Abstract
IN an interesting article in the April issue of the Hibbert Journal, Dr. R. R. Marett remarks that in addition to its mystic and religious associations the cave played no small part in early medicine, and suggests that it was primarily as a hydropathic establishment that the cave found so much favour with the sick. In the cave of Aesculapius, mentioned by Pausanias, for example, the healing waters gushed out from a rock, and at Elis in the cave of the Anigrid nymphs he states that a leper must sacrifice before bathing in the neighbouring river in order to leave his “shame” there. There were also caves mentioned by Pausanias of which the efficacy had possibly nothing to do with water, such as the cave of Aphrodite. Moreover, the famous Lemnian earth or terra sigillata which was supposed to provide an antidote to snake-poisoning was obtained from a cave.
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Cave Worship. Nature 146, 229 (1940). https://doi.org/10.1038/146229b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/146229b0