Aesculapius

(European mythology)

In Greek mythology, the patron of medicine and son of Apollo. He not only cured the sick, but recalled the dead to life. This rare authority over Hades may have derived from the circumstances of his own birth. Koronis, a lake nymph, was impregnated by Apollo, yet dared to take in secret a human being as a second lover. So furious was the god on discovering the infidelity that he sent his sister Artemis to slay Koronis. This she did with a pestilence. When the fire was already blazing round the lake nymph on the funeral pyre, Apollo felt compassion for his unborn son, and removed him from the corpse. In this manner Asclepius came into the world and was taught the art of healing by Chiron, the wisest of the Centaurs, beast-like monsters who dwelt in the woodlands. The success of this instruction was so great that Zeus, fearing lest men might contrive to escape death altogether, killed Asclepius with lightning; but at Apollo's request he placed the medicine god among the stars. His chief temple was at Epidaurus, near Argos, and sacred to him there were serpents—the only species with the power to slough its skin. At Rome the worship of Asclepius was introduced from Greece in 293 BC, for the purpose of averting a plague.

The god of medicine and healing.

[Latin Aesculāpius, Greek Asklēpios, Asklāpios, Asclepius.]

(click to enlarge)
Asclepius, from an ivory diptych, 5th century ; in the Liverpool City Museum, England (credit: The Bridgeman Art Library/Art Resource, New York)

Greco-Roman god of medicine. He was the son of Apollo and the nymph Coronis. He learned the art of healing from the Centaur Chiron. Fearful that Asclepius would make humans immortal, Zeus slew him with a thunderbolt. His cult originated in Thessaly and spread throughout Greece. Because he was said to cure the sick in dreams, the practice of sleeping in his temples became common. Asclepius was often represented holding a staff with a serpent coiled around it.

For more information on Asclepius, visit Britannica.com.

Asclēpius (Lat. Aesculapius), the Greek god of healing. Strictly speaking he was a hero, the son of the god Apollo (himself a healing god) by a mortal, Coronis, daughter of Phlegyas. Apollo killed Coronis for being unfaithful to him. (Regretting it afterwards, he turned the crow which had told him of her infidelity from a white bird into a black.) He saved his unborn child Asclepius, and entrusted him to the care of the centaur Chiron. From him Asclepius learned the art of medicine. Answering the prayer of the goddess Artemis he restored to life her favourite Hippolytus, son of Theseus. Zeus, angered at his interference, slew Asclepius with a thunderbolt; Apollo in his turn was angry at the death of his son, and in revenge killed the Cyclopes who had made the thunderbolt. To expiate this murder Apollo became for a year the slave of Admetus. Homer in the Iliad represents Asclepius as the father of Machaon and Podaleirius, the doctors of the Greek army at the siege of Troy.

There is still controversy as to whether Asclepius was originally a god or, more probably, a nearly-divine type of hero, but certainly by classical times he had overshadowed other healing gods and heroes and was worshipped as a god and the founder of medicine. The most famous seat of his cult was at Epidaurus. From there lesser shrines were founded in other places, notably at Athens in 420 and at Rome in 293 BC (see AESCULAPIUS). There is a tradition that the poet Sophocles played a prominent part in establishing the Athenian cult. Many inscriptions found at Epidaurus and at Athens describe successful cures, achieved perhaps sometimes through faith but also through normal medical treatment. In historical times the Asclepiadae were a clan (genos) which practised medicine as a hereditary skill, tracing their descent from Asclepius and perhaps deriving their science partly from the priestly cult. They seem to have admitted to membership doctors from other families (compare HOMERIDAE). Asclepius was closely associated with the snake, and in instituting new shrines a sacred snake was always taken from the temple at Epidaurus. In art he is often shown bearing a staff, which is usually entwined with a snake; he is sometimes accompanied by a dog. See also ARISTEIDES (3).

