"Respectful image": revenge of the barber surgeon.

Abstract

Although some separation of surgery from the practice of medicine had begun to develop in early medieval times, this was accentuated in 1215 by the Fourth Lateran Council, a papal edict which forbade physicians (most of whom where clergy) from performing surgical procedures, as contact with blood or body fluids was viewed as contaminating to men of the church. As a result, the practice of surgery was relegated to craft status with training by apprenticeship through guilds. Physicians followed a university-directed program of education, which involved knowledge of the classics and writings of ancient medical authors such as those by Galen, which allowed no independent thought or inquiry. Competition among physicians and surgeons, including the lowest group of surgical practitioners, the barbers, continued until Henry VIII signed a charter in 1540 uniting barbers and surgeons in London. This Guild of Barbers and Surgeons, forerunner of the Royal College of Surgeons, established a regulatory agency for training and certification of surgical practice, which set the stage for legitimizing surgery as a profession.