(Ἀσκληπιός), the god of the medical art. In the Homeric poems Aesculapius does not appear to be considered as a divinity, but merely as a human being, which is indicated by the adjective ἀμύμων, which is never given to a god. No allusion is made to his descent, and he is merely mentioned as the ἰητὴρ ἀμύμων, and the father of Machaon and Podaleirius. (Il. 2.731, 4.194, 11.518.) From the fact that Homer (Hom. Od. 4.232) calls all those who practise the healimlg art descendants of Paeeon, and that Podaleirius and Machaon are called the sons of Aesculapius, it has been inferred, that Aesculapius and Paeeon are the same being, ad consequently a divinity. But wherever Homer mentions the healing god, it is always Paeeon, and never Aesculapius; and as in the poet's opinion all physicians were descended from Paeeon, he probably considered Aesculapius in the same light. This supposition is corroborated by the fact, that in later times Paeeon was identified with Apollo, and that Aesculapius is universally described as a descendant of Apollo. The two sons of Aesculapius in the Iliad, were the physicians in the Greek army, and are described as ruling over Tricca, Ithome, and Oechalia. (Il. 2.729.) According to Eustathius (Eustath. ad Hom. p. 330), Lapithes was a son of Apollo and Stilbe, and Aesculapius was a descendant of Lapithes. This tradition seems to be based on the same groundwork as the more common one, that Aesculapius was a son of Apollo and Coronis, the daughter of Phlegyas, who is a descendant of Lapithes. (Apollod. 3.10.3; Pind. P. 3.14, with the Schol.)
The common story then goes on as follows. When Coronis was with child by Apollo, she became enamoured with Ischys, an Arcadian, and Apollo informed of this by a raven, which he had set to watch her, or, according to Pindar, by his own prophetic powers, sent his sister Artemis to kill Coronis. Artemis accordingly destroyed Coronis in her own house at Lacereia in Thessaly, on the shore of lake Baebia. (Comp. Hom. Hymn. 27. 3.) According to Ovid (Ov. Met. 2.605, &c.) and Hyginus (Poet. Astr. 2.40), it was Apollo himself who killed Coronis and Ischys. When the body of Coronis was to be burnt, Apollo, or, according to others (Paus. 2.26.5), Hermes,
These are the legends about one of the most interesting and important divinities of antiquity. Various hypotheses have been brought forward to explain the origin of his worship in Greece; and, while some consider Aesculapius to have been originally a real personage, whom tradition had connected with various marvellous stories, others have explained all the legends about him as mere personifications of certain ideas. The serpent, the perpetual symbol of Aesculapius, has given rise to the opinion, that the worship was derived from Egypt, and that Aesculapius was identical with the serpent Cnuph worshipped in Egypt, or with the Phoenician Esmun. (Euseb. Praep. Evang. 1.10; comp. Paus. 7.23.6.) But it does not seem necessary to have recourse to foreign countries in order to explain the worship of this god. His story is undoubtedly a combination of real events with the results of thoughts or ideas, which, as in so many instances in Greek mythology, are, like the former, considered as facts. The kernel, out of which the whole myth has grown, is perhaps the account we read in Homer; but gradually the sphere in which Aesculapius acted was so extended, that he became the representative or the personification of the healing powers of nature, which are naturally enough described as the son (the effects) of Helios,--Apollo, or the Sun.
