5. Erasmus and Medicine

Abstract

If it is true that the history of humanistic culture begins with Petrarch’s polemic against the physicians of his time—that he commanded to remain in their own field and not to mingle with things they did not know—with Erasmus we can observe an important development. The propelling element might not always have been Erasmus himself: it is often said that Linacre was part of the group of ‘English Erasmians’—what if, on the contrary, Erasmus was a ‘Linacrian’?

This paper examines Erasmus’ relations to medicine and his contributions to the knowledge of medical writings and to a renewal of the ethos and of the general image of the medical science, From Erasmus’ letter to Caduceator to the Encomium medicinae, from Eramus’ youthly interest for the medical writings published by Manutius, to the development of his network of physicians versed in the study of letters, with a clear interdisciplinary approach.