What did the ancient people believe about kidneys?
In this article, we will discuss what did the ancient people believe about kidneys.
Although renal disease has been present for over 200 millennia of Homo sapiens’ existence, knowledge of the causes and management of these disorders has only emerged during the last 4000 years.
Important insights into human disease have emerged from time-to-time over the long period of human existence, but deeper understanding could only be advanced after writing began in about 3200 BC.
Humans could then make observations, record these thoughts, and have others in their present and future – leading to improvement in information and understanding.
Mesopotamia
Some of the earliest knowledge about kidney and urinary diseases comes from the cradle of Western civilisation, Mesopotamia, from the cuneiform clay tablets of Akkadia, Assyria, and Babylon. They contain references to urinary obstruction, stone, cysts, urethritis, stricture, and urethral discharge.
In ancient Babylon, ‘physicians’ made diagnoses depending on whether the urine looked like paint, wine dregs, beer, or beet juice. As was common with ancient humans, therapy for renal disease was based on the use of available plants or minerals.
They administered drugs by blowing them through a tube into the urethra, most likely also to relieve urinary obstruction, and used alcohol as an anaesthetic.
In the 13th century BC, an early model of a kidney has been found in Kition (Cyprus). It resembles similar findings from Mesopotamia. Historians have interpreted the Kition model to be either an offering to the Gods of the local temple by an individual with renal disease; or a teaching aid for novices used by priest-doctors of the temple.
Votive bronze replica of a kidney found at Kition (Cyprus) dating from the 13th century BC.
Egypt
Modern medicine (i.e. of Western civilisation) often dates its knowledge starting with Egyptian physicians, whose work was reflected in a classic medical document of antiquity – the Ebers Papyrus (1550 BC).
Ebers Papyrus (1550 BC)
Understanding of medicine at this time was stimulated by the German Egyptologist Georg Ebers (1837-1989) who discovered the Ebers Papyrus in 1875; it dates back to the reign of Amenophis I, the second King of the 18th Dynasty.
Furthermore studies of the Egyptian mummies illustrate humans with kidney disease that includes renal cysts and stones. There was a recommendation of using ointments made from cooked old papyri books in oil to improve a condition involving fluid retention (dropsy).
They also wrote about red urine, as schistosomiasis‑induced haematuria was common then (as now) because of Schistosoma haematobium eggs implanted in the bladder wall. This disease was (and is) common in Egypt, as exposure to schistosomes is highest in slow-moving water near riverbanks, such as the River Nile.
There is also evidence that ancient Egyptian ‘physicians’ dealt with patients having dysuria, urinary frequency (including nocturnal enuresis), and urinary retention.
Although they had minimal recognition of the function of the kidneys, they concluded that kidneys were important for human beings. For example, kidneys were linked to the heart in the famous Egyptian ‘Book of the Dead’ (1550‑50 BC), which was used to assist the dead in their proposed afterlife.
Important people were mummified and all organs were removed, except the heart and the kidneys. The heart was identified as the centre of human thought (as well as emotion and memory); and in the afterlife, it was weighed on what was called the ‘Scale of Maat’ and compared to the weight of the ‘feature of truth’ by the jackal‑headed Anubis.
The result was recorded by the ibis‑headed Thoth, who was the scribe for the Egyptian Gods, and if the result was good (i.e. the heart weighed the same as the feature of truth), the person was allowed to enter the afterlife in a positive manner.
With advances in modern physiology and medicine, we now know that the heart and kidneys are both very important, and their functions (and diseases) are intrinsically related.
Summary
We have described some of what ancient people believed about kidneys. We have described the importance of the kidneys to the Ancient Babylonians and Egyptians. There is a more complete history in the references below. We hope you have found it interesting.
Other resources
History of nephrology and transplantation timeline
This is a good review paper (on which this article is partly based): Greydanus, 2016
Acute Renal Failure according to Ancient Greek and Byzantine medical writers (Marketos, 1993)
History of nephrology: beginnings (Dunea, 2017)
Ancient Egyptian medicine (Metwaly, 2021)
Last Reviewed on 1 May 2024