Girolamo Fracastoro and the Origin of the Etymology of Syphilis

Abstract

In 1530, Girolamo Fracastoro, an illustrious Italian physician and poet, published a book about a disease that was then known as the “ French disease ” , which he named <i> syphilis </i> . Fracastoro’s book, <i> Syphilis sive morbus Gallicus </i> , was written as a poem in hexameters verses, using figures from Greek mythology that provided facts about the Spanish discovery of the New World in 1492. A thorough literature review of the historical facts and mythological figures mentioned in Fracastoro’s book enabled us to complete an in-depth analysis of the poem and understand some its smallest details. Hence, we propose a new hypothesis that the origin of the term Syphilis is based on the name Sypilus as well as the appearance of people who suffer from the disease.