Ointments, leeches and saws

At medieval festivals, dentist Dr.Andreas Klug takes his audience back in time to around 1500. Playing the role of a physician, he makes spectators’ skin crawl by demonstrating the primitive medical practices of the period.

The soldier roars with pain. His armor had protected his chest, but a sword swipe has left a gaping wound in his lower arm: it is infected and there is a risk of blood poisoning. “We’ll have to amputate right away,” says the doctor after a brief glance. The injured man lashes about wildly: two henchmen hold him down as Andreas Klug applies a fine-toothed saw. The soldier emits a blood-curdling scream, the doctor proceeds to saw off his arm and a minute later he presents the amputated limb to the audience.

Andreas Klug then sits down at a wooden table where there is a row of jars with mysterious contents. “This is a brain, these are eyes, and these are testicles,” he lectures. “We can use these ingredients to make powerful essences or acquire the qualities of other people such as intelligence, keen vision—or even sexual potency.” He fishes a black worm out of one of the jars using a wooden spoon, lets it crawl over his hand and holds it out to his repulsed audience. “A blood sucker,” explains Klug: “A little helper for drawing the patient’s blood.” In reality of course, the blood is only theatrical and the amputated arms and legs are made of plastic.

Andreas Klug’s medieval medical show can be seen at the annual “Peter-und-Paul-Fest” in Bretten, Baden, a festival which transports visitors back to the year 1504.

The ancient art of healing falls into oblivion
“In those days, knowledge of medicine in Germany was just above zero,” explains Klug. The healing skills of the ancient Greeks had fallen into oblivion in the Western world. It was the Arabs who absorbed the ancient wisdom, translating Greek writings into Arabic and spreading what they learned. The texts eventually found their way to Moorish Spain, and the expertise finally returned to Western Europe via the University of Toledo. “The doctors in Spain and Northern Italy held the most knowledge,” says Klug.

This is why Klug’s historical doctor has a fictitious career which includes a period of study in Padua. The healing professions were subject to a rigid hierarchy in the Middle Ages. The ‘medicus’ was an academically qualified doctor, though there were actually very few of these in existence. The most common practitioners were the so-called barber-surgeons: they did not usually have a university education. Nonetheless their status was far above that of the quack doctor. The latter’s knowledge of bones derived from the fact that his job was to break them: he was the executioner.He would sell the body fat from the corpses of the dead as an ointment.

Autopsies forbidden
Medieval healers could only gather information on the human anatomy indirectly. Postmortem examinations were not allowed until the 17th century, and even then were only performed in exceptional cases—for example on executed criminals.“Physicians based their treatments on the doctrine of the four body fluids,” explains Klug. According to this, a healthy human body had a balance of blood, mucous, yellow gall and black gall. If this harmony was disrupted, sickness set in. “Avicenna’s Canon of Medicine gives instructions as to how to proceed in case of an imbalance,” says Klug. “Drawing blood was particularly popular.” One of the most important methods for diagnosing ailments was urine inspection—as re-enacted by Klug at the medieval festival. A girl brings him a jar containing an amber fluid. “Father is sick.What does the urine tell us?” she asks. Klug lifts the jar to the sunlight and inspects the color. He then dips his finger into the liquid and tastes it. “Honey-sweet,” is his verdict. The finger test allows the physician to pronounce diagnoses such as “diabetes mellitus”—the word ‘mellitus’ is Latin for honey-sweet. Of course, some of the doctor’s treatments fail to have the desired healing effect. In such cases, he simply refers to the medieval fee scales for medical treatment. “If the patient dies, the treatment is only half-price.”

(Text: Mathias Rittgerott, Photos: Christoph Püschner, Theo Barth)