generations. While, on the one hand, the ancient Greeks may have been full of superstitious beliefs, they were at the same time as kindly disposed toward their fellow men, as generous in their spending of money for this purpose, and as practical in their selection of suitable methods as are the benefactors of to-day all over the world. In course of time these so-called temples became the prototypes of our hospitals, sanatoria and schools of medicine, and it therefore seems only proper that they should here be described somewhat in detail.
The so-called Aesculapian Temples and their Chief Purpose.—The first of these temples, or Asclepieia, were established at Trikka, in Thessaly; at Cnidus, on the coast of Caria in Asia Minor, opposite Cos; at Epidaurus, in Argolis, Greece; at Cyrene on the northern coast of Lybia, Africa, opposite the Island of Crete; at Crotona, on the southeastern coast of Italy; and, finally, at Athens. It is said that traces of as many as eighty of these Asclepieia have been found in different parts of the ancient world. One of them, for example, is known to have existed on the small island (Isola San Bartolommeo) in the Tiber, at Rome. Their management was intrusted, in the earlier years of their existence, to men who were descendants of Aesculapius—i.e., the sons and grandsons of Machaon and Podalirius. They were both priests and physicians, and are mentioned in history as the Asclepiadae. With the progress of time it became necessary, as one may readily understand, to intrust the temple service to individuals who were not members of the family of Aesculapius. The original Asclepiadae guarded as valuable secrets the methods of treatment and the pharmaceutic formulae which had been handed down to them by the head of the family. It was therefore natural, when these newly adopted members were installed in office, that they should be made to promise, under oath, not to "divulge these secrets to any but their own sons, the sons of their teachers, or the pupils who were preparing themselves to become regular physicians." (Neuburger.)
The divulging of these secrets, it may be assumed,
