ABSTRACT
Medicine continued to be regarded at Rome as a profession unworthy of a Roman citizen. In spite of the success of the Greek physicians in Rome, tradition forbade the Roman patricians to practise medicine, which was regarded as a profession worthy only for slaves, freedmen, or foreigners. The complete work of Celsus, called De artibus, included agriculture, the military art, rhetoric, philosophy, jurisprudence, as well as medicine. In medicine, Pliny was certainly less versed than Celsus, but his knowledge of natural history, his wide culture, and his love of study made him one of the most interesting of the Golden Age of Latin writers. The same uncertainties in the schools, the frequent discussions between disciples of different masters, the long theoretical controversies on which medical thought spent its energy, all these show how vague and uncertain medicine was. The writings of Galen mark a culminating point in the ancient history of medicine.
