Page 267 - ירושלים: גיליון רפואי

Franciscan Medicine in Jerusalem

Narcyz Klimas

In 1342, Pope Clement VI entrusted the Franciscan Order with the role of protecting the Holy
Places. Since then, the Jerusalem hospices have served to demonstrate the presence of the
Franciscan Order in the Holy Land. They have offered care and hospitality to pilgrims and locals
alike, initially on Mount Zion and – when the monks were expelled from there in 1555 – at the
monastery of St Savior.

The pilgrims’ hospital existed in Jerusalem from as early as 1335. It apparently operated
satisfactorily until the middle of the fifteenth century, but then its condition began to
deteriorate. As long as the hospital was more or less able to function, there was no cause for
the Mount Zion Franciscans to compete with it. When it stopped fulfilling the requirements
of the needy, however, the Franciscans sought to find solutions for every individual case. The
St Savior Monastery included a pharmacy and an infirmary alongside a site used to house
pilgrims. The needy came to the pharmacy to be treated with medicinal herbs; because of
the shortage of trained professionals in the city, the Franciscan brothers also cared for the
population outside the monastery, including the Muslim population, as described by the Polish
nobleman Radziwill, who visited Jerusalem in 1583.

There is no written evidence of the establishment of the pharmacy and the clinic at the
monastery. This is unusual, since any such action would have required permission from the
authorities. There is existing documentation permitting the building’s renovation, but it
dates from a relatively late period, from the seventeenth century, even though the St Savior
Monastery pharmacy was the most active and well-known of the pharmacies operating inside
monasteries in Bethlehem and Nazareth in Palestine, at Knaya in Syria, and at Antep (modern-
day Gaziantep) in Turkey. The St Savior pharmacy probably extended across the entire southern
part of the monastery, opposite the present-day Casa Nova hostel and possibly in the area that
is now the laundry. Next to the pharmacy was a small garden where plants used to prepare
medicines were grown. Nearby was a medical library containing a wealth of rare books and
manuscripts, including fourteenth-century medical manuscripts. Between the years 1710–1720,

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