Ophthalmic Folk-lore

Abstract

Shakespeare, Henry V, ii, 3), "day li'ghts," "glaziers," "goggles," "optics," "peepers," "squinters" and "winkers."Historical Note Although ophthalmology reached a high degree of development at a early period of its hstory, rational views concerning its aetiology and treatment were for a long time assbciated with the grossest errors and absurdities (Shastid), the earliest examples of the kind.beingfurnished by the Ebers Papyrus and the Assyrian Medical Texts translated by Campbell Thompson.These errors and superstitions were gradually discarded by the medical profession, but many of them continued for many centuries to form part of folk-medicine.In Pliny's Natural History, which is one of the chief storehouses of all forms of folk medicine, the importance which he attached to the eye in particular, which he describes as the most precious portion of the human body (XI, 52) is shown by the numerous references to the eye throughout his work.The bulk of his contri- butions to this subject is devoted to human, animal, plant anid mineral remedies for diseases of the eye in the later books (XXV, 91-103; XXVIII, 47; XXIX, 37-38; XXXII, 24), but his work also contains remarks on visual acuity (VII, 21), growth-of the eye after removal (XI, 35), colour of the eye (XI, 35), and the eye as guide to the character of the individual (XI, 59).Pliny, was -a credulous bookworm and not a man of science, and many of the remedies which he proposes were not only disgusting but also injurious.Obviously erroneous statements connected with the eye made by him include such examples of acuteness of sight as the Iliad written parchment so small as to bre eicIosed in a nutshell (VII, 21), ability to distinguish objects at a distance of 135 miles (ibid), as well as his descriptions of fabulous animals such as the 'catoblepas (VIII, 32), and basilisk (VIII, 33), the sight of which -caused everyone who looked at it to fall dead on the ground, and denial of sight to moles, worms, grasshoppers and locusts (XI, 52).Of subsequent works dealing with the folk-lore of.eye disease mention may be made of Leechdoms, Wort-conning and Starcraft int Early England (O.Cockayne), of 'which an excellent summnary has -been mide by R. R. James; Payne's Fitzpatrick lectures on English Medicine in Anglo-Saxon Times; Henslow's Medical Works of the Fourteenth Century; Moncrief's Poor Man's Physician .(2nded., 1716); and Wesley's Primitive Physic, of which the 24th edition was published in 1824.Aetiology A number of popular explanations have been offered to account for the occurrence of ocular diseases generally or some isolated.eye condition.Among the most.widely held is the doctrine

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