History shows that malaria has always been one of the deadly plagues that have hit the existence of mankind. Because of these there have been various researches on the causes and treatment of this diseases associated with mosquitoes and insects.
Going back to history, ancient people have always attributed malaria to some supernatural source. It was known that the ancient Chinese believed that the issue of malaria was attributed to three demons, one with a hammer, one with a pail of cold water and the other with a stove. There has always been this connection with swampy areas. The ancient Romans believed that the gods responsible for these fever lived within theses marshes.
It is known that that Hippocrates was probably the first malariologist, describing various malaria fever of man and differentiating intermittent malarial fever from the continuous fever of other infectious diseases and giving day to day symptoms temperature rise of the fever on man. His text call the Hippocratic corpus was the first text that stated the changes in malaria and its relationship with the ingestion of stagnant water and its effects and symptoms on man. He did this stating related case its time and location.
A great Greek physician popularly known as Galen worked in Rome from 162 A.D. it was here that he attained a great influence as a great practitioner and a demonstrator of anatomy. His thesis was used and undoubted for about 1500 years. He suggested that for the body to come back to its balance, all the disorders accompanied with malaria is normal. Such disorders like bleeding, vomiting and purging are means the body uses to dispose of its poisons. This of course was not challenged.
The first detailed description of the clinical picture of malaria and its treatment with cinchona was presented in 1696 by Morton.
Another great discovery on malaria was made by an Italian physician named Giovanni Maria Lancisi (1654-1720). He described the spleen in the victims of malaria and the black pigment of the brain. This was also identified by many workers in the nineteenth century. This was also confirmed by the autopsy done by a German physician on an insane patient suffering from fever. The name of this scientist was Heinrich Meckel. He saw a round; spindle shaped structured black pigment in the blood. We can then say he was the first to see malaria but he did not know the importance of his finding.
So many histories has been associated with the discoveries of malaria it is weird enough to know that once a time in Mississippi a person was convicted for murder just because he found malaria pigment in the blood of a dead person. You can think about that.
