Rhazes

Persian physician who was the first to distinguish smallpox from measles.

Life

Musician turned physician

Rhazes was born in Rey near Tehran. As a young man he studied music and philosophy and turned to medicine only in his thirties, later heading hospitals in Rey and Baghdad. It is said that when choosing a site for a hospital in Baghdad, he hung pieces of fresh meat around the city and picked the spot where the meat rotted most slowly.

Baghdad hospital

He wrote more than two hundred works. His medical encyclopedia, the Comprehensive Book of Medicine, brought together Greek and Indian knowledge and his own clinical records; his Treatise on Smallpox and Measles was the first work in medical history to distinguish the two diseases accurately. He was also a chemist, describing distillation and other chemical methods and a large number of chemical substances.

Smallpox and measles

He went blind late in life and died in c. 925 CE.

Legacy

Rhazes is considered one of the greatest clinical physicians of the Middle Ages, and Latin translations of his works were used in European medical schools for several hundred years.

Major works & achievements

• Comprehensive Book of Medicine
• Treatise on Smallpox and Measles

Did you know? He insisted that physicians judge by the patient's actual condition rather than blindly follow ancient authorities, Galen included.

Key dates

• 900Directed the Baghdad hospital (approx.)
• 910Wrote the Treatise on Smallpox and Measles (approx.)
• 925Died (approx.)