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Theophrastus (medicine)


Theophrastus
<person> Theophrastus was born in Lesbos (island of lesbians) and is often called the Father of Botany.

He was born Tiranos, but Aristotle renamed him Theophrastus (the divine orator). He was the leading botanist of ancient times and remained unsurpassed until the Renaissance. He created a monumental canon (500 plant varieties) of medical botany, Inquiry Into Plants.

In this text, he noted that dittany (a mint flavoured plant) from the bitter bark of the devil (dita) tree, is a plant which makes labour in pregnancy easy and may stop pain altogether. From this we realize that he had some idea of anesthaesia.

Theophrastus wrote fluently including texts of physics, zoology, psychology, botany, art, music, ethics, politics and logic.

Lived: 370-286 B.C.