23

The History of Bioelectromagnetism

skate (Mormyrus), and the electric eel (Electrophorus electrricus). Later, the electric discharge from

these fishes was introduced into medicine as a cure for headache and gout. As medical applica­

tions of the electric discharge of electric fish, Scribonius Largus (1–50 AD), the court physician

to the Roman emperor Claudius (10 BC–54 AD), recommended first the use of torpedo over the

scalp for curing headache and gout around 46 AD. This is the first written document on the use

of electric discharge of the torpedo as electrotherapy. The first person known to have been cured

by electricity was Anthero, who suffered from gutta (probably gout), a freed slave of the Emperor

Tiberius Claudius Nero Caesar Augustus (42 BC–37 AD) (Cambridge, 1977). Claudius Galenus

Galen (130–201), Roman physician, employed the electric shock from the torpedo to treat headache

and epilepsy. In electrotherapy, Galen followed in the footsteps of Largus’s medical treatment. In

the late eleventh century, Ibn-Sidah, the Muslim physician of India, advocated placing live catfish

on the brows of the patients (Delbourgo, 2006). The electric stimulation by electric fish spread to

Africa. Jesuit missionaries in early modern Abyssinia (now, Ethiopia) reported that locals strapped

patients to tabletops and shocked them with catfish as a method of expelling “Devils out of the

human body”(Delbourgo, 2006). The use of electric fish to produce the electric discharge for elec­

trotherapy was the most popular and was used until the seventeenth century.

Te destructive power of high temperature on living tissues was well known in antiquity. In ancient

ages, red-iron was used to treat cancer. Te basic concept of hyperthermia is based on temperature rise.

Te source of the term “hyperthermia” is derived from two Greek words: “hyper” (over) and “therme”

(heat). Te hyperthermia refers to the induction of local heating in the human body. Te temperature

rise, hyperthermia, was referred to achieve therapeutic efects. Generally, the high-temperature rise

is associated with the sun power for healing. An Egyptian chancellor, Imhotep (2655–2600 BC) was

known frst as the user of heat treatment. Two thousand years afer his death, the status of Imhotep had

risen as a god of medicine and healing. In ancient Greece and Rome, Parmenides (ca 500 BC, or 475

BC-unknown data of his death), the Greek philosopher, was convinced of the efectiveness of hyper­

thermia (Gas, 2011; Seegenschmiedt and Vernon, 1995). Hippocrates (460–370 BC), the famous Greek

philosopher and physician, who is considered the father of medicine, used heat to treat breast tumors.

Aulus Cornelius Celsus (25 BC–50 AD), a Roman encyclopedist, the author of the frst medical work

De Medicina, believed the curing efects of fever and described the use of hot baths in the treatment

of various diseases. Hippocrates used the Greek words, or expressions “karkinos” (early tumor stage),

or “karkinoma” (advanced tumor stage), meaning crab. Tese expressions were translated into the

Latin language by Celsus as the term of “cancer.” Anyway, the efectiveness of heat treatment had been

increased.

Gaius Plinius Secundus was born in Como and was a Roman scholar in Italy. He wrote the ency­

clopedia, Naturalis Historia a 37-volume book which contained and condensed the collection of the

knowledge of his time (Pliny the Elder, 77 AD, 1938). However, it contained a mixture of fact, fction,

folklore, and superstition. In his encyclopedia, Plinius regarded that a magnet has the power to cure

human diseases. In chapter 25 of volume 36, he mentioned: “All magnets, incidentally, are useful for

making up eye-salves if each is used in its correct quantity, and are particularly efective in stopping

acute watering of the eyes. Tey also cure bums when ground and calcined.” For amber, he mentioned

in volume 37, chapter 11 that “For even today the pleasant women of Transpadane Gaul wear pieces of

amber as necklaces, chiefy as an adornment, but also because of its medical properties. Amber, indeed,

is supposed to be a prophylactic against tonsillitis and other afections.” In addition, Plinius mentioned

in the same volume that “amber is found to have some use in pharmacy, although it is not for this reason

that women like it. It is of beneft to babies when it is attached to them as an amulet.”

Te above writing seems to imply that electric and magnetic phenomena have medical applications

to cure human diseases. In his idea, sympathy and antipathy were the cause of magnetic phenomena.

Plinius died in 79 AD during the rescue of his family from the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Tis erup­

tion destroyed the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum.

From early times, the existence of the earth magnetic feld was well known. In 2637 BC, Emperor

Huang-ti of China used a compass in a battle. In 1110 BC, Taheon-Koung gave his crew a compass to