Girolamo Mercuriale and his medical compendium ‘De Arte Gymnastica’
On the workout routine through the ages — Part 3 of 8
A flying leap forward has been taken during the late Renaissance. All prior knowledge about physical exercises (see part 2) has been distilled into a medical compendium. There was no easier and more systematic way for physicians to devise an exercise prescription. A selection from a set of generic items — which when individualized and put together into a workout regimen — was expected to tackle the diagnosed health issue provided that the patient strictly followed the advice. Routine was the consequence — at least during the treatment.
Classical antiquity has been rediscovered in Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries. It was a period in history characterized by an extensive cultural effort to revive Hellenic and Roman ideas and to make them a starting point for further progress with man being the measure of all things again. The Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci is the most iconic graphical representation of these times. And today this drawing is widely associated with health, physical fitness, and the practice of medicine.
The Italian Peninsula had always been home to bright minds. Many of them lived in the Renaissance. Among them was Girolamo Mercuriale (1530–1606) who published the widely acclaimed work entitled ‘De Arte Gymnastica’. It comprised six books. The first edition hit the shelves in 1569, after several years of antiquarian study. At that time, Mercuriale worked as a physician at the court and under the patronage of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese in Rome.
The late Renaissance was also the stormy time of Counter-Reformation. Mercuriale was perhaps the most famous Italian physician of his generation. And he certainly knew that the best place to hide anything is in plain sight. No clue if he made use of this secret sauce. Anyway, his opus magnum unlocked the gates for him to pursue an academic career. Consequently, all subsequent editions appeared during his tenure at the universities in Padua, Bologna, and Pisa — still no further than one or two steps away from the scrutiny of church authorities.
Although the Greek verb ‘gymnazo’ means ‘to train naked’ (the ancient code of conduct required the athletes to exercise and compete without clothing) the title of Mercuriale’s medical compendium should rather be translated into ‘The Art of Physical Exercise’. It represents the most comprehensive historical coverage of the physical culture of its time including the interpretation of recent concepts through the lens of ancient beliefs — among them those of Hippocrates, Aristotle, Claudius Galenus, and other proponents of the prevailing medical tradition.
Mercuriale’s erudition helped to produce an illustrated masterpiece that was quite different from what was available before. Especially with the elite of Rome in mind, he aimed to revive and to re-establish medical gymnastics for preventive (as was hygiene, the healthcare’s backbone established by Claudius Galenus) and therapeutic purposes alike. And he precisely separated it from mundane physical activities including work, military gymnastics, and — as he was convinced of — from the detrimental athletic gymnastics. Moreover, he positioned medical gymnastics as a sort of pre-science to let physicians enjoy unquestioned authority over athletes and their trainers.
Interestingly, a great deal of his advice involved limitations and warnings. Mercuriale argued at length that health benefits can only unfold if physical exercises are prescribed by an educated physician. Subsequently, the prescription must be strictly followed by the patient. He rephrased this argument by making clear that without an individualized exercise prescription defined by a competent physician none of the various physical activities available at hand can be considered to be a sufficient health intervention at all. In addition, an unprescribed exercise intervention, he wrote, can neither be considered powerful enough to mitigate the symptoms of the health issue nor can it have a positive effect on the internal causes.
By providing an analogy he made the point that just like in the case of any pharmaceutical treatment — where the proper chemical or herbal drug composition, dosage, and timing all do matter — if the patient violates the prescribed proper set of selected exercises, its intensity or duration, the bespoke regimen cannot lead to any of the expected health benefits. Mercuriale also justified his belief, with all due caution of course, that his medical gymnastics approach under certain circumstances and conditions is likely to outperform any known pharmaceutical remedy (mercury pills were en vogue at that time, though used for completely different purposes) or surgical intervention (the infamous bloodletting for instance).
We cannot be sure here but maybe this insight gave him a push to look at medical gymnastics as a stand-alone solution instead of making it an integral part of a fully-fledged clinical treatment that Claudius Galenus suggested. Or maybe he just decided to focus on medical gymnastics as a complementary part of hygiene and intentionally omitted the bigger picture of preventive measures altogether. Diet was the most popular health topic at his time. And physical exercises were somewhat neglected.
The pre-scientific nature and encyclopedic style of Mercuriale’s medical compendium made it a handy and super practical reference for physicians. He presented in all analytical detail a wide array of different physical exercises (together with the relevant equipment) ranging from running, jumping, swimming, and riding through ball games and weightlifting to boxing, wrestling, and even dancing and hunting — to enumerate only some of them. All exercise descriptions included a section on their benefits and drawbacks. They also included anecdotes and allusions to outline all the principles and rules underpinning his medical approach to gymnastics with moderation and body aesthetics constituting its centerpieces. Amid plenty of reservations to be found throughout the text, walking was the only form of exercise that Mercuriale unambiguously approved.
And above all, health was the only purpose. Skills and aesthetics came second. Mercuriale made this very clear in the blueprint of a gym-like place which he designed based on what he knew from a vast range of texts and artifacts about the ancient Greek gymnasium and Roman palaestra. Architectural design and functional division had to put health first. However, he did not exclude other places to be equally appropriate for medical gymnastics provided that such places fulfilled the requirements he defined as crucial.
We can take for granted that Mercuriale followed the path of Claudius Galenus who walked in the shoes of Hippocrates. But it was Mercuriale who distilled all prior knowledge into an authoritative framework with the main objective to facilitate physicians so they can (whenever required) devise an informed prescription from a set of predefined and generic physical exercises. When individualized and put together into a workout regimen the very specific exercises were expected to turn into the right measure aimed at tackling the health issue of the patient if she only followed the advice.
We can detect two advancements in Mercuriale’s work, especially when his fundamental concepts are compared with those from antiquity. First, medical gymnastics became integral to the practice of physicians. And second, the workout routine became something like a key success factor of this medical specialization.
Main source: Nancy G. Siraisi (2003) History, Antiquarianism, and Medicine: The Case of Girolamo Mercuriale. Journal of the History of Ideas, 64(2), pp. 231–251.
