Surgeons and barber-surgeons have an interesting history in France, although I don't know how well it correlates to what was happening in the rest of Europe. T

Surgeons and barber-surgeons have an interesting history in France, although I don't know how well it correlates to what was happening in the rest of Europe. There was an official brotherhood of surgeons founded in the 13th c. in Paris, made of highly educated members molded in the scholastic tradition. Newcomers had to go through a commission of peers to be inducted as masters. In parallel, there remained a much more numerous flock of barber-surgeons who weren't well regulated and were for the most part only allowed to do small work. Because the surgeons were both in regular conflict with the medical doctors (who had higher standing) and the barber-surgeons, the medical faculties ended up opening surgical degrees to barber-surgeons in the early 18th c. which led to their disappearance and the consolidation of surgery as a singular discipline.