Appears in
Oxford Companion to Food

By Alan Davidson

Published 2014

  • About

Galen (ad 129–99) a Greek physician who was born in Pergamum, once the capital of a kingdom, but at that time a provincial capital within the Roman Empire and still a centre of culture and learning. He studied philosophy and medicine there, proceeding to Smyrna and eventually to Alexandria as his studies advanced. He settled in Rome in 164. There he practised, lectured on anatomy and medicine, and wrote voluminously. He wrote on philosophy and literature as well as medicine, but it is the medical works that have largely survived. He moved in the highest society, and was appointed personal physician to the future emperor Commodus.