Philistion of Locri was a physician

Physician

A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...

 and writer on medicine

Medicine

Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....

 who lived in the 4th century BC.

He was a native of Locri

Locri

Locri is a town and comune in the province of Reggio Calabria, Calabria, southern Italy. The name derives from the ancient Greek town Locris.-History:...

 in Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, but was also referred to as "the Sicilian." He was tutor to the physician Chrysippus of Cnidos

Chrysippus of Cnidos

Chrysippus of Cnidos was a Greek physician. He was the son of Erineus, and a contemporary of Praxagoras, a pupil of Eudoxus of Cnidos and Philistion of Locri, father of Chrysippus the physician to Ptolemy Soter, and tutor to Erasistratus, Aristogenes, Medius, and Metrodorus. He accompanied his...

, and the astronomer and physician Eudoxus

Eudoxus of Cnidus

Eudoxus of Cnidus was a Greek astronomer, mathematician, scholar and student of Plato. Since all his own works are lost, our knowledge of him is obtained from secondary sources, such as Aratus's poem on astronomy...

, and therefore must have lived in the 4th century BC. He was one of those who defended the opinion that what is drunk goes into the lungs. Some ancient writers attributed to Philistion the treatise De Salubri Victus Ratione, and also the De Victus Ratione, both of which form part of the Hippocratic collection. By some persons he was considered one of the founders of the Empiric school

Empiric school

The Empiric school of medicine was an ancient school of medicine in ancient Greece and Rome. They were so called from the word empeiria because they professed to derive their knowledge from experiences only, and in doing so set themselves in opposition to the Dogmatic school...

. He wrote a work on materia medica, and on Cookery, and is several times quoted by Pliny

Pliny the Elder

Gaius Plinius Secundus , better known as Pliny the Elder, was a Roman author, naturalist, and natural philosopher, as well as naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and personal friend of the emperor Vespasian...

, and Galen

Galen

Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus , better known as Galen of Pergamon , was a prominent Roman physician, surgeon and philosopher...

. Oribasius

Oribasius

Oribasius or Oreibasius was a Greek medical writer and the personal physician of the Roman emperor Julian the Apostate. He studied at Alexandria under physician Zeno of Cyprus before joining Julian's retinue. He was involved in Julian's coronation in 361, and remained with the emperor until...

 attributes to him the invention of a machine for restoring dislocations of the humerus

Humerus

The humerus is a long bone in the arm or forelimb that runs from the shoulder to the elbow....

.

A brother of Philistion, who was also a physician, but whose name is not known, is quoted by Caelius Aurelianus

Caelius Aurelianus

Caelius Aurelianus of Sicca in Numidia was a Roman physician and writer on medical topics. He is best known for his translation from Greek to Latin of a work by Soranus of Ephesus, On Acute and Chronic Diseases. He probably flourished in the 5th century, although some place him two or even three...

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