Selling Pharmaka, Buying Health in Ancient Greece and Rome

Retail Therapy
1. Auflage 2026
ISBN: 978-1-138-21608-2
Verlag: Taylor & Francis Ltd

Buch, Englisch, 208 Seiten, Format (B × H): 156 mm x 234 mm

Reihe: Medicine and the Body in Antiquity

This book examines Greek and Roman pharmacology in its mercantile dimensions, studying the people who were involved in the trade, the places where they worked, and the consumers whom they tried to attract through promises of health.

In the ancient Mediterranean, selling pharmacological substances and preparations meant big business. Selling Pharmaka, Buying Health in Ancient Greece and Rome draws upon a wealth of ancient medical literature and artefacts to reconstruct this ancient pharmacological trade, focusing on the first two and a half centuries of the Common Era but often touching upon other periods. It discusses the strategies that actors in the trade deployed to advertise their goods, the accusations of fraud and mercantilism that were levelled against them, and the varied responses of consumers to these tactics.

Blending approaches from medical and socio-economic history, this book will appeal to researchers interested in social approaches to ancient pharmacology. Written with a reader without classical languages in mind, it will also interest historians of medicine working on periods beyond antiquity.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Totelin, Laurence

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Alte Geschichte & Archäologie Geschichte der klassischen Antike Griechische Geschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Alte Geschichte & Archäologie Geschichte der klassischen Antike Römische Geschichte
• Medizin | Veterinärmedizin Medizin | Public Health | Pharmazie | Zahnmedizin Medizin, Gesundheitswesen Geschichte der Medizin

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction; 1. Pharmacological actors in the marketplace; 2. Procuring and storing simple drugs; 3. Compound remedies: Written recipes and their transmission; 4. Stamping, branding, and advertising ancient remedies; 5. Stretching out the pepper: drug adulteration and adulteration by means of drugs in antiquity; 6. ‘Hard’ and ‘soft’ pharmacological consumers in the Graeco-Roman world; 7. The hands of the gods: Pharmaka and divine powers; Conclusions.

Über Autor(innen)

Laurence Totelin is Professor of Ancient History at Cardiff University, where she carries out research on Greek and Roman pharmacy, botany, and gynaecology. Her key publications include Ancient Botany, with Gavin Hardy (2016) and A Cultural History of Medicine in Antiquity (2020).