ABSTRACT
Theoretical pronouncements notwithstanding, the Hippocratic physician was first and foremost a craftsman plying his trade.1 He, and it was almost always he, might work from his own house, which thus served as his surgery or ‘medical workshop’, and remain largely within his own community, or he might, like Homer’s craftsman-doctor, travel in search of patients.2 He might practise alone, or in company with others, travelling around familiar territory or wandering further afield as a total stranger.3 With one exception, his income depended on finding patients prepared to pay for his services, supplemented by whatever else he might gain from his property or estates, if he had any. That exception was some form of state service, whether as a doctor with the army or navy on campaign or as a so-called ‘public doctor’. If Herodotus is to be believed, there was already a system of public doctors in Aegina and Athens by the late sixth century, for Democedes held such a post in both cities.4
