Was there PTSD in the ancient or medieval world?

Re:Was there PTSD in the ancient or medieval world? by SAI_Peregrinus on Monday April 27, 2020 @10:14AM (#22995993)

Also concussive blast damage was far, far more common from WW1 than in any previous war. The Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) caused by blast damage isn't externally visible, but is responsible for some of the common symptoms of PTSD[1]. We know there are forms of PTSD unrelated to blast-based TBI, but it's quite possible that pre-WWI soliders didn't experience PTSD as much because there weren't as many explosions. Combined with different social views & more traumatic lifestyles the (non-physical injury) trauma of war wouldn't be as great.

Also, surviving a battle injury was far less common before the discovery of antibiotics and the germ theory of disease. Infection from relatively minor wounds caused a much higher death rate. So the surviving soldiers were less likely to have experienced physical trauma and lived long enough to make it into accounts of their behavior afterwards.

[1] https://blastinjuryresearch.amedd.army.mil/assets/docs/newsH...

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Was there PTSD in the ancient or medieval world? by marcus_holmes on Monday April 27, 2020 @11:29AM (#22996757)

I'm always dubious about this. "Decimation" was a horrific thing, inflicted on Roman Legions as punishment for cowardice. It meant killing one out of every ten soldiers. So it seems to me that that's the extreme upper bound of casualties - 10%. Anything more and running away to face decimation would improve your odds.

But the survivors might well have trauma from their actions not their injuries. Hacking another human to death is traumatic for normal people. The survivors would also have survivor guilt.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Was there PTSD in the ancient or medieval world? by csours on Monday April 27, 2020 @12:16PM (#22997215)

I think you also have to consider the fact that throughout history, the individual outcome of battles for most soldiers has been survival - either you win, flee, or become a prisoner. People did die, for sure, but maybe not as many as we imagine.

I wonder how much video games have do to with this perception? In a video game, you have a Kill-Death ratio, not a Kill-Death-Prisoner-Flee-Serious Injury-Light Injury ratio (I know some games have a more sophisticated model, but still).

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Was there PTSD in the ancient or medieval world? by pjc50 on Monday April 27, 2020 @01:16PM (#22997782)

Or disease or desertion. The majority of Napoleon's troops in the famous Tufte diagram were not lost in battle. The Boer war similarly lost more to disease than combat.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Was there PTSD in the ancient or medieval world? by csours on Monday April 27, 2020 @01:54PM (#22998170)

Yup. I think of the Battle of the Bulge this way as well. It's much easier for Americans to identify with the Battle of the Bulge because we have access to many more dramatizations of it, but it was only a hint of what was going on on the Eastern front!

[ Parent | on HN ]