Much of the Western intellectual tradition’s interest in pain can be traced back to Greek material. This book investigates one theme in the interest in physical pain in Greek culture under the Roman Empire. Traditional accounts of pain in the Roman Empire have either focused on philosophical or medical theories of pain or on Christian notions of ‘suffering’; and fascination with the pained body has often been assumed to be a characteristic of Christian society, rather than ancient culture in general. The book uses ideas from medical anthropology, as well as contemporary philosophical discussions and cultural theory, to help unpack the complex engagement with pain in the ancient world. It argues, centrally, that pain was approached as a type of embodied experience, in which ideas about the body’s physiology, its representation, and communication, as well as its emotional and cognitive impact on those who felt pain and others around them, were important aspects of what it meant to be in pain. The formulation of this sense of pain experience is examined across a range of important areas of Imperial Greek culture, including rational medicine, rhetoric, and literature, as well as ancient art criticism. What is common across these disparate areas of cultural activity is the notion that pain must be understood within its broad personal, social, and emotional context.
Variation of the human mu-opioid receptor (OPRM1) gene predicts vulnerability to frustration