The links between the medical school of Padua and the Hellenic medical world

Med Secoli. 1992;4(2):45-58.

Abstract

Between the 15th and 19th centuries the University of Padua attracted a great number of Greek students, who wanted to study medicine. They came not only from Venetian dominions (where the percentage reaches 97% of the students in Italian universities) but also from Turkish-occupied territories of Greece. It is also characteristic that several professors of the School of Medicine and Philosophy of this famous University were Greeks. They were the following ten: giovanni Cottunio, Niccolò Calliachi, Giorgio Calafatti, Tomaso Catani, Simone Stratigo, Giovanni Zografo, Pietro Zografo, Marco Carburi, Pietro Antonio Bondioli, and Angelo Dalla Decima. It is also interesting that most physicians who distinguished themselves as leading personalities in the political and scientific life of Europe had studied at the University of Padua. Five names stand out from among the multitude: Alessandro Mavrocordato (politician and diplomat), Giovanni Capodistria (first governor of Greece), Lazzaro de Mordo (philosopher-physician), Giacomo Pilarino and Emmanuel Timoni (the two discoverers of the smallpox inoculation with pus extracted from a patient suffering from a slight attack of the disease). It is concluded that the close traditional relations between Greece and the Medical School of the Universitiy of Padua were at their strongest during the period from the 15th to the 19th centuries.

Publication types

  • Historical Article

MeSH terms

  • Education, Medical / history*
  • Greek World
  • History, Modern 1601-
  • Humans
  • Italy
  • Schools, Medical / history*
  • Students, Medical / history