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Aztec medicine Notes

Research

http://olivercowdery.com/texts/1806Clv1.htm#title

• "There is an oil also drawn from the fruit of the Huitziloxitl, similar in stench and taste to that of the bitter almond, but more acrimonious and intense, which is found highly useful in medicine.”

• Fruit of the plant was used in medicine.

• The “Elastic Gum” or Olin or Olli was not only used to varnish hats and make foot-balls, but was melted down to extract a medicinal oil.

• Some worms were used in medicine. The Axin and the Pollin…….

Aztec medicine by Francisco Guerra

• “The Aztecs were the most powerful among Mexican nations at the time of Cortes's arrival”

Beliefs :

•  The believed that the Tonalamatl (religious calandar) determined everything about the individual except their profession. A persons longevity, luck, sickness, and even their name was determined by the month and day they were born. The Tonalamatl was split into 13 months, each month representing a different god.
• It was believed that when you were sick you were being punished by the gods for their sins. Specific sicknesses were linked to individual gods and their punishments. Tlaloc, the water god, was responsible for sickness related to wet and cold; such as rheumatic ailments. Tlaloc also was responsible for tremor, delirium and other symptoms of alcoholism for those who abused consuming pulque. To relieve their symptoms, the Aztecs would travel to mountains and rivers to present the god with offerings.
• The flayed god, Xipe Totec was responsible skin eruptions and rashes of the skin. Common ailments include scabies, boils, and eye diseases. The way to treat this disease was to march infront of others wearing the skins from human sacrifices during the second month. After they did this, Xipe Totec would cure them of their ailments.
•  When people broke vows such as fasting and sexual behavior, Tezcatlipoca would induce incurable disease. There were many other gods as well, connected with venereal diseases such as syphilis.  Macuilxochitl would send hemorrhoids, boils, and corruption of the penis as punishment for breaking his rule. 
• The Aztecs thought the art of medicine was founded by four men of the Toltecs. These men included Oxomoco, Cipactonal, Tlatetecui and Xochicaoaca. It was believed that these men understood the qualities of the plantlife including those that were harmful, deadly, and medicinal.
•  Aztec medicine comprised of a combination of medical botany and the supernatural.

Historical Sig.

• Historical account about the Aztecs are much more numerous than compared to other pre-Columbian civilizations because of the documentation that has been recovered and preserved. The Badianus codex and the Sahagun codices are the main source of information of Aztec medicine. These codices gathered information from Mexican informants.
• Martin de la Cruz wrote the original Badianus codex. This codex included numerous pictographic representations of medical herbs commonly used by the Aztec people. Four other manuscripts detailing medicine and plants written by the Indian physician no longer remain.
• Bernardino de Sahagun spent the majority of his life writing and obtaining information about the Aztecs. He studied and recorded data directly from Indian informants. Today three original manuscripts survive, preceding his draft of 1541.
• Publications by Bustamente (1829-1830) and Load Kingsborough (1831) have contained small amounts of Sahaguns medical information and have been available to the public since the start of the nineteenth century.
• The English translation of the Florentine codex by Dibble and Anderson has been regarded as the “ most valuable for medical research, though it contains a number of errors in the transcript and translation”.

Medical Hagiology

• The Aztec people believed in a life after death. The referred to a hereafter with a Tonatiuh (heaven) on the sun reserved for the strongest and the heroes and another on earth. The Aztec were very religious people. The mother of gods (Teteoinam or Toci) was worshiped and followed by those in the medical field. As the goddess of medicine and herbs, her image was always kept in view of medical practioners.

