I’m currently watching Roman Empire on Netflix. Apparently Caligula was in a coma for three months. How was he(or anyone in a coma during this time period) able to survive without modern medicine and not die of dehydration or starvation?

by ask_me_about_frank

I never post so I’m sorry if this is the wrong place/etc

DanKensington

Caligula and his coma has been asked about before, but received no surviving responses. In the meanwhile, I did turn up some answers regarding comatose care before modern medicine:

A now-deleted user offers the medical side of things in this thread.

u/jpallan offers insight on Henry VI in this thread.

And bonus: u/itsallfolklore has a post on how the comatose were socially regarded; not directly medical, but related and interesting.