Facets

1467

#2190

De sermonum proprietate sive Opus de universo.

Also known as De rerum naturis. This dictionary or encyclopedia is the earliest known printed book to include a section dealing with medicine, and this brief section, Book 18, Chap. V concerning medicine and diseases,…

1471

#1789

Antidotarium. Add: Quid pro quo; Synonyma.

This work, which first circulated in manuscript in 1140, was the first formulary to be printed. It consists of 139 prescriptions and includes the original formula for the “anesthetic sponge” (spongia somnifera), the e…

1472

#2070

Conciliator differentiarum philosophorum et medicorum. Add: De venenis.

Includes the first printed book on toxicology; one of the more elegantly printed of medical incunabula, printed in folio format. For an English translation, see Ann. med. Hist., 1924, 6, 26-53. ISTC No. ip00431000. Di…

1474

#7151

Liber pandectarum medicinae.

An encyclopedia of medicines, mostly derived from plants, completed about the year 1317. The medicines are arranged in alphabetical order. Two printed editions were issued in 1474. The first, issued in Naples, appeare…

1475

#276.1

Buch der Natur.

The first printed book to contain illustrations of animals, and the first notable scientific book in German. It discusses animals, birds, fish, anatomy, physiology, plagues, the medicinal value of plants and stones, e…

1477

#1791

De viribus herbarum carmen.

De viribus herbarum carmen has been attributed to Macer Floridus, a pseudonym of Odo of Meung, who lived in the Loire area of France towards the end of the eleventh century. Macer's unillustrated text described the me…

c. 1477 –c. 1483

#1959.3

Regimen sanitatis Salernitanum (With commentary by [Pseudo-Arnoldus de Villa Nova]). Add: Arnoldus de Villa Nova: Regimen sanitatis ad regem Aragonum.

Probably originating about 1160, the Regimen sanitatis from the medical school at Salerno (where medicine was first treated as a separate science) had greater popular influence than virtually any other medieval medica…

1478

#1959.2

Von Bewahrung und Bereitung der Weine.

The first printed book on wine, its production and preservation, translated from the Latin by Wilhelm von Hirnkofen. It discusses the value of wine in diet and as a medication. Wine has been called the oldest document…

1481

#6313

Liber ad Almansorem sive Tractatus medicinae I-X. Add: Liber divisionum; De aegritudinibus juncturarum; De aegritudinibus puerorum; De secretis sive aphorismi; De sectionibus et ventosis; Synonyma. Galenus: De medicinis experimentatis. Mesue (the elder): Aphorismi. Hippocrates: secreta; Capsula eburnea; De humana natura; De aere et aqua et regionibus; De pharmaciis. Tabula de herbis medicis.

Rhazes was the first to devote an entire treatise to diseases of children. Although he lived so many years before the advent of printing, he was still regarded as an authority in the 15th century and his works were am…

c. 1481 –c. 1482

#6811

Herbarium Apulei.

The first printed herbal with illustrations was an illustrated edition of the Herbarium Apulei by Apuleius Platonicus or Pseudo-Apuleius, originally compiled circa 400 CE or earlier, and issued in Rome by the printer …

1483

#1783

De historia et causis plantarum. Edited, with a table, by Georgius Merula. Translated by Theodorus Gaza.

A student of Aristotle, Theophrastus succeeded his teacher as head of the Athens Peripatetic School. This is the earliest work of scientific botany, a subject not addressed in any of the writings of Aristotle. Theophr…

1485

#14113

De balneis et thermis naturalibus omnibus Italiae.

The second printed book on balneology. Savonarola took a skeptical approach to the subject, relying on his own observations and rejecting the notion that baths owed their virtues to occult or supernatural properties. …

1487

#1961

De particularibus diaetis.

The first separately printed treatise on diet was written by the Egyptian-Jewish physician and philosopher Isaac Judaeus who lived from about 832 to 932 CE. He was also known as Isaac Israeli ben Solomon and Abu Ya'qu…

1490

#47

Liber Teisir, sive rectificatio medicationis et regiminis. Antidotarium. Translated from Arabic into Hebrew by Jacobus Hebraeus; into Latin by Paravicius. Add: Averroes: Colliget.

This is a Latin translation from a Hebrew version dating from 1280. Avenzoar, the greatest Muslim physician of the Western Caliphate, described the itch-mite, Sarcoptes scabiei, serous pericarditis, mediastinal absces…

1492

#1960

Thesaurus pauperum. [Italian:] Tesoro de poveri. Tr: Zucchero Bencivenni.

One of the most popular medical books of the Middle Ages; first written about 1260. After its first printing about 1492 it was reprinted many times in the next 100 years. "Petrus Hispanus was the only practicing physi…

1492

#7791

De venenis. Ed: Dominicus de Canali.

Compiled in the years, 1424-1426, from Greek, Arabic and Latin works on medicine and nature. "Although Ardoini quotes previous authors at great length, his work is no mere compilation, since he does not hesitate to di…

1495 –1498

#8395

Aristotle. [Opera omnia]. 5 vols.

Between November 1495 and June 1498 scholar printer Aldus Manutius (Teobaldo Mannucci) of Venice issued the first edition in the original Greek of Aristotle's Opera omnia. The set appeared in five thick quarto or smal…

1497

#1790

Breviarium medicinae. Tr: Gerardus Cremonensis. Add: Serapion the Younger: In medicinis simplicibus. Tr: Simon a Cordo Januensis and Abraham Judaeus Tortuosiensis. Galenus: De virtute centaureae; Johannes Platearius: Practica brevis; Matthaeus Platearius: De simplici medicina "Circa instans".

Serapion the Elder and Serapion the Younger were Syrian Christians who wrote in Arabic. Breviarum medicinae was an abridgement of the opinions of the Greek and Arabic physicians concerning diseases and their treatment…

1498

#12925

Chirurgia. Add: Brunus Longoburgensis: Chirurgia magna et minor; Bonaventura de Castello: Recepta aquae balnei de Porrecta; Theodoricus Cerviensis: Chirurgia; Rolandus: Libellus de chirurgia; Lanfrancus Mediolanensis: Chirurgia; Rogerius: Practica; Leonardus Bertapalia: Recollectae super quarto libro Avicennae.

This late 15th century edition of the surgery of Guy de Chauliac also contained the first printed editions of various lesser-known medieval surgeries such as those by Bruno da Longoburgo and Leonardo Bertapaglia. It a…

1499

#2069

Dioscorides, De materia medica [Greek]. Add: Pseudo- Dioscorides, De venenis, De venenatis animalibus [Greek]; Add: Nicander, Theriaca; Add: Alexipharmaca; Scholia [Greek].

Nicander was a Greek poet and physician. His Theriaca, in 958 hexameters, dealt with the symptoms and treatment of poisoning by the bites of poisonous animals; the Alexipharmaca considered intoxications through animal…

1509

#8445

Medicinae Pliniae libri quinque finiunt foeliciter.

The Medicina Plinii was an anonymous compilation of remedies dating to the early 4th century CE ."The excerptor, saying that he speaks from experience, offers the work as a compact resource for travelers in dealing wi…

1525

#1799

Here begynnyth a new mater, the whiche sheweth and treateth of ye vertues & proprytes of herbes, the whiche is called an Herball.

BANCKES' HERBAL

Earliest English printed herbal. Published anonymously, it is usually referred to as “Banckes’ Herbal”, after its publisher, Rycharde Banckes. The text was derived from a medieval manuscript, and although the work had…

1529

#1959.1

Caelii Aureliani Siccensis Tardarum passionum libri V. D. Oribasii Sardi Iuliani Caesaris archiatri Euporiston lib: III. Medicinae comperi: lib: 1. Curationum lib: 1. Trochiscoru confect: lib: 1.

From a clinical point of view, the two works of Caelius Aurelianus, which were translated into Latin from Greek originals by Soranus of Ephesus that were later lost, represent the high-point of Graeco-Roman medical ac…

1533

#9863

En nyttelig laegebog for fattige og rige, unge og gamle.

Pedersen, a Danish canon, humanist scholar, writer, printer and publisher, wrote and published the earliest medical book issued in Scandanavia by a Scandanavian writer. Translated as "A useful doctor book for poor and…

1534

#9864

Om UrteVand.

Petersen issued a second book, "On herbal extracts" in 1534. According to Stokker, Remedies and rituals: Folk medicine in Norway and the new land (2007) p. 111, Pedersen's two works together contained "250 medical her…

1539

#1806

New Kreütter Buch.

Bock was the first to describe the local flora of Germany, discovering many new species. His work gave a fresh impetus to plant description, With Brunfels and Fuchs he was one of the three “German fathers of botany”. …

1546

#9865

Skøn lystig ny Urtegaard.

Smid was one of the first writers on medicine in Scandinavia who was trained in medicine, but according to Stokker, Remedies and rituals: folk medicine in Norway and the new land (2007) p. 111 "had trouble succeeding …

1554

#1812

Cruÿdeboeck.

Dodoens was the first Belgian botanist of international repute. Drawing on the illustrations of Fuchs, but preparing his own text, Dodoens improved on the alphabetical Fuchs organization scheme by grouping plants acco…

1564

#1816

Enchiridion, sive ut vulgo vocant dispensatorium, compositorum medicamentorum, pro Reipub. Augstburgensis pharmacopoeis.

One of the earliest pharmacopeias, and one which exerted a great influence on later pharmacopeias. Several new editions followed the first, and that of 1613 was adopted as the official pharmacopeia of Augsburg, the fa…

1567

#9053

Secretos de chirurgia, en especial de la enfermedades de morbo-galico y lamparones, y asimismo la manera como se curan los indos las llgas y heridas, y otras pasiones en las Indias, muy útil y provechoso par España, y otros muchos secretos de chirugia hasta ahora no escritos.

Arias de Benevides travelled to the New World where he observed native remedies and reported them in this book. In the book he also described his performance in Mexico City (1561) of the first neurosurgical interventi…

1569

#1986.1

Artis gymnasticae apud antiquos celeberrimae, nostris temporibus ignoratae.

A history, based on extensive study of the classical literature, of the attitudes and practices of the Greeks and Romans concerning diet, hygiene, bathing, and exercise. This is one of the earliest books to discuss th…

1578

#1819

Tractado de las drogas, y medicinas de las Indias Orientales, con sus plantas debuxadas al bivo.

This is mainly a translation of Garcia d’Orta’s Coloquios (No. 1815) with the addition of some illustrations. Acosta, a Portuguese Jesuit physician and surgeon, travelled to India where he met Garcia d’Orta. Acosta pi…

1582

#7327

Aigentlich Beschreibung der Raiss, so er vor diser Zeit gegen Auffgang inn die Morgenländer, fürnemlich Syriam, Iudaeam, Arabiam, Mesopotamiam, Babyloniam, Assyriam, Armeniam etc....

Rauwolf provided the first modern descriptions of the flora of the area east of the Levantine coast. He was also the first to describe the riparian flora of the Euphrates, and the first European to publish an account …

1591

#13351

L'horto dei semplici di Padova, oue si vede primieramente la forma di tutta la pianta con le sue misure: & indi i suoi partimenti distinti per numeri in ciascuna arella, intagliato in rame.

First catalogue of the Orto botanico di Padova, the oldest academic botanical garden that remains in its original location., Digital facsimile from fc.cab.unipd.it at this link.

1598

#13347

Onomatologia, seu nomenclatura stirpium quae in Horto Regio Monspeliensi recens constructo coluntur.

The first catalogue of medicinal plants in the Jardin des plantes de Montpellier, founded by Richer de Belleval in 1593. This was the first medical botanical garden in France. Reprinted in Opuscules de Pierre Richer d…

1629

#1822

Paradisi in sole paradisus terrestris. Or a garden of all sorts of pleasant flowers which our English ayre will permitt to be noursed vp: with a kitchen garden of all manner of herbes, rootes, & fruites, for meate or sause vsed with vs, and an orchard of all sorte of fruitbearing trees and shrubbes fit for our land together with the right orderinge planting & preseruing of them and their vses & vertues.

The title is a pun on the author’s name (park-in-sun). Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

1636

#12135

Pharmacopoea Amstelredamensis, Senatus auctoritate munita. [Edited by Nicolaes Tulp.]

Tulp was both a surgeon and mayor of Amsterdam. As such he was responsible for inspections of apothecary shops. Thanks to new shipping routes, pharmacists in Amsterdam had access to many exotic herbs and spices from t…

1640

#1823

Theatrum botanicum: The theater of plants: Or, An herball of large extent: containing therein a more ample and exact history and declaration of the physicall herbs and plants ... distributed into sundry classes or tribes, for the more easie knowledge of the many herbes of one nature and property ... / collected by the many yeares travaile, industry and experience in this subject.

Parkinson, the last of the old English herbalists, was Apothecary to James I. His massive herbal of 1,755 pages described nearly 3,800 plants, nearly double the number described in the first edition of Gerard. Parkins…

1640

#13346

L'ouverture du Jardin Royal de Paris, pour la demonstration des plantes medecinales.

La Brosse founded the Jardin des Plantes (originally Jardin du Roi), the first botanical garden in Paris. It was the second garden of this type in France, after the Jardin des plantes de Montpellier founded in 1593. D…

1641

#12811

Pharmacopoeia Bruxellensis: Jussu amplissimi senatus edita.

The first Brussels pharmacopeia, modeled after the first Paris pharmacopeia. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1652

#8588

The English physitian: Or, an astrologo-physical discourse of the vulgar herbs of this nation. Being a compleat method of physick, whereby a man may preserve his body in health; or cure himself, being sick, for three pence charge, with such things only as grow in England, as they being most fit for English bodies. Herein is also shewed, 1. The way of making plaisters, oyntments, oyls, pultisses, syrups, julips, or waters, of all sorts of physical herbs, that you may have them readie for your use at all times of the yeer. 2. What planet governeth every herb or tree (used in physick) that groweth in England. 3. The time of gathering all herbs, both vulgarly, and astrologically. 4. The way of drying and keeping the herbs all the yeer. 5. The way of keeping their juyces ready for use at all times. 6. The way of making and keeping all kind of useful compounds made of herbs. 7. The way of mixing medicines, according to cause and mixture of the disease, and part of the body afflicted.

"Culpeper attempted to make medical treatments more accessible to laypersons by educating them about maintaining their health. Ultimately his ