Talk:Surgery in ancient Rome

Trepanation

New light on cranial surgery in ancient Rome, Mariani-Costantini et al. (paywalled ☹️)

In 1995, the skeleton of a hydrocephalic child was excavated from a cemetery that was probably part of a villa in suburban Rome, on the site of the ancient town of Fidenae.The child was 5–6 years old, on the basis of the teeth, and was dated to about the end of the first or the start of the second century AD on archaeological context. The remarkably well-preserved cranium of this child (figure 1) is a fine example of trepanation, which may have been intended to alleviate the clinical signs of an endocranial space-occupying lesion. The large frontoparietal opening, which is bigger on the outer than on the inner table, was obtained by the grooving method, as clearly shown by the presence of a well-demarcated peripheral track marking the line of surgical incision (figure 1). The U-shaped cross-section of this track suggests that a blunt-edged surgical instrument, possibly a chisel, was used to avoid meningeal damage. In this respect, Galen’s treatise De methodo medendi, written in the second half of the second century AD, specifically states that cutting through the cranial bones is safer than drilling when operating on thin-walled skulls.

Might be useful?  Tewdar  09:08, 14 May 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for providing this source, I will look into it. Graearms (talk) 02:34, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:03, 15 June 2022 (UTC)

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• Comment or view
• Article history

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• ... that ancient Roman surgeons used materials such as bran and ashes to heal burns? Source: Spitz, Lewis; Davenport, Mark; Coran, Arnold (2006-11-24). Operative Pediatric Surgery 6Ed. CRC Press. p. 957. ISBN 978-1-4441-1360-0.
  • ALT1: ... that ancient Roman surgeons could treat hernia by clamping the scrotum between two blocks of wood? Source: LeBlanc, Karl A.; Kingsnorth, Andrew; Sanders, David L. (2018-04-16). Management of Abdominal Hernias. Springer. p. 4. ISBN 978-3-319-63251-3.
  • Comment: Personally, I believe both hooks pass as a tease, they hint at more information. The first one will have the reader questioning what lead Roman surgeons to believe ashes could serve as an effective treatment. The second will lead readers to want to know more about this seemingly painful surgical practice.

Created by Graearms (talk). Self-nominated at 20:56, 2 June 2022 (UTC).

• Article is new enough and long enough. Has not been on the front page before. Article is extensively referenced to high-quality sources. Either of the hooks are OK, but I think the first one is better. I would make a minor copyedit, however:
• ... that ancient Roman surgeons used materials such as bran and ashes to heal burns?
• Earwig shows no copyright problems.
• This appears to be Graearms's first DKY (congratulations!), so they are QPQ-exempt.
• This is an exceptionally good submission. It was a pleasure to review it. Thank you for writing it. -- RoySmith (talk) 01:49, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for your kind words! Graearms (talk) 19:59, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

Clear as mud

"They were used to treat bone fractures. In this procedure, the wound was filled with black ointment, then a linen rag filled with oil, and finally, it was used to scrape the bones. They would make incisions into and remove the skin to hold it or the bones in place. These tools were made of steel and covered in spiral decorations."

"Another procedure involved injecting a piece of thread with wool wrapped around it into the pipe of the tool. Then it was dipped in oil and used to make an incision into the perineum."

"These hooks were smooth and had short points, which were inserted into the ears, eyes, mouths, and forehead to extract children."

"To treat pterygium it was raised with a sharp hook, then a needle with a flaxen thread and horsehair was passed under it. The horsehair was used to saw off the pterygium and a scalpel was used to sever the base of it. Alternatively, the pterygium knife was a kind of knife used to cure pterygium."

Lots of nearly incomprehensible descriptions in this article. 2A02:AA1:1047:278A:EC6A:33FC:E0EF:8139 (talk) 12:08, 13 December 2024 (UTC)