Sugar and spices in portuguese renaissance medicine

Abstract

The history of medicine in late fifteenth and sixteenth-century Portugal cannot be dissociated from the evolution of the monarchy and overseas expansion. Kings and queens were responsible for changes in the institutional structures of charity, creating new hospitals (especially Nossa Senhora do Pópulo in Caldas and Todos-os-Santos in Lisbon) and a new set of confraternities—the Misericórdias—that would take charge of most hospitals in the kingdom from 1564 onwards. Overseas expansion made possible the transformation of the island of Madeira into one of the main producers of sugar, which was then distributed by private persons and institutions, including charitable ones, forming part of medical treatment for the sick poor. Asian spices, also, became common in public and private pharmacies early in the sixteenth century. Through hospitals, which were linked to the royal network of patronage, substances such as sugar and spices became available to the poor.