What does your urine say about your health? (Medieval Version)

During the Middle Ages, one of ways physicians would check on the health of their patients was to look at their urine. Uroscopies were very popular medieval texts that detailed what health problems one might have depending on the look and smell of someone’s urine. These are excerpts from a text called ‘On Urines’, written by Giles Corbeil around the start of the 13th century.

This translation is part of the book Medieval Medicine: A Reader, edited by Faith Wallis and published by the University of Toronto Press in 2010.

You can learn more about how urine was used in medieval medicine from these articles:

Signs and Senses: Diagnosis and Prognosis in Early Medieval Pulse and Urine Texts

A New Look at the Role of Urinalysis in the History of Diagnostic Medicine

Medical Prognosis in the Middle Ages: William the Englishman’s De urina non visa and its fortune

When Urine is like Snot – Middle English Uroscopy Texts

The Judgement of Urines

Examining urine is also used in modern day medicine – you can learn more about it from de Ketham revisited: a modern-day urine wheel and What Does Your Pee Mean?