MEDICINE
Hello everyone! It is an honour and pleasure tomeet you all. I hope you and your families arekeeping well. I’m Doctor Wells and I live in Kells.Sit up, switch on and get those brains in learningmode.
DESTINATION ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. – 20 B.C.
Ok, hope you are all ready to take a trip back intime to Ancient Egypt. We have a long way to go– over 5,000 years! Lock and load and get readyto throw shapes on the dance floor –presumably pyramid shaped ones.
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.Some of you may have studied Ancient Egypt in your Primaryschools. In families, for some odd reason, mums tend to do reallywell on Ancient Egyptian History. I wonder why? Maybe it’sbecause they are mummies! We know about Ancient Egyptianmedicine because evidence survived. The Egyptians wrote onPapyri scrolls – it was a paper made out from a plant calledPapyrus. Here is what the Papyrus plant looks like:
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.With Papyrus, the Egyptians could write down their discoveries and ideasand pass them on to others, many years after the person who wrote on thePapyrus died. It also meant that historians could read all about theEgyptians and all their ideas about medicine and the methods they used.This letter is an example of Egyptian writing on Papyrus was written in 1570B.C. – it is over 3,000 years old!
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.The Egyptians believed that the gods created andcontrolled life. They believed THOTH (drawing on theleft) created humans and the demon-god BES (stonecarving on the right) oversaw childbirth.
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.The Egyptians were pretty good at basic first aid. Theydeveloped bandaging techniques (they used willow leaveswhich is an antiseptic – it can kill germs! They also learned howto stitch wounds. We have found surgical tools used by theEgyptians. Here are bronze surgical knives which may havebeen used for mummification. These knives could be over2,000 years old.
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.
We also know that the Egyptians usedmosquito nets (but it was more to stop beingbitten than to prevent malaria), had publicbaths and built toilets. They even wore eyemake up which helped to protect their eyesfrom disease. It is accepted that the Egyptianswere the first people to develop medicine as aprofession.
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.
However, they cast spells in the belief this would heal thepatient. The Egyptians also believed that a pig’s eye could beused to restore the sight of the blind! They believed the powerof sight in the pig’s eye could be transferred over to a human. Iguess the ‘Three Blind Mice’ would have felt very lucky inAncient Egypt.
Stay away fromme and mygorgeous peepersyou Egyptianfools!
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.
The Egyptians believed that when they died there would be anafterlife. They believed that they would need their bodies againso they mummified their bodies. They did their best topreserve their bodies. The process was quite nasty! The nextslide will take you through the process of mummification. Ireally hope you aren’t eating – it’s a bit horrible!
MUMMIFICATIONSTAGE 1 The body was washed.
STAGE 2 - All internal organs were removed, however, they left the heart in place.
STAGE 3 - They filled in the body with a kind of stuffing so that it would look normal.They had to ‘dry’ the body out, so they placed it in a naturally found substance called‘natron’. This was almost like salt and it drew out all of the moisture in the body.
STAGE 4 In about 40-50 days, they removed the body from natron and then replacedthe original stuffing with new stuffing made out of sawdust or linen.
STAGE 5 The body was then carefully wrapped in layers of linen that covered everyarea of the body. Some special oils were placed on the body to help in thepreservation. A final covering was placed on it called a ‘shroud’.
STAGE 6 The finished mummy was placed in a stone or wooden container called a‘sarcophagus’.
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.
The organs of the body that had been taken out were alsomummified and placed in special containers that would be placedin the burial tomb with the body.
Both the sarcophagus (a special coffin) and the jars containing thebody parts were sealed with a black resin.
They left the heart in the body as they thought this was requiredfor part of the test needed to enter the afterlife.
The believed the heart was the centre of all intelligence andemotion, but they removed the brain, thinking it wasn’t important.
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.
This is the sarcophagus, orcoffin, of the Pharaoh (King)Tutankhamun, probably themost famous of thePharaohs. It is beautiful andtruly amazing. He ruledEgypt between 1334 – 1325B.C.
You can see an example of a real Egyptian mummy
in the Ulster Museum in Belfast. She is called
TAKABUTI and she was brought back from Egypt
in 1834 by Thomas Greg of Holywood, Co. Down.
She was donated to the museum and her body was
unwrapped in 1835.
ANCIENT EGYPT – 3150 B.C. - 20 B.C.
We have finished thepresentation. Go to Part 2for the questions. Good luckand if you are not sure whatthe answer to any of thequestions are just look overthe presentation again andmake notes. Good luck!
