Introductory description

Health and the environment are closely connected in ancient thought. As part of the wider 'cosmos' or universe, the same principles apply across creatures - human health and illness thus reflect the essential qualities of their environment (air, water, landscape, climate, food...). Similar ideas continue to operate in Renaissance Europe and inform state responses to rising epidemics such as the plague, accelerating the development of public health strategies. Venice offers a particularly stimulating case study: a very special environment (lagoon, small islands with high density) in combination with its maritime empire and connections created challenging conditions which the State attempted to bring under control.

This module will take you from ancient ideas on health and the environment, contagion, and epidemics, through to early modern understanding of ancient thought and new diseases. You will study in depth the distinctive case of Renaissance Venice, through texts and related site visits. You will develop the ability to think critically about how and why it is important to think of the environment in relation with health; how and why ancient epidemics matter to our understanding of the new ones; and how public health as a field emerged from responses to earlier health crises.

Module web page

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

Preparatory work will take place remotely (set texts, group tasks and discussions) ahead of the course.
Indicative topics to be covered through week 1 and 2 through lectures and seminars:
-Health and the Environment: Ancient Ideas
-Epidemics: Texts and History
-Ancient Medical Texts in Renaissance Venice
-Medical Teaching in an Expanding World: the case of Padua
-Health and Healing in Venice
-Responses to Epidemics in Renaissance Europe and Veneto

• The plague of 1575

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• Have enhanced their research, writing and communication skills
• Have developed skills in the close analysis of a range of ancient and early modern texts.
• Gained an awareness of some of the methods used by medical historians
• Thought critically about how different communities have engaged with health and illness in different contexts and the potential impact of social, political, economic, and religious factors on such engagement.
• Expanded their knowledge of several health-related themes, both in antiquity and the early modern world.
• Thought critically about individual and community responses to health issues, ancient and modern

Indicative reading list

Set texts:
Hippocrates, Airs, Waters and Places;
Girolamo Mercuriale, On pestilence (tr. Craig Martin)

Suggested reading:
Jerome Bylebyl 'The School of Padua: Humanistic Medicine in the 16th century', in C. Webster ed, Health, Medicine and Mortality in the 16th, 1979, 335-370
Jane Crawshaw, Plague Hospitals: Public Health for the City in Early Modern Venice, 2012
Merle Eisenberg and Lee Mordechai, 'The Justinianic Plague and Global Pandemics: the Making of the Plague Concept', American Historical Review 105-5, 2020, 1632-1667
Dag Hasse, Success and Suppression: Arabic Sciences and Philosophy in the Renaissance, 2016
Francesca Malignini, Il lazzaretto nuovo di Venezia. Le scritture parietali, 2017
Craig Martin, 'Histories of Medieval Plague in Renaissance Italy', Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, 78-2, 2023, Pages 131–148
Vivian Nutton, Ancient Medicine (3rd edition, 2023)
Vivian Nutton, Renaissance Medicine: A Short History of European Medicine in the Sixteenth Century, 2022
Richard Palmer, 'Girolamo Mercuriale and the Plague of Venice' in A. Arcangeli & V. Nutton eds, Girolamo Mercuriale, medicina e cultura nell' Europa del Cinquecento, 2008, 51-65
Richard Palmer, 'Pharmacy in the Republic of Venice in the 16th c', A. Wear et alii eds, The Medical Renaissance of the 16th, 1985, 100-117
Rosa Salzberg, Ephemeral City: Cheap Print and Urban Culture in Renaissance Venice, 2014

Interdisciplinary

The module is designed to provide the students with an understanding of relationships between Classics (and Ancient History), the History of Medicine, the History of Art, and Renaissance Studies. It also invites to the students to make connections with other disciplinary areas covered in their main study programme. The material will include textual, artistic and archaeological material. The module provides the students with a critical understanding of dominant traditions and methodologies associated with the main phenomena covered in the module and enables the students to transcend disciplinary boundaries. The interdisciplinary course cohort provides contact opportunities and learning to see from different perspectives is a core aspect of the learning experience.

International

WIISP module.
The module draws on cases from different contexts, including different geopolitical areas, professional environments and linguistic contexts. The content and assessment invite the students to reflect on the societal relevance in different environments of the phenomena covered in the module. The assessment involves students working in groups with academic and non-academic stakeholders, and a global and local outlook will be built into the module’s work. The international and diverse course cohort provides contact opportunities and learning to see from different perspectives is a core aspect of the learning experience.

Subject specific skills

By the end of the module students should be able to show skills of textual analysis by:

• Interpreting the aims, style and contents of early medical texts
• Identifying relevant information pertaining to a range of ancient and early modern sources
• Evaluating the scholarly approaches to early health crises (e.g. retrospective diagnosis)
• Assessing the role of environmental thought in early medical works

They will also be able to show the following intellectual skills:

• The ability to evaluate the merits of different methodological approaches to the material
• The ability to select and present material clearly and with a coherent argument both verbally and in writing
• The ability to set their findings into a wider comparative context, drawing in other aspects of the study of the ancient world
• The ability to seek out appropriate secondary literature and show discernment in the types of primary evidence addressed.

They will also be able to show the following interdisciplinary skills:

• An understanding of relationships between the different disciplinary areas within Classics and Medical History.
• The ability to make connections with other disciplinary areas covered in their main study programme.
• A critical awareness of dominant traditions and methodologies associated with the study of ancient medicine
• An appreciation of different perspectives, as a result of interacting with an interdisciplinary and international cohort.

Transferable skills

• critical thinking
• problem solving
• active lifelong learning
• communicating clearly and effectively both in discussions and in writing
• information literacy, including finding, evaluating and using previous research
• professionalism
• working effectively with others in groups and tasks
• project and time management
• using a range of tools and resources effectively in the preparation of course work
• developing strong analytical skills by using appropriate methods to analyse research data