Page 239 - ירושלים: גיליון רפואי

Between Tradition and Modernization

The Ottoman Period

At the start of the Ottoman period, Jewish, Karaite, and Muslim doctors practiced in a public
hospital alongside traditional healers. Most methods of treatment during this period were
based on the Greek-Arabic medical tradition and the Ottoman authorities allowed Jews and
Christians to provide medical services to their own communities. The Franciscan monastery
had a modern pharmacy, founded on a known European model; it was considered to be the
largest pharmacy in the Middle East. The pharmacy stocked medication from everywhere in
the world, including rare herbs imported from the American continent. At the beginning
of the 19th century, Jewish and Christian doctors and apothecaries who had received their
medical training at European universities, settled in Jerusalem, signaling the first signs of
modern Western-oriented medicine.

‫קמע ירושלמי‬
,]...[ ‫ל"שמירה ממגיפה‬
,‫ לחולי ומכאוב‬,‫רפואה למחלות ילדים‬
,"‫לחולשת הגוף והאיברים‬
1910 ,‫ירושלים‬
‫אביב‬-‫ תל‬,‫| אוסף משפחת גרוס‬

A Jerusalem charm
Widely used as "protection
against an epidemic […] a
remedy for pediatric illnesses,
for sickness and pain, for
weakness of the body and limbs"
Jerusalem, 1910 |
Gross Family Collection, Tel Aviv

237 ■ ‫בין מסורת לקדמה‬