Healing in Antiquity

4.0 credits

Examination of the intersection of religion and healing by examining the range of ways in which people understood and responded to the experience of illness and physical suffering in Greco-Roman antiquity and the various means by which they sought healing. Drawing on a range of sources, such as medical treatises, religious texts, and archaeological evidence, focus will be on: “Medicine” (the development of ‘professional’ medicine in ancient Greece and Rome), “Magic” (magical practices, texts, and magicians as healers) and “Miracles” (miracle workers such as Jesus and Apollonius of Tyana, healing religions such as the Asklepios cults and the emerging Christian movement).