Criptopaleontología: los fósiles contenidos en los tratados médicos Hispano-Árabes entre los siglos X-XII

• Eladio Liñán ^[1] ; Joaquín Carrasco ^[1] ; María Liñán ^[2]
  1. [1] Universidad de Zaragoza

     Universidad de Zaragoza

     Zaragoza, España

     
  2. [2] Contemporánea S. L. Cruz Roja de León, 8. 24008-León.
• Localización: Revista de la Sociedad Geológica de España, ISSN 0214-2708, Vol. 27, Nº. 1, 2014, págs. 351-360
• Idioma: español
• Títulos paralelos:
  • Cryptopalaeontology: The fossils contained in the Spanish-Arabian medical treatises between the centuries X and XII
• Enlaces
  • Texto completo (pdf)
• Resumen
  • español

    Se analizan los fósiles contenidos en el tratado médico “Kitâb al-Taysîr” y en el farmacológico “Kitâb al-Djâmi” de Avenzoar (Ibn Zhur) y se estudia su empleo en geofarmacia, ya sea como remedios simples o bien como constituyentes de diversos electuarios, comparándolo con el que les dieron otros autores hispano-árabes (Abulcasis o Al-Zarawi, Abû l-Alâ Zuhr, Ibn Yulyul, Ibn Wâfid, Ibn Buklâris y Maimónides) en sus escritos sobre medicina. También se analiza el significado de estos fósiles en el contexto geológico y de la farmacopea actual. Los fósiles contenidos son fundamentalmente la Piedra Judaica (equinoideos), el ámbar y el asfalto con indicación de las localidades españolas de donde se extraían dichos fósiles. Además, Abulcasis (s. X) incluye también el carbón, considerado aquí como un fósil químico, y sus propiedades terapéuticas. El estudio criptopaleontológico indica que los fósiles eran bien conocidos en la farmacopea hispano-árabe donde fueron ampliamente empleados como diferentes remedios medicinales. Además sugiere que tanto las diferentes fuentes escritas consultadas como el acervo empírico que sirvieron para redactar cada tratado, fueron fundamentalmente distintos en cada reino de taifas (Córdoba, Sevilla, Toledo o Zaragoza) y se homogeneiza a partir de la obra de Avenzoar en el siglo XII.

  • English

    Fossils contained in the Avenzoar´s (Ibn Zhur’s) treatises; both the medical treatise (“Kitâb al-Taysîr) and the pharmacological treatise (“Kitâb al-Djâmi”) are analyzed from a geopharmacological point of view, either as simple remedies or as components of several electuaries. The therapeutical uses compiled in these two treatises are compared with the descriptions and uses of fossils proposed in other works written by other Spanish-Arabian authors from 10th to 12th centuries (Abulcasis, Abû l-Alâ Zuhr, Ibn Yulyul, Ibn Wâfid, Ibn Buklâris and Maimónides). The meanings of the fossil descriptions are analyzed in a modern geological and pharmacological context. The fossils studied were mainly: the Jew’s stone (echinoids), the amber and the asphalt, placing, where they can be found in Spain. Furthermore, in this paper it is included the coal, which is considered here, as a chemical fossil and it was employed by Abulcasis (s. X). The Jew’s Stone was barely cited. There is only a brief quote about the oftalmological use of this stone in the Abulcasis’work. The reason why other hispanic-arabian authors don’t mention this Stone in their therapeutical treatises could have been due to the fact that the influence of Galeno’s work was spreaded widely across the North of Africa, which was an area visited by the Banu Zuhr family (Avenzoar and his father Abû l-Alâ Zuhr). The geographic origin of the Jew’s Stone included in the remedies of Avenzoar, was probably Spanish due to the high amount of echinoids present in Cretaceous and Tertiary areas of this country. Moreover, we may conclude that high amount of the amber used for healing purposes was also Spanish. Therefore, Avenzoar describes the pharmacological properties of the yellow Andalusian amber. Medina Sidonia (Cádiz) territory was at that time the capital town of a vast territory between the bay of Cadiz and the bay of Algeciras, and it was described as another provider of amber. Finally, the Cryptopalaeontological study, suggests that the sources of knowledge and the customs that influenced the hispanic-arabian authors to write their treatises, were different depending of the taifa where they belonged (Córdoba, Sevilla, Toledo or Zaragoza). However, after Avenzoar’s work in the 12th century, all the therapeutic tendencies became more unified.