ABSTRACT
The earliest known description of the treatment of brain injury is from an Egyptian document of 2500–3000 years ago. The papyrus was discovered by Edwin Smith in Luxor in 1862 (described by Walsh, 1987). It describes the treatment of 48 cases of injury of which 27 were brain trauma cases. It contains the first known descriptions of the cranial structures, the meninges, the external surface of the brain, the cerebrospinal fluid and the intracranial pulsations. The word ‘brain’ appears for the first time in any language. The treatment procedures demonstrate an Egyptian level of knowledge that surpassed that of Hippocrates, who lived 1000 years later. Among the first cases described are a man with a gaping wound in his head penetrating the bone of his skull, rending open the brain. It has to be said, however, that the procedures described in the Smith Papyrus were more about treatment than rehabilitation.
