Nutrition the supply and uptake of nourishment, has been studied since ancient times. The Greek physician Hippocrates, who lived in the 5th century bc, and his followers over the next two centuries examined the connection between diet and health; many of their writings survive. Unfortunately they pursued the doctrine of the ‘four humours’ (See also composition of foods), which did much harm for many centuries afterwards. Chinese philosophers also studied nutrition, regarding all foods as having an influence on health so that there was no real distinction between foods and medicines; their beliefs live on in traditional Chinese medicine.
