<span>This book attempts to deal with that problem by exploring the thinking of Greek antiquity, a vital period in the history of psychiatry. Even defining the scope of modern psychiatry is a formidable task. Yet without some sense of what psychiatry is, it is impossible to write anything about its history, let alone use the past to illuminate the psychiatry we know today. I shall explore this difficulty and sketch some previous attempts to define the connection between ancient and modern psychiatry before going on to discuss in detail the ancient precursors and analogues of contempory models of mental illness. With an examination of Homer, the tragedians, Plato, and Hippocrates I explore the nature and origins of the two fundamental polarities in psychiatry today: the intrapsycic vesus the social model of the origins and treatment of mental disturbance, and the medical versus the psychological model. The application of all these models to the elucidation of one particular condition is presented in a case study of hysteria. I shall conclude with a consideration of the requirements for a synthesis of these divergent perspectives</span>

Mind and Madness in Ancient Greece: The Classical Roots of Modern Psychiatry PDF

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