Aesculapius was worshipped all over Greece, and many towns, as we have seen, claimed the honour of his birth. His temples were usually built in healthy places, on hills outside the town, and near wells which were believed to have healing powers. These temples were not only places of worship, but were frequented by great numbers of sick persons, and may therefore be compared to modern hospitals. (Plut. Quaest. Rom. p. 286, D.) The principal seat of his worship in Greece was Epidaurus, where he had a temple surrounded with an extensive grove, within which no one was allowed to die, and no woman to give birth to a child. His sanctuary contained a magnificent statue of ivory and gold, the work of Thrasymedes, in which he was represented as a handsome and manly figure, resembling that of Zeus. (Paus. 2.26 and 27.) He was seated on a throne, holding in one hand a staff, and with the other resting upon the head of a dragon (serpent), and by his side lay a dog. (Paus. 2.27.2.) Serpents were everywhere connected with the worship of Aesculapius, probably because they were a symbol of prudence and renovation, and were believed to have the power of discovering herbs of wondrous powers, as is indicated in the story about Aesculapius and the serpents in the house of Glaucus. Serpents were further believed to be guardians of wells with salutary powers. For these reasons a peculiar kind of tame serpents, in which Epidaurus abounded, were not only kept in his temple (Paus. 2.28.1), but the god himself frequently appeared in the form of a serpent. (Paus. 3.23.4; V. Max. 1.8.2; Liv. Epit. 11; compare the account of Alexander Pseudomantis in Lucian.) Besides the temple of Epidaurus, whence the worship of the god was transplanted to various other parts of the ancient world, we may mention those of Tricca (Strab. ix. p.437), Celaenae (xiii. p. 603), between Dyme and Patrae (viii. p. 386), near Cyllene (viii. p. 337), in the island of Cos (xiii. p. 657; Paus. 3.23.4), at Gerenia (Strab. viii. p.360), near Caus in Arcadia (Steph. Byz. s. v.), at Sicyon (Paus. 2.10.2), at Athens (1.21.7), near Patrae (7.21.6), at Titane in the territory of Sicyon (7.23.6), at Thelpusa (8.25.3), in Messene (4.31.8), at Phlius (2.13.
The sick, who visited the temples of Aesculapius, had usually to spend one or more nights in his sanctuary (καθεύδειν, ineubare, Paus. 2.27 § 2), during which they observed certain rules prescribed by the priests. The god then usually revealed the remedies for the disease in a dream. (Aristoph. Pl. 662, &c.; Cic. De Div. 2.59 ; Philostr. Vita Apollon. 1.7; Jambl. De Myst. 3.2.) It was in allusion to this incubatio that many temples of Aesculapius contained statues representing Sleep and Dream. (Paus. 2.10.2.) Those whom the god cured of their disease offered a sacrifice to him, generally a cock (Plat. Phacd. p. 118) or a goat (Paus. 10.32.8; Serv. ad Virg. Georg. 2.380), and hung up in his temple a tablet recording the name of the sick, the disease, and the manner in which the cure had been effected. The temples of Epidaurus, Tricca, and Cos, were full of such votive tablets, and several of them are still extant. (Paus. 2.27.3; Strab. viii. p.374; comp. Dict. of Ant. p. 673.) Respecting the festivals celebrated in honour of Aesculapius see Dict. of Ant. p. 103. &c. The various surnames given to the god partly describe him as the healing or saving god, and are partly derived from the places in which he was worshipped. Some of his statues are described by Pausanias. (2.10.3, 10.32.8.) Besides the attributes mentioned in the description of his statue at Epidaurus, he is sometimes represented holding in one hand a phial, and in the other a stalf; sometimes also a boy is represented standing by his side, who is the genius of recovery, and is called Telesphorus, Euamerion, or Acesius. (Paus. 2.11.7.) We still possess a considerable number of marble statues and busts of Aesculapius, as well as many representations on coins and gems. (Böttiger, Amalthea, i. p. 282; ii. p. 361; Hirt, Mythol. Bilderb. i. p. 84; Müller, Handb. der Archäol. p. 597, &c. 710.)
There were in antiquity two works which went under the name of Aesculapius, which, however, were no more genuine than the works ascribed to Orpheus. (Fabricius, Bibl. Graec. i. p. 55, &c.)
The descendants of Aesculapius were called by the patronymic name Asclepiadae. (Ἀσκληπιάδαι.) Those writers, who consider Aesculapius as a real personage, must regard the Asclepiadae as his real descendants, to whom he transmitted his medical knowledge, and whose principal seats were Cos and Cnidus. (Plat. de Re Publ. iii. p. 405, &c.) But the Asclepiadae were also regarded as an order or caste of priests, and for a long period the practice of medicine was intimately connected with religion. The knowledge of medicine was regarded as a sacred secret, which was transmitted from father to son in the families of the Asclepiadae, and we still possess the oath which every one was obliged to take when he was put in possession of the medical secrets. (Galen, Anat. ii. p. 128 Aristid. Orat. i. p. 80; comp. K. Sprengel, Gesch. der Medicin. vol. i.)
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