Necrotic and purulent infections in the ancient and early Christian world
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Date
2017
Authors
Penner, Heather
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Abstract
This thesis focuses on the startling ways in which a significant number of early Christian hagiographies feature saints with rotting flesh and suppurative wounds. It explores this phenomenon first by considering ancient medical understandings of diseases such as phagedenic ulcers, gangrene, and the production of pus as evidence of humoural imbalances requiring medical intervention. Then it considers reasons why early Christians developed more positive attitudes regarding these conditions. These include associating rotting flesh with superior spiritual fortitude. They also include non-theological reasons for this phenomenon. This thesis hypothesizes that early Christians also enjoyed looking at rotting saints out of a voyeuristic desire to gaze upon otherwise hidden bodies. Furthermore, it argues that Christians enjoyed exposing themselves to feelings of fear and anxiety because of the neurochemical dimensions the experience stimulated.
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Keywords
Ancient medicine, Hagiography, Early Christianity, Early Christian saints, Hippocrates, Galen, Necrosis, Pus, Rotting flesh