Mesoamerican Medicine encompasses the healing traditions of the Aztec (Nahua), Maya, Zapotec, and other Mesoamerican civilizations. It integrated sophisticated botanical knowledge with a spiritual-cosmological framework. The Aztec pharmacopoeia contained over 3,000 medicinal plants, many still used in Mexican traditional medicine today.
Ask about this tradition12
Conditions
10
Treatments
30
Evidence Records
7
Sources Used
First medical text written in the Americas — herbal pharmacopoeia of Aztec medicine with color illustrations
Comprehensive ethnographic documentation of Aztec medical knowledge, materia medica, and healing practices
Maya medical-ritual text with incantations and herbal treatments for disease
Determination of whether the disease is caliente (hot) or frío (cold) through symptom pattern, guiding selection of opposing remedy
Aztec physicians read the pulse, though methods differed from Chinese/Greek systems. Used to assess the state of the teyolía (heart-soul).
The 260-day sacred calendar used to determine auspicious and inauspicious days for treatment, and to identify spiritual causes of illness