The Four Humours

The Four Humours In Greek, Medieval, and Renaissance thought, the traditional four elements form the basis for a theory of medicine and later psychological typology known as the four humours. Each of the humours were associated with various correspondences and particular physical and mental characteristics, and could, moreover, be combined for more complex personality types: (e.g. choleric-sanguine, etc). The result is a system that provides a quite elaborate classification of types of personality.

The Four Humours and Classical Thought In classic times medicine was equated with philosophy and three Greek philosophers Hippocrates  (c.460 – 370 b.c.e.), Plato (427-348 b.c.e.) and Aristotle (384-322 b.c.e.) contributed to the vision of health, disease and the functions of the body. Although they had differences in general they saw health as an equilibrium of the body as determined by the four humors. 

The Four Humours and Classical Thought Cont’d… Sap in plants and the blood in animals is the fount of life. Other body fluids- phlegm, bile, faeces, became visible in illness when the balance is disturbed. For instance, epilepsy, the sacred disease was due to phlegm blocking the airways that caused the body to struggle and convulse to free itself. Mania was due to bile boiling in the brain. Black bile was a late addition to disease theory and was associated with melancholy."

The Four Humours and Unani (Greek-derived Islamic Medicine) Unani is Arabic for Ionian, which means “Greek”. It is a formal medicine that has been practiced for 6,000 years. Also known as “hikmat”, Unani Tibb Medicine was developed by the Greek physician Hippocrates from the medicine and traditions of the ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. Hikmat is still practiced today among Muslims of Xinjiang, China as a part of Uighur medicine in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

The Four Humours and Unani Cont’d Unlike modern Western medicine, Hikmat does not hold to mind-body dualism but is rooted in the understanding that spiritual peace is essential for good health. Unani medicine considers many factors in maintaining health and divides the body in a number of ways to define this wisdom.  The first way that Hikmat defines the body is to describe it in terms of the four humors or akhlaat: air, earth, fire and water emanate from the liver forming a subtle network around the body. In healing, foods and herbs are also classified according to the four humors.

The Four Humours and Unani Cont’d The four humors correspond to four bodily fluids: blood, phlegm, black bile and yellow bile. A typical diagnosis of a patient would take the balance of these humors into consideration. For instance, over-stimulation of wet-hot elements effects nervous biochemical interactions within the body with glandular ramifications within the blood. A wet-cold over-stimulation also effects nervous biochemical interactions but with ramifications for the relationship between the muscular biochemical exchanges and the bloodstream such as diarrhea and diabetes. Excess black bile in the blood leads to heart palpitations and constipation Excess yellow bile leads to general weakness

The Four Humours in Reniassance and Elizabethan Time By this time the humours had become standardized as follows: Humour Body substance produced by Element Qualities Complexion and Body type Personality Sanguine blood liver air hot and moist red-cheeked, corpulent amorous, happy, generous, optimistic, irresponsible Choleric yellow bile spleen fire hot and dry red-haired, thin violent, vengeful, short-tempered, ambitious Phlegmatic phlegm lungs water cold and moist corpulent Sluggish, pallid, cowardly Melancholic black bile gall bladder earth cold and dry sallow, thin Introspective, sentimental, gluttonous

It was though that each of the "humours" gave off vapors which ascended to the brain; an individual's personal characteristics (physical, mental, moral) were explained by his or her "temperament," or the state of that person's "humours." The perfect temperament resulted when no one of these humours dominated. By 1600 it was common to use "humour" as a means of classifying characters; knowledge of the humours is not only important to understanding later medieval work, but essential to interpreting Elizabethan drama

The Four Humours in the Modern World Rudolf Steiner, who derived a lot of his ideas from Graeco- Medieval thought, not unsurprisingly incorporated the humours into his overall synthesis, and he discusses the four temperaments. These are associated with dominance of one or the other of the four levels of self. Choleric with the ego (which Steiner associates with "warmth", hence "fire") The Sanguine with the astral body The Phlegmatic with the etheric body The Melancholic with the physical body

The Four Humours in the Modern World Cont’d… The sequence is from most subtle (fire, traditionally "spirit") to most dense (earth, hence physical) Elements. Steiner's has had less impact than Hans Eysenck (1916-1997) who developed the personality classification. Eysenck took the two gradations of extrovert-introvert and stable-unstable, to come up with four quadrants which could be associated with the classic four temperaments. Each quadrant is also are further divided by keywords, creating a 360ｰ gradation as follows: