During times of war and plague, barber surgeons provide medical interventions. Astrologer-physicians look to astrological charts to treat their patients. And groundbreaking surgical practices arise from an innovative figure in ancient India.

A Roman shipwreck reveals the oldest known medical tablets, poppy-shaped jars in a Canaanite tomb trace the roots of opioid use and a Stone Age skeleton with an amputated leg challenges our understanding of prehistoric medicine.

Royal relics expose a healing ritual once believed to cure with a touch. An ancient skull reveals how far healers go to fight leprosy. And new evidence from Egypt reveals how early medicine confronted cancer.