk, until the blood returns to itself; and it returns most quickly when one rises and wets the part above the ankles in cold water. This numbness is easy to manage, for the blood refluxes quickly because of the straightness of the vessels, and the part of the body is not critical. But from the heart and the phrenes it refluxes slowly; for the vessels run obliquely and the region is critical, being prone to both derangement and madness.
When these parts are filled, a shuddering arises together with fever; they call these fevers wandering fevers. With things in this condition, from acute inflammation she rages; from putrefaction she thirsts for blood; from the darkness she is afraid and frightened; from the pressure around the heart they urge strangulation; and from the badness of the blood, the spirit (thymos), being restless and distressed, draws evil upon itself — and it names other fearful things too; and they command one to leap and to fall into wells and to strangle oneself, as though these were better things and had some kind of utility. But when there are no visions, a certain pleasure arises, from which she is in love with death as though it were some good.
When the woman comes back to her senses, the women dedicate to Artemis many things — above all the most costly of women's garments — following the instructions of diviners, and being thus deceived. The release from this condition comes when nothing obstructs the outflow of the blood. I myself urge that virgins, when they suffer such things, be joined with men as quickly as possible; for if they conceive, they become healthy. And if they do not, either straightaway at puberty or a little later she will be seized by this, provided no other disease intervenes. Of women who have had marital relations, the barren ones suffer this condition more.