A call to reclaim the missing mothers of medicine

From nativity scenes attended by male shepherds and the three wise men, to bearded Santas ho-ho-ho-ing, Christmas features an almost all male cast. However, the season was once associated with many more women. The magi (also known as wise men) may well have included women,1 and girls were commonly involved in shepherding in biblical times. The medieval nativity included midwives, and Italy’s folk figure La Befana, who still brings gifts to children in January, may pre-date Christianity.23 Today, we depict just one woman in the nativity scene, and give the unmistakably male figure of Father Christmas full credit for the largely female labour of giving gifts.4Medicine, too, has erased women from its history, despite the existence of a long lineage of women healers who passed their knowledge and practice, grounded in the natural world, through female generations.56 From Hippocrates to Harvey, we largely remember only the so-called forefathers of medicine….