CLASSIC 48Ancient Greek and Roman Medicine
Classics · 5 units · Undergraduate lower division (0-99)
Introduction to Greek and Roman medicine in its intellectual and cultural context. Examination of construction of concepts such as health, disease, physician, man, woman, cause, and difference. Readings from Greek literature and healing in cult of Asclepius. Readings of texts from Hippocratic collection, thought to be close to practice and theory of 5th-century BCE Greek physician, relating them to medical practice, competition for students and patients, intellectual display, developing scientific methods, ethnography, and Greek philosophy. Discussion of plagues as attempts to view such outbreaks as social phenomena. Examination of how Hippocratic understanding of how—or whether—we can know about what happens inside body was developed and challenged in 3rd-century BCE Alexandria. Study of Prince of Physicians, Galen, champion of Hippocratic medicine, influential into 18th century.
P/NP or letter grading.
When it runs
Not on the schedule for any of Fall 2025 through Spring 2027. UCLA publishes only that window, so this does not mean the course is gone — check the official listing.
Requisites
UCLA lists no requisites for this course.
Requires
Everything that has to come before this course, not just the courses named in the requisite above.
Nothing — this is an entry point.
Unlocks
What this course is a requisite for, and what those courses lead to in turn.
No course in the catalog lists this as a requisite.