Skip to content

The Library

Forty Centuries of Christian Writing

1693 works catalogued century by century, from the literature the Bible was written among to the present — each with a note on what it is, why it lasted, and where to read it.

101–200

The Second Century

1 work

c. 175–192; survives in fragments, partly in Arabic

Greek, partly surviving in Arabic

The Notices on the Christians

Galen of Pergamum · 129 – c. 216

The greatest physician of antiquity mentions Christians four or five times in passing, twice comparing arguing with them to arguing with the school of Moses — they accept undemonstrated laws. But he grants that they hold to justice, restrain their appetites, and include some who philosophise as well as anyone.

Greco-Roman · FragmentsRomans1 CorinthiansTitus

301–400

The Fourth Century

1 work

c. 390–400

Greek

On the Nature of Man

Nemesius of Emesa

A Christian synthesis of Greek medicine and philosophy on body and soul, sensation, imagination, memory, and the will, drawing on Galen throughout.

Antiochene · Anthropology

601–700

The Seventh Century

1 work

c. 680

Syriac

The Book of Medicine of the Kingdom

Shem'on d-Taybutheh · 7th century

A physician-monk describes the stages of contemplative prayer alongside an account of the brain, the nerves, and the humours, treating soul and body as one subject.

Church of the East · Mystical

801–900

The Ninth Century

1 work

c. 840

Latin

The Little Garden

Hortulus

Walafrid Strabo · c. 808–849

A poem on twenty-three plants in a monastery garden — sage, rue, melon, lily, rose — with their uses in medicine and their meanings.

Western · Poetry

1001–1100

The Eleventh Century

2 works

c. 1030–1043

Arabic

The Paradise of Christianity

Firdaws al-Nasraniyya

Ibn al-Tayyib · d. 1043

A commentary on the whole Bible in Arabic by a Baghdad physician, philosopher, and priest who also wrote on Aristotle and on medicine.

Church of the East · Commentary

11th century; attribution debated

Greek

On the Operation of Daemons

Michael Psellos · 1018–c. 1078

A dialogue classifying demons by the element they inhabit, reporting the practices of a heretical sect, and treating some possession as physical illness.

Byzantine · Dialogue

1101–1200

The Twelfth Century

2 works

c. 1150–1158

Latin

The Natural History

Physica

Hildegard of Bingen · 1098–1179

Nine books on plants, elements, trees, stones, fish, birds, animals, and metals, giving the properties and medicinal uses of each.

Western Monastic · Natural science

c. 1150–1160

Latin

Causes and Cures

Causae et Curae

Hildegard of Bingen · 1098–1179

A medical handbook on the humours, digestion, sleep, conception, and remedies, including frank descriptions of sexual physiology from a woman's viewpoint.

Western Monastic · Medicine

1201–1300

The Thirteenth Century

1 work

c. 1240

Latin

On the Properties of Things

De Proprietatibus Rerum

Bartholomaeus Anglicus · c. 1203–1272

Nineteen books on God, angels, the human body, illness, air, birds, stones, colours, and smells, compiled by a friar teaching in Germany.

Franciscan · Encyclopaedia

1501–1600

The Sixteenth Century

1 work

1553

Latin

The Restoration of Christianity

Christianismi Restitutio

Michael Servetus · c. 1511–1553

A complete alternative theology rejecting the Trinity and infant baptism, containing in passing the first European description of the pulmonary circulation of the blood.

Radical Reformation · Theology