Hugh Of Lucca

Bruno brought up with him the methods and principles of surgery from the
south of Italy, but there seems to have been already in the north at
least one distinguished surgeon who had made his mark. This was Ugo da
Lucca or Ugo Luccanus, sometimes known in the modern times in German
histories of medicine as Hugo da Lucca and in English, Hugh of Lucca. He
flourished early in the thirteenth century. In 1214 he was called to
Bologna to become the city physician, and joined the Bolognese
volunteers in the crusade in 1218, being present at the siege of
Damietta. He returned to Bologna in 1221 and was given the post of legal
physician to the city. The civic statutes of Bologna are, according to
Gurlt, the oldest monument of legal medicine in the Middle Ages. Ugo
died not long after the middle of the century, and is said to have been
nearly one hundred years old. Of his five sons, three became physicians.
The most celebrated of these was Theodoric, who wrote a text-book of
surgery in which are set down the traditions of surgery that had been
practised in his father's life. Theodoric is especially enthusiastic in
praise of his father, because he succeeded in bringing about such
perfect healing of wounds with only wine and water and the ligature and
without the employment of any ointments.

Ugo seems to have occupied himself much with chemistry. To him we owe a
series of discoveries with regard to anodyne and anaesthetizing drugs. He
is said to have been the first who taught the sublimation of arsenic.
Unfortunately he left no writings after him, and all that we know of him
we owe to the filial devotion of his son Theodoric.

Next: Theodoric
Previous: Bruno Da Longoburgo

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