Medical Education / Practice (320)

• The Aztec people absorbed medical information from their neighboring areas and through the people they conquered.
• Unlike traditional social hierarchy, those in the medical profession were not highly regarded. Men were along the same social level as mason and scribe, while women were similar to the cook and seamstress. Women were to be knowledgeable in plant life, herbs, roots, trees and stone. Women were to set bones, provide splints, treat festering wounds, and other similar practices.
• Physicians often specialized in certain areas of the body and the bodies reaction to herbs and treatment, these were the tepatiani or ticitl. The physicians that specialized in the supernatural focused were called nahualli. These people relied on horiscopes, predictions, and religious ceremonies to cure aliments.
• the surgeon is reffered to as tetecqui or texoxotla
• ticitl, the phlebotomist tezoc or teximani, the midwife tlamatqui or temixintiani ticiti, and the apothecary papiani or panamacani”
• Physicians and practitioners at Texcoco and Tenochtitlan had to undergo an examination to practice medicine in the four councils of government. Aztecs in these areas had a very strict medical doctrine outlining what made a good physician versus a bad physician. 16^th century writings denote that emperor Netzahuakcoyotl had a council of men supervise the physicians and witchcraft.
• Accounts show that physicians learned the practice through apprenticeship. This knowledge was passed down through the family structure. Students would learn the calendar, identification of medical herbs, and surgical training. Typically the father was the teacher in the family, teaching his sons at a much ealier stage in life than the daughters. This was due to the fact that the Aztecs saw menstruation as bodily impurities. 

K-star (talk) 03:59, 13 October 2017 (UTC)

The Aztecs, Michael E. Smith

• text
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Aztec Medicine Draft

Lead Section

Clara Sue Kidwell said, “Medicine is in many ways an art rather than a science. It is an art at which native people of the Americas were highly adept. Native medicine involved knowledge of the physical effects of natural substances on the human body and was also based on the ways in which people understood the actions of forces in the world around them as they affected their well-being”.The Aztecs thought the art of medicine was founded by four men of the Toltecs. These men included Oxomoco, Cipactonal, Tlatetecui and Xochicaoaca. It was believed that these men understood the qualities of the plant-life including those that were harmful, deadly, and medicinal . Aztec medical knowledge expanded as the people did, absorbing medical information from their neighboring areas and through the people they conquered. 

Beliefs

Aztec medicine comprised of a combination of medical botany and the supernatural . The Aztecs understood there was a balance between hot and cold, bearing resemblance to Humorism.

The Aztecs believed that the body contained a balance of three separate entities or souls; the tonalli, the teyolia, and the ihiyotl, a balance that affected the health and life of a person . The tonalli, which was commonly attributed with the disease of "soul loss", was located in the upper part of the head . They believed that this life force was connected to a higher power, and the Aztec people had to make sure their tonalli was not lost or did not stray from the head. The teyolia was located in the heart. This entity has been described to be specific to the individual and stood for a person’s intelligence and memory. The ihiyotl, which resided in the liver, was strongly attached to witchcraft and the supernatural. It could also leave the body but was always connected through the wind or an individual's breath, “...thus, each individual could affect other people and things by breathing on them” .

The Aztecs believed in a life after death, and a life heavily influenced by the gods. They believed in Tonatiuh (heaven) on the sun reserved for the strong and the heroes after death, and another heaven on earth. The mother of gods (Teteoinam or Toci) was worshiped and followed by those in the medical field. As the goddess of medicine and herbs, her image was always kept in view of medical practitioners. The Tonalamatl (religious calendar) had an impactful role in their belief system. They believed that the Tonalamatl (religious calendar) determined everything about the individual except their profession. A person’s longevity, luck, sickness, and even their name was determined by the month and day they were born. The Tonalamatl was split into 13 months, each month representing a different god .The Codex Vaticanus depicts the relationship between human organs and calendar signs, illustrating certain organs or body parts held magical significance .

Because the calendar had so much authority over a persons life, the day on which someone was born or got sick had great importance and usually gave reference to which god you had to pay respect to. It was believed that when you were sick you were being punished by the gods for your sins. Specific sicknesses were linked to individual gods and their punishments . Tlaloc, the water god, was responsible for sickness related to wet and cold; such as rheumatic ailments . Tlaloc also was responsible for tremor, delirium and other symptoms of alcoholism for those who abused consuming pulque. To relieve these symptoms, people would travel to mountains and rivers to present the god with offerings. The flayed god, Xipe Totec was responsible for skin eruptions and rashes of the skin. Common ailments include scabies, boils, and eye diseases. The way to treat this disease was to march in front of others wearing the skins from human sacrifices during the second month. After they did this, Xipe Totec would cure them of their ailments. When people broke vows such as fasting and sexual behavior, Tezcatlipoca would induce incurable disease. There were many other gods as well, connected with venereal diseases such as syphilis; Macuilxochitl (Xochipilli), would send hemorrhoids, boils, and other similar diseases.  K-star (talk) 18:54, 18 October 2017 (UTC) Checkerstar (talk) 03:14, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Peer edit by K8shep (talk) 18:39, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