In Greek mythology, the son of Apollo and Coronis who was instructed in the arts of healing by the centaur Chiron. Asclepius married Epione, who begat Hygeia (health). So successful was Asclepius in the art of healing that Zeus was fearful that he would make mankind immortal, so he killed him with a thunderbolt. Apollo retaliated by attacking the Cyclopes who had forged the thunderbolt, and Zeus was eventually prevailed upon to admit Asclepius to the ranks of the gods.

The worship of Asclepius centered in Epidaurus, and the cock was offered to him in sacrifice. The serpent and the dog were sacred to him, and his symbol of the serpent coiled about a staff still remains as the sign of medical practice. Asclepius is also featured in the Hermetic literature connected with Hermes Trismegistus ("Thrice-greatest Hermes").

Sources:

Edelstein, Emma Jeanette Levy. Asclepius: a Collection and Interpretation of the Testimonies. New York: Arno Press, 1975.

Aesculapius (or Asclepius) was the most popular healing divinity of the Hellenistic world. He was a mortal son of Apollo who was slain by Zeus for daring to bring people back from the dead. Taught the healing arts by the centaur Chiron, he was a healer by profession. He gradually evolved into a god, and by the end of the classical period he was one of the most popular deities of the Greek pantheon.

The central asclepieion (temple dedicated to Aesculapius) was situated six miles inland from the Greek city of Epidaurus, the birthplace of the legendary healer. This temple was established in the sixth or seventh century b.c.e. and was the focus of Aesculapius worship for over eight hundred years. The cult of Aesculapius was officially transplanted to Rome in 293 b.c.e. when the asclepieion at Epidaurus sent a giant snake regarded as a form of Aesculapius himself to Rome in order to halt a disastrous plague. The subsequent waning of the plague was attributed to Aesculapius, and he became a popular god among the Romans. At least two hundred asclepieions were know to have existed in the Greco-Roman world.

The principal activity at the asclepieions was the seeking of cures via the technique of dream incubation, the practice of seeking dreams for specific purposes-for everything from healing to practical guidance. (Dream incubation was extremely popular in the ancient world and seems to have originated as a method of divination in ancient Mesopotamia.) People went to asclepieions to "camp out" and sleep with the intention of receiving a healing dream from Aesculapius. Particularly in the earliest centuries of the cult, it was believed that the dream directly cured the pilgrim. However, as the cult evolved, it came to be regarded as acceptable if the dream merely provided information that, if followed, would lead to a cure. Aesculapius himself sometimes appeared in the seeker's dreams, touched the diseased part of the body with his finger, and then disappeared. In other healings, he appeared in the form of a dog or a snake.

The dreamer fasted and engaged in other rituals before lying down to sleep. In cases where the temple was too far away from the person seeking dream guidance, or when the person was too sick to undertake the required fasts, sacrifices, cold baths, or other rituals, a surrogate could go through the rituals for the seeker. Priests assisted pilgrims in performing the proper rituals and were also available to help interpret their dreams.

Asclepius
Statue of Asclepius with his symbol, the serpent-entwined staff
God of medicine, healing, rejuvenation and physicians
Symbol	A serpent-entwined staff
Consort	Epione
Parents	Apollo and Coronis
Children	none
Roman equivalent	Aesculapius
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For other uses, see Asclepius (disambiguation).

Asclepius (pronounced /æsˈkliːpiəs/, Greek Ἀσκληπιός, transliterated Asklēpiós; Latin Aesculapius) is the god of medicine and healing in ancient Greek mythology. Asclepius represents the healing aspect of the medical arts, while his daughters Hygieia, Meditrina, Iaso, Aceso, Aglæa/Ægle and Panacea (literally, "all-healing") symbolize the forces of cleanliness, medicine, and healing, respectively. The rod of Asclepius, a snake-entwined staff, remains a symbol of medicine today, although sometimes a staff with two snakes, a caduceus is mistakenly used instead. He was associated with the Roman/Etruscan god Vediovis.

