ABSTRACT
It might seem paradoxical to link Hippocratism with early modern ideas of progress, since the term ‘progress’ is generally taken to imply an outlook that is future-oriented.1 Thus, it would seem highly unlikely that Hippocrates would have ever caught the attention of those we regard today as early modern ‘progressives’. Surely it would be more appropriate to associate him with reactionaries, those opposed to or openly obstructing progress. It might also seem paradoxical to link sixteenth-and early seventeenth-century medicine with ‘progress’ because historians have denied the era between Petrarch and Descartes any claim to the idea of progress.2 Although this verdict has been challenged,3 it is true that the idea of progress has received relatively little attention from Renaissance scholars.4
