Horses in the Hippiatrika as Individualised Patients in the Medical Encounter

This paper examines Theomnestos’s case histories in the Hippiatrika as rare clinical narratives that position horses as individualised patients in the medical encounter. His accounts reveal a distinct concern for equine welfare, emphasising emotional connection, responsibility of human caretakers, and the moral dimensions of treatment. By presenting horses as beings capable of suffering and in need of compassionate care, the Hippiatrika foreground their hypostasis, their concrete presence as subjects rather than interchangeable livestock. These narratives thus invite us to reconsider the ethical and affective dynamics that structured human–animal medical relationships in Byzantium.