No one had peer edited yours, so I'm doing a quick one of this section, and the one below in a separate peer edit section. This is really good and you go into great detail. You might be able to link to a few more things--I linked to the Vatican A Codex, or the Codex Vaticanus. Are there other pages you could link to? Using the word "impactful"...you might find another word or phrase that means the same thing. As for humorism, you might even say something about the fact that the guy who wrote most of the stuff on aztec medicine was a humoral doctor in Europe. Be careful too, in comparing Aztecs to Europe (Unlike in Europe...) Good job here! Make sure to cite a bit more.

Response to Peer Review by K-star and Checkerstar

Upon further review I do believe the statement “unlike the European view” seems out of place in the article and lacks any facts to back it up. I decided to get rid of this general statement all together and leave the comparison to European ideals to the section where I mention humourism. I am still trying to figure out a way to mention that the guy who wrote the main codices was a humoral doctor without jumping to my own personal conclusions. I did a quick search and found I use the word “impactful” or a variation of, 5+ times in one section. To fix this I took your advice and reworded the sentences including synonyms for impactful. I looked through my writing to find more places to link to and found many gods, body parts, etc. to link to that help verify my article. We will also continue to do more research and cite more sources.  

Medical Education

Unlike traditional social hierarchy, those in the medical profession were not highly regarded. Men were along the same social level as mason and scribe, while women were similar to the cook and seamstress. Women were to be knowledgeable in plant life, herbs, roots, trees and stone. Women were to set bones, provide splints, treat festering wounds, and other similar practices. Accounts show that physicians learned the practice through apprenticeship. This knowledge was passed down through the family structure. Students would learn the calendar, identification of medical herbs, and surgical training. Typically the father was the teacher in the family, teaching his sons at a much earlier stage in life than the daughters. This was due to the fact that the Aztecs saw menstruation as bodily impurities. The female roll in medicine was reduced further through Christian pressure. After the Conquest, the Spanish defined the “traditional medicine systems as witchcraft”. 

Physicians often specialized in certain areas of the body and the bodies reaction to herbs and treatment, these were the tepatiani or ticitl. The physicians that specialized in the supernatural focused were called nahualli. Since the nahualli heavily believed in the supernatural, for certain prognoses of ailments, physicians would add grains of maize to water. If the grains stayed grouped together, it meant a good omen and the physicians would give a good prognosis.  When the grains dispersed, the physician would read it as a bad omen and give a bad prognosis.  These people relied on horoscopes, predictions, and religious ceremonies to cure aliments. Physicians and practitioners at Texcoco and Tenochtitlan had to undergo an examination to practice medicine in the four councils of government. Aztecs in these areas had a very strict medical doctrine outlining what made a good physician versus a bad physician. 16th century writings denote that emperor Netzahuakcoyotl had a council of men supervise the physicians and witchcraft. In contrast to the European humoral pathology, the Aztecs’s pathology was based on observed information of diseases. As mentioned above they believed thadisease was a punishment sent f rom the gods. Ailments were grouped by location; dandruff is grouped near skull fractures. Historians use this information to predict that there was not a definitive idea of causes of disease other than supernatural intervention.. 

