Galen postage stamp from the Yemen Arab Republic, 1966. Galen (131-201) was born in Asia Minor. After receiving medical training in Smyrna and Alexandria, he gained fame as a surgeon to the gladiators of Pergamos. He was summoned to Rome to be the physician of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius and spent the rest of his life at the Court writing an enormous corpus of medical works. Taking Hippocrates' notions of the humors and pathology, he incorporated the anatomical knowledge of noted Alexandrians. A supporter of observation and reasoning, he was one of the first experimental physiologists, researching the function of the kidneys and the spinal cord in controlled experiments. His works came to symbolize Greek medicine to the medical scholars of Europe and the Middle East for the next 15 centuries. The most accomplished of all medical researchers of antiquity, he contributed greatly to the understanding of many scientific disciplines including anatomy, physiology, pathology, pharmacology, neurology, philosophy, and logic.