Talmudic pediatry (1)

Text
A Talmudic pediatric text appears in Kethuboth 50a, in which Abaye states that

‘a six-year old (child) bitten by a scorpion does not survive. What is the remedy? Gall (mrrtˀ) of a white kite in beer, let it be rubbed into him and have him drink it. A one-year old (child) stung by a bee does not survive. What is the remedy? Creepers (ˀṣwwtˀ) of date palm.’

Babylonian parallels can be found for this passage, which give ages of child or young adult affected by 3 types of epilepsy or seizure. For example, a child affected by disease in his 3rd, 7th, or 10th year, but also adults in 20th or 30th year, are mentioned. In the first few recipes, patient will die (as in the Talmud text above), but the Akkadian recipe adds, ‘he will die, but in order to avoid him dying, do such and such … ‘. Moreover, in an Akkadian therapeutic text šimmatu-paralysis was caused by a scorpion bite. The point is that although such stings are not normally fatal, there was probably an assumption that stings and bites, such as dog bites, worm in the tooth, etc., caused diseases in general.

Source (list of abbreviations) (source links will open in a new browser window)
Babylonian Talmud, Kethuboth 50a

Bibliography

Mark Geller

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