The oldest Persian accounts of Ātašak (The outbreak of syphilis in Iran and the influence received by Iranian physicians from European sources)

Following the Italian War of 1494 (Naples war), a horrendous far-flung disease spread out in Europe, which was later named syphilis. According to the account related by Bahā’ al-Dawla Ḥoseynī Nūrbaḵš (an eminent physician in the late Timurid and early Safavid periods) who called this disease Armanī dāneh (Armenian sore), Ābele-ye farang (European pox) and Ātašak, this disease first surged from the Ottoman Empire territories in 1498 to Azerbaijan, ʿEraq-e Ajam (west and central Iran) and Fars and, then, spread all over Iran. The unique characteristic of Bahā’ al-Dawla’s account in his ḵolāṣat al-Tajāreb, is that, despite the short time span between the writing of the essay and the outbreak of the disease in Europe (only 6 years), he has mentioned one of the medicines prescribed by ḥokamā-ye farang (European physicians). In this manuscript as well as in Bahā’ al-Dawla’s prescriptions and in the observations made by both his contemporary and succeeding physicians, mercury continued to play the principal role until, in the latter half of the 16th century, ʿEmād al-Dīn Šīrāzī prescribed, as herbal remedy for Ātašak, "China wood/root", which had lately entered Iran.