Common Medical Practitioner Names
Nahuatl Name	Name
Texoxotla or Ticitl	General Surgeon
Tezoc or Tezoani	Phlebotomist
Texiuhqhui or Teximani	Barber Surgeon
Tezalo or Teomiquetzani	Bone Surgeon
Tlacopinaliztli	Dentist
Teixpati	Eye Surgeon
Teahpatiani	Fontanelle Specialist

Medical Practices

The Badianus and Sahagun codices cover treatments over the body laid out from the head, down to the toes of a person. The second book has thirteen chapters devoted to illnesses of the “head, eyes, ears, nose, teeth, throat, lungs, heart, stomach, intestines, urinary tract, limbs…and in obstetrics and pediatrics”. Physicians used herbs and other minor remedies for trivial ailments but for serious wounds the physician would tell the patient "you have committed a sin" and treat them based on the sin and the severity of the ailment. Detailed anatomical information was available for the Aztecs because of their widespread practice of human sacrifice. It was common to rip the heart out and flay the body. Doing this led to the familiarity of different muscles, joints, bones, arteries, and veins in the body. The Aztec people were most familiar with the exterior parts of the body; there are fifty-four terms denoting body parts while there are only seventeen denoting internal organs. Surgical practices were not always successful since they lacked control of infection of hemorrhagic events. When surgery was performed, flint and obsidian blades were used for surgeries along with needles made out of bone from humans or animals. 

Common diagnostic treatments included the uses of hallucinogenic plants to determine a persons sickness, find the cure, or determine which god was responsible. To cure burns, a poultice of plants, sap, honey, and an egg yolk was applied directly to the burn. The egg in particular, bound the mixture like a plaster which allowed for natural easy healing of the wound. This process of treatment was carried over to treat open wounds. Lacerations were stitched together with hair and then covered in a salve. The uninterrupted suture was used in all surgical procedures. Salve was made of sap and similar ingredients to the burn dressing. During the healing process wounds were redressed only when inflammation occurred. Other adhesive dressing include latex ulli, which was used to treat  aliments such as keloids. Bones were set in “plasters made of downy feathers, gum, resin, and rubber”. The only instances recorded involving prosthesis are in the case of nasal wounds when suturing failed. To cover the open wound a prosthetic made of common or easily obtainable materials was applied.

Caida de mollera or sunken fontanelle (crown) of infants, is a culture bound syndrome found in Mesoamerica. This disease was so prevalent in the culture that the Aztecs had healers that specialized in the fontanelle. Cures for this disease included children having pressure applied to their palate with cotton or they were hung upside down and shaken from side to side. The cause of this disease was believed to be the children were suffering from a huge loss of tonalli. Parents were very cautious of the tonalli, they didn’t cut the hair at the back of their children's head for fear it would leave the children without a way to keep the tonalli from escaping. The tonalli was especially important for children since it gave them vigor, warmth, courage, and allowed them to grow.

Temazcalli or sweat-houses, were beehive like structures constructed to aid in the healing process. The chambers were only around six feet by six feet and four feet high with walls constructed out of adobe brick and tetzontli. Tetzontli is porous volcanic stone that is a common building material in the area. These sweat-houses provided the Aztecs with a place to “combine the idea of bodily cleanliness with spiritual purification” as patients would sweat for around 30 minutes and then take a cold shower, bringing invigorating results. Herbs were burned in these steam rooms to add to the smoke, and ointment was applied to the skin of patients furthering promoting the healing process. The sweat-houses were quite beneficial to patients because of the elevated levels of sulfur in the springs. 

The Aztecs had a common practice of oral hygiene similar to today's practices. Dental practices included rinsing the mouth with water and removing food particles with thorns. People also used a dentifrice of ashes and honey applied with a root to brush their teeth. This abrasive tool was gentle enough to use in the mouth without harming those using. To remove tartar on teeth, charcoal in combination of salt water was used. For swollen or inflamed gums, the Aztecs would use thorns to pierce the gums until the pus was cleansed. Any decayed teeth were treated with a mix of vegetable juices. It is not specified how well these treatments worked or how common rotted teeth were in the Aztec society.K-star (talk) 20:52, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

Peer Edit by K8shep (talk) 18:43, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Good work--I wonder if you couldn't focus on just one of these two sections? That way you may be able to go into a bit more detail or depth on one of these. This section seems to lend itself to a bit more general of an investigation, so you might do well in working here. -When you open, you open with a direct quote. This is okay, but it needs a lead in statement, like "So and so says..." or something like that. -This section seems like it could be the opening section for the article on Wikipedia. Have you thought about that? Or even making the first paragraph the lead section and then working the rest into a subsequent section? Again, I'm not sure that I would do both of the sections you have here. Decide on one and work on that? If you have any questions, let me know.

