Published in III UNESC Seminar of Medical Humanities / I UFES Seminar of Medical Humanities

Keywords: History of Medicine, Leprosy, Middle Ages.

A brief study of leprosy in the Middle Ages, its history, medical perception and social attitude toward manifestations of the disease. As a case study about the prevailing medical principles, we present some excerpts from Començaments de Medicina (c.1274-1283), Doctrina pueril (c. 1274-1276), Fèlix o Libre de Maravelles (1288-1289), and Liber prouerbiorum (c. 1296) by the medieval philosopher Ramon Llull (1232-1316). It presents the theoretical foundations of his Medicine: a metaphorical art that links the Hippocratic four elements (air, fire, earth and water) and Christian Theology using numeric symbolism.