= Paper =
In this paper, I want to show the influence of the hippocratic treatise On airs, waters, places ((Περὶ ἀέρων, ὑδάτων, τόπων) and Galen’s commentary in particular, on the arabic scientific literature. Of course, we find it in medicine but also in geography. In this field, the Galen’s commentary of hippocratic text determined the base of the theory of geographical determinism, giving a conceptual structure (physic and even physiological) to the influence of the man’s environment. The mediaeval thinkers applied this theory to the humanity and in this context, the hippocratic opposition between Schythians and Egyptians is replaced by the one between Turks and Egyptians or Slaves and Blacks. They used it also to explain the physical constitution and the ethics of a specific population.
