(3) H. O. Taylor: The Mediaeval Mind, Vol. I, p. 251.
(4) De Renzi: Storia Documentata della Scuola Medica di Salerno,
2d ed., Napoli, 1867, Chap. V.
The Norman Kingdom of South Italy and Sicily was a meeting ground of
Saracens, Greeks and Lombards. Greek, Arabic and Latin were in constant
use among the people of the capital, and Sicilian scholars of the
twelfth century translated directly from the Greek.
The famous "Almagest" of Ptolemy, the most important work of ancient
astronomy, was translated from a Greek manuscript, as early as 1160, by
a medical student of Salerno.(5)
(5) Haskins and Lockwood: Harvard Studies in Classical
Philology, 1910, XXI, pp. 75-102.
About thirty miles southeast of Naples lay Salernum, which for centuries
kept alight the lamp of the old learning, and became the centre of
medical studies in the Middle Ages; well deserving its name of "Civitas
Hippocratica." The date of foundation is uncertain, but Salernitan
physicians are mentioned as early as the middle of the ninth century,
and from this date until the rise of the universities it was not only a
great medical school, but a popular resort for the sick and wounded. As
the scholar says in Longfellow's "Golden Legend":
Then at every season of the year
There are crowds of guests and travellers here;
Pilgrims and mendicant friars and traders
From the Levant, with figs and wine,
And bands of wounded and sick Crusaders,
Coming back from Palestine.
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