Ayurvedic, Greek and Chinese Medicines at a Glance

Ethnomedicine—Circumferential distribution of humoral medicine

The geographic distribution of humoral traditions from three of the world’s great civilizations—ancient Greece, India and China—are remarkably similar (Laderman 1992: 272).  The Greek, Ayurvedic and Chinese medical systems are “naturalistic” and share fundamental values in protoscientific, philosophical, cosmological views of the universe, and in their classic form are characterized by the metaphoric pairs or qualities of hot and cold, wet and dry (Foster 1987: 355).  Despite the fact that each of these medical systems has the dual bi-polar axis of hot-cold and wet-dry, which are ‘elements’ by mutual agreement, oddly enough these categorizations are referred to collectively as ‘humoral’ although only the Greek and Ayurvedic medical systems have ‘humors’.  The chart below clearly shows the four Greek elements of fire, air, earth and water corresponding directly to the temperature and moisture metaphors, and these in turn, correlating with the four humors or four bodily fluids—blood, phlegm, yellow and black bile.  Albeit the Ayurvedic medical system has one additional element, ether, and one less humor—comprising two bodily fluids and the third humor being wind or flatulence—the Ayurvedic medicine delineates a similar labeling system involving elements and humors.  The Chinese medical system, on the other hand, does not have ‘humors’ at all, but four ‘qualities’, and these qualities (1) do not directly correlate with the elements as in the Greek and Ayurvedic medical systems but (2) are in harmony and balance with the five elements which reflect the eternal cyclical, functional relationship to the natural world: wood generates fire, fire generates earth, earth generates metal, metal generates water, and water generates wood (Song 2005: 232). 

MEDICAL SYSTEMS
Greek	Four elements: Fire/heat Air/cold Earth/dry Water/moist	Four humors: Yellow bile Blood Black bile Phlegm
Ayurvedic	Five elements: Fire/heat Air/cold Earth/dry Water/moist Ether/??	Three humors: Phlegm/mucus Bile/gall Wind/flatulence
Chinese	Five elements: Fire Wood Earth Water Metal	Four qualities: Hot Cold Wet Dry

(adapted from text as written by Foster 1987: 359)

The Greek medical system originated in the 4^th century B.C. and, perhaps due to it being the forerunner of the other medical systems, became the basis of cosmopolitan medicine (Cunnar n.d.)., and hence, in the West the reason for referring to ‘humoral medicine’—based on the Greek interpretation of the bodily humors—as opposed to referencing the bodily qualities in accordance with Chinese categorization. 

The winged staff with the intertwined snakes is a symbol of ancient Indian medicine that predates the Caduceus of Greek medicine and mythology, now a universal symbol of modern medicine and science. (Source) 

The Chinese medical system from the 1^st century B.C. and the Ayurvedic medical system from approximately 2000 years ago (Cunnar n.d.) in conjunction with the Greek medical system influence some of the most heavily populated areas on earth.  The Greek medical system has moved both westward through Europe, Latin America and the Philippines and also eastward to heavily influence India, where it became transposed to the Unani or Ionian medical system (Foster 1987: 360), a mixture of the Greek and Ayurvedic medical systems and which is now arguably one of the four “literate” medical systems of the world (Cunnar n.d.).  This medical system has in turn influenced the Moslem world and South Asia (Foster 1987: 360-61) while the Ayurvedic system is the primary medical system in India (although Unani is also practiced there), Nepal and Sri Lanka and from there diffused to Burma, and in part to Malaysia and adjacent areas (Foster 1987: 360-61).  The Chinese medical system diffused through the Koreas and Japan and southward to Thailand, where Ayurvedic and Greek medical systems are simultaneously practiced (Foster 1987: 360).  

At present the three, arguably four, medical systems together lay a wide belt around the globe.  Like the earth’s geological Ring of Fire, a ring of migration and religio-social and political interactions have affected the acceptance and diffusion of the medical humoral beliefs.  Broadly banding the globe above the equator on the Asian-European continents to marginal areas around the equator and below it on the South American continent, humoral beliefs are strongly held.  However, in the spread of humoral medical beliefs, due to underlying values of indigenous cultures, modifications of the four humors have taken place.  The humoral system lost the bi-polar axis of wet-dry in Latin America (Mathews 1983: 837) and the New World in general, arguably due to no dichotomous indigenous beliefs of wet-dry in the New World (Foster 1987: 356-58); nevertheless, owing to the “profound imprint of the Spanish culture” in its long-term colonization of Latin America, the Caribbean and the Philippines, these areas are remarkably homogeneous in their hot-cold beliefs (Foster 1987: 367).  Similarly, in Malay, in accepting Ayurvedic humoral beliefs that later became softened by Greek and Chinese thought (Laderman 1992: 273), the wet-dry dichotomy was lost and a neutral category, having neither hot nor cold significance, arose in importance (Laderman 1992: 279).    

In conclusion, while the term ‘humoral’ does not in truth transmedically discuss the bodily ‘humors’ among the three medical systems categorized as ‘humoral’, it does provide an identifying label for transculturally comparing the elements and approaching a study of the beliefs the elements play within the cultures.  Nevertheless, while humans’ understanding of the medicine comes from various global locations (Moerman 2002: 56), homogeneous assumptions for the humoral categories must be avoided for societies are composed of intracultural and contextual variables (Rubel and Hass 1996: 120). 

REFERENCES

Cunnar, Christiane, Human Relations Area Files (n.d.), ‘Teaching Ehraf: Hraf Topics in Medical Anthropology (Level Ii)’.

Foster, George M. (1987), ‘On the Origin of Humoral Medicine in Latin America’, Medical Anthropology Quarterly 1: 355-93.

Laderman, Carol (1992), ‘A Welcoming Soil: Humoralism on the Malay Peninsula’ in Paths to Asian Medical Knowledge, ed. Charles Leslie and Allan Young (Los Angeles: University of California Press): 272-88.

Mathews, Holly F. (1983), ‘Context-Specific Variation in Humoral Classification’, American Anthropologist 85: 826-47.

Moerman, D. (2002), Chapter 5: Formal Factors and the Meaning Response (Meaning, Medicine, and the 'Placebo' Effect; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).

Rubel, A. J., and M. R. Hass (1996), ‘Ethnomedicine’ in Medical Anthropology: Comtemporary Theory and Method, ed. C. F. Sargent and T.M. Johnson (Praeger, Westport, CT and London): 113-30.

Song, Il-byung (2005), An Introduction to Sasang Constitutional Medicine, ed. Floyd E. Sandoval and Naomi R. Gelperin (Korean Studies Series No. 29; Seoul: Jimoondang).