Early anesthesia can be traced back to ancient times (Babylonians, Greeks, Chinese and Incas), but one of the first European accounts occurred in the 1200s when Theodoric of Lucca, an Italian physician and bishop, "used sponges soaked with opium and mandragora [from the mandrake plant] for surgical pain relief," ...

Where did the term anesthesia come from?

The word "anesthesia", coined by Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809–1894) in 1846 from the Greek ἀν-, an-, "without"; and αἴσθησις, aisthēsis, "sensation", refers to the inhibition of sensation.

What was the first Anaesthetic made from?

Ether (diethyl ether) was the first general anaesthetic to be used widely in surgery. Michael Faraday actually published a report on the sedative and analgesic properties of this volatile and flammable liquid in 1818.