The Smith Papyrus and Medical Treatments

The dates of the objects in this composite image are far removed from the origin of their subjects: in the background is the Edwin Smith Papyrus, dating from the 17th-century BCE, but ultimately stemming from about 2500 BCE. In the foreground is a Greek Hellenistic statue of Imhotep, the Ancient Egyptian polymath whom many suspect of having authored the original text. The Smith Papyrus is well known for its clinical approach to surgery, for Imhotep — or whoever the author was — took care to describe forty-eight cases of medical conditions without reference to magical cures. In this manuscript is the first written description of the disease cancer.

Alongside fractures, abscesses, and dislocated vertebrae, “Imhotep” records the following: “If you examine [a case] having bulging masses on [the] breast [and] find them to be cool, there being no fever at all when your hand feels him; they have no granulations, contain no fluid, give rise to no liquid discharge, yet they feel protuberant to your touch . . . ” this is a case unlike other tumors. And unlike other cases featured in the Smith Papyrus, which list out treatments both palliative and curative, for this diagnosis, the author states with unusual terseness: “Therapy . . . . There is none.”