Skin Colour and Humours: Galen as an Interpreter of Hippocrates Epidemics VI 3, 13 and VI 2, 6

Abstract

  In this article I show that Galen interpreted the rich vocabulary related to the skin colour in two passages of Hippocrates’ Epidemics, in the framework of the four humours’ doctrine. In particular the adjective χλωρός (together with its compounds and derivatives) was ‘translated’ by Galen with its equivalent ὠχρός, a colour that Galen uses for bile.