CAELIUS

AURELIANUS  , a physician of Sicca in Numidia, who probably flourished in the 5th century A.D., although some place him two or even three centuries earlier . In favour of the later date is the nature of his Latin, which shows a strong tendency to the Romance, and the similarity of his language to that of Cassius Felix, also an African medical writer, who about 450 wrote a short treatise, chiefly based on Galen . We possess a translation by Aurelianus of two works of Soranus of Ephesus (2nd century), the chief of the " methodist " school of medicine, on chronic and acute maladies—Tardae or Chronicae Passiones, in five, and Celeres or Acutae Passiones in three books . The translation, which is especially valuable since the original has been lost, shows that Soranus possessed considerable practical skill in the diagnosis of ordinary and even of exceptional diseases . It is also important as containing numerous references to the methods of earlier medical authorities . We also possess considerable fragments of his Medicinales Responsiones, also adapted from Soranus, a general treatise on medicine in the form of question and answer; it deals with rules of health (salutaria praecepta) and the pathology of internal diseases (ed . Rose, Anecdota Graeca et Latina, ii., 1870) . Where it is possible to compare Aurelianus's translation with the original—as in a fragment of his Gynaecia with Soranus's Hepl ymscuKeicov lIaO& '—it is found that it is literal, but abridged . There is apparently no MS. of the treatises in existence .