Contents 1 Etymology 2 Mythology 2.1 Birth 2.2 Wives and offspring 2.3 Death 3 Sacred places and practices 4 Notes 5 Further Reading

Etymology

The etymology of the name is unknown. In his revised version of Frisk's Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch (Greek etymological dictionary), R.S.P. Beekes gives this summary of the different attempts:

"H. Grégoire (with R. Goossens and M. Mathieu) in Asklépios, Apollon Smintheus et Rudra 1949 (Mém. Acad. Roy. de Belgique. Cl. d. lettres. 2. sér. 45), explains the name as 'the mole-hero', connecting σκάλοψ, ἀσπάλαξ 'mole' and refers to the resemblance of the Tholos in Epidauros and the building of a mole. (Thus Puhvel, Comp. Mythol. 1987, 135.) But the variants of Asklepios and those of the word for 'mole' do not agree.

The name is typical for Pre-Greek words; apart from minor variations (β for π, αλ(α) for λα) we find α/αι (a well known variation; Fur. 335 - 339) followed by -γλαπ- or -σκλαπ-/-σχλαπ/β-, i.e. a voiced velar (without -σ-) or a voiceless velar (or an aspirated one: we know that there was no distinction between the three in the substr. language) with a -σ-. I think that the -σ- renders an original affricate, which (prob. as δ) was lost before the -γ- (in Greek the group -σγ- is rare, and certainly before another consonant); Beekes Pre-Greek.

Szemerényi's etymology (JHS 94, 1974, 155) from Hitt. assula(a)- 'well-being' and piya- 'give' cannot be correct, as it does not explain the velar."^[1]

One might add that even though Szemerényi's etymology (Hitt. asula- + piya-) does not account for the velar, it is perhaps inserted spontaneously in Greek due to the fact that the cluster -sl- was uncommon in Greek: So, Aslāpios would become Asklāpios automatically.

Mythology

Birth

He was the son of Apollo and Coronis. His mother was killed for being unfaithful to Apollo and was laid out on a funeral pyre to be consumed, but the unborn child was rescued from her womb. From this he received the name Asklepios "to cut open".^[2] Apollo carried the baby to the centaur Chiron who raised Asclepius and instructed him in the art of medicine.^[3]

Wives and offspring

Asclepius was married to Epione, with whom he had six daughters: Hygieia, Meditrina (the serpent-bearer), Panacea, Aceso, Iaso, and Aglaea^[4][5], and three sons: Machaon, Podaleirios and Telesphoros. He also bore a son, Aratus, with Aristodama. The names of his daughters each rather transparently reflect a certain subset of the overall theme of "good health".^{[6][7][8][9][10][11][12]}

Death

Zeus killed Asclepius with a thunderbolt because he raised the dead and accepted gold for it.^[13] Other stories say that Asclepius was killed because after bringing people back from the dead, Hades thought that no more dead spirits would come to the underworld, so asked his brother to remove him. This angered Apollo who in turn murdered the cyclops who made the thunderbolt for Zeus.^[14] For this act, Zeus banned Apollo from the night sky^[15] and commanded Apollo to serve Admetus, King of Thessaly.^[16][17] After Asclepius' death, Zeus placed Asclepius among the stars as the constellation Ophiuchus ("the Serpent Holder").^[18]

Sacred places and practices

Greek deities series
Primordial deities
Titans and Olympians
Aquatic deities
Chthonic deities
Personified concepts
Other deities
Asclepius, god of medicine Leto, mother of Apollo and Artemis Pan, shepherd god Nymphs Anatolian deities

The most famous temple of Asclepius was at Epidaurus in north-eastern Peloponnese. Another famous healing temple (or asclepieion) was located on the island of Kos, where Hippocrates, the legendary "father of medicine", may have begun his career. Other asclepieia were situated in Trikala, Gortys (in Arcadia), and Pergamum in Asia.

In honor of Asclepius, snakes were often used in healing rituals and non-venomous snakes were allowed to crawl on the floor in dormitories where the sick and injured slept. From about 300 BC onwards, the cult of Asclepius grew very popular and pilgrims flocked to his healing temples ( Asclepieia) to be cured of their ills. Ritual purification would be followed by offerings or sacrifices to the God (according to means), and the supplicant would then spend the night in the holiest part of the sanctuary - the abaton (or adyton). Any dreams or visions would be reported to a priest who would prescribe the appropriate therapy by a process of interpretation.^[19] Some healing temples also used sacred dogs to lick the wounds of sick petitioners.^[20]

The original, ancient Hippocratic Oath begins with the invocation "I swear | by Apollo the Physician and by Asclepius and by Hygieia and Panacea and by all the gods ..." Scholars have written that this oath may not have been written by Hippocrates, but by or with others in his school, or followers of Pythagoras.^[20]

Some later religious movements claimed links to Asclepius. In the 2nd Century AD The False Prophet Alexander claimed that his god Glycon was an incarnation of Asclepius.

The botanical genus Asclepias (commonly known as milkweed), is named after him, and includes the medicinal plant A. tuberosa or "Pleurisy root".

Asclepius was depicted on the reverse of the Greek 10,000 drachmas banknote of 1995-2001.^[21]

Notes

1. ^ Greek etymology database
2. ^ The Asklepios cult
3. ^ Pindar, Pythian Ode 3. 5 ff (trans. Conway) (Greek lyric C5th B.C.)
4. ^ Greek Lyric V Anonymous, Fragments 939 (Inscription from Erythrai) (trans. Campbell) (B.C.)
5. ^ Suidas s.v. Epione (trans. Suda On Line) (Byzantine Greek lexicon C10th A.D.)
6. ^ Pausanias, Description of Greece 2. 29. 1 (trans. Jones) (Greek travelogue C2nd A.D.)
7. ^ Suidas s.v. Epione (trans. Suda On Line) (Byzantine Greek lexicon C10th A.D.)
8. ^ Homer, Iliad 4. 193 & 217 ff (trans. Lattimore) (Greek epic C8th B.C.)
9. ^ Homer, Iliad 11. 518 ff (trans. Lattimore) (Greek epic C8th B.C.)
10. ^ Homer, Iliad 2. 730 ff (trans. Lattimore) (Greek epic C8th B.C.)
11. ^ Lycophron, Alexandra 1047 ff (trans. Mair) (Greek poet C3rd B.C.)
12. ^ Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 4. 71. 3 (trans. Oldfather) (Greek historian C1st B.C.)
13. ^ Philodemus, On Piety (trans. Campbell, Vol. Greek Lyric IV Stesichorus Frag 147 & Cinesias Frag 774) (C7th to 6th B.C.)
14. ^ Apollodorus, Bibliotheca 3. 121 (trans. Aldrich) (Greek mythographer C2nd A.D.)
15. ^ Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica 4. 610 ff (trans. Rieu) (Greek epic C3rd B.C.)
16. ^ Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 4. 71. 3 (trans. Oldfather) (Greek historian C1st B.C.)
17. ^ Hyginus, Fabulae 49 (trans. Grant) (Roman mythographer C2nd A.D.)
18. ^ Hyginus, Astronomica 2. 14 Latin Mythography C2nd A.D
19. ^ Sigerist. Chapter 3, Religious medicine: Asclepius and his cult", p63ff.
20. ^ ^{a b} Farnell, Chapter 10, "The Cult of Asklepios" (pp.234-279)
21. ^ Bank of Greece. Drachma Banknotes & Coins: 10,000 drachmas. – Retrieved on 27 March 2009.

Further Reading

• Farnell, Lewis Richard. Greek Hero Cults and Ideas of Immortality, (Oxford Clarendon Press,1921).
• Hart, Gerald D. MD. Asclepius: The God of Medicine (Royal Society of Medicine Press, 2000)
• Sigerist, Henry E. A History of Medicine Volume 2: Early Greek, Hindu, and Persian Medicine (Oxford University Press 1987), chapter 3.
• Asklepios cult.

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