La veine hypocondriaque dans la littérature grecque ancienne et byzantine

• Main Author: Corinne Jouanno
• Format: Article
• Language: fra
• Published: Presses universitaires de Caen 2002-12-01
• Series: Kentron
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/kentron/1986

Bodily deficiencies are given much importance in autobiographical writings and epistolography. Examples drawn from Greek works (by Aelius Aristides, Libanius) or Byzantine ones (by Theophylact, Gregory Antiochos, Chortasmenos) show how deeply influenced by literary models ancient and medieval authors may be, when speaking about their own diseases: there is a rhetoric of the suffering self, whose influence upon individuals appears to be somewhat compelling. Otherwise it is noticeable that literary displays of hypochondria become more prominent at times of intensified interest in medicine – which are perhaps also times of secularization, when one begins to care for bodily health more than for salvation.