Avicenna (Ibn Sīnā)
Canon of Medicine, ‘On cooling and moisturising drugs’
Paper, Egypt, 11th–13th century
T-S Ar. 44.99

This Judaeo-Arabic fragment preserves passages from Avicenna’s Canon dealing with drugs that are used to re-establish the harmonic balance between the four humours of the human body, according to the classical theory of the four qualities/humours of Greek derivation. In particular, this page describes the function of cooling and moisturising drugs. The circulation of the Canon in Judaeo-Arabic versions shows the influence of this work on medieval Jewish medical culture.