Response to Peer Review by K-star and Checkerstar

Aztec medicine had many facets including their belief system, how they practiced and learned medicine, along with the plants used and specific treatments. I think if I just focus on one specific section I will miss represent what Aztec medicine is. As for the content I do plan to add much more detail and more sources to this section because I mainly cite one source throughout the 6 paragraphs which is typically not good practice in Wikipedia. I do agree that the first paragraph in this section would be good for the lead section of the article. Upon reviewing what can and cannot be in a lead section I believe this section is a good fit. I plan to talk with my partner and discuss reworking the structure of this section so it flows better, along with rewording a stronger lead section.

Plants/Herbal Medicine

Although the Aztecs relied heavily on a combination of medicine and magic, they also relied on imperial evidence gathered about plants to properly treat individuals.The number of rmedical plants recorded for magical, religious, and natural practices differs depending on source. 251 different plants are mentioned in the Badianus codex, while another study conducted in 1570-1577 by Francisco Hernández quotes over 1200 medical plants, and Bernardino de Sahagún refers to 123 different plants. At the time, the sheer number of plants and drugs Hernandez recorded surpassed the number of drugs that Pedanius Dioscorides had knowledge of in the ancient world.  Hernandez gave plants the warm, cold, and moist characteristics common to the four humors theory regarded by most Europeans. 

The naming of each plant in Nahuatl nomenclature always referred to the plant properties, function, or attributes. A few issues arise when trying to ascertain which plants of today were used for medical treatment in Mesoamerica. It was common to use the same Nahuatl name for different plants and many depictions of plant types are not illustrated well enough to discern differences in the plants. For example, Yolloxóchitl (Talauma mexicana) was used to treat heart weakness since it was magically tied to the heart. It was also required in a tonic to treat madness and used as a diuretic.We also do not know how effect some plants were because while the plants in many treatments have active ingredients to cure ailments, there are others that add nothing to the recipe and are still used in many medical remedies.  It was common for medical recipes to not include specific amounts of each plant and their dosage are rarely mentioned. Another issue regarding assumptions made by Bernard Ortiz de Montellano and other historians includes that the knowledge is based off firsthand accounts that depict a culture at one point in time rather than a “historical development of knowledge”. 

Many medical practices required pain relievers. The pain from setting bones, surgery, making incisions with obsidian blades, and other injuries were dulled through narcotics applied externally or ingested. These pain relievers were obtained from the tlapatl, toloatzin, and nexehuac plants. Another common pain reliever, juice of cocoxihuitl, was applied externally for local pain. Common drugs were the yauhtli and iztau- hyatl which were used to fit a variety of symptoms and medical disorders; “herbs, yauhtli and iztau- hyatl...were used to cure cold and wet diseases associated with the Aztec rain god, Tlaloc”. The Aztecs believed madness was attributed to possession from Tlaloc’s assistants and that he only cure was to use the herb yauhtli. Yauhtli was also used in deity festivals and against thunderbolt fright or evil tendencies. A balsam made from the hoitziloxitl (Toluifera pereirae) tree was applied to the temple to treat eye infections, relieve toothache, injured feet, and moisturize rough skin. 

Other common drugs used included guiac, jalap, castor oil, and sarsaparilla. Totoncaxihuitl (Cassia occidentalis) was prescribed for a fever and skin diseases, “the Aztecs believed that fever was caused by interior heat, which could be eliminated by a diuretic, a purgative, or a digestive”. This plant is used today as a diuretic. A number of hallucinogenic drugs that were used by the Aztecs were discovered in 1954; these included teonanacatl mushrooms, peyotl and ololiuhqui .Tobacco had many uses including a depressant, disinfectant, and a counterirritant for the skin. Many lotions made of resins and balsams are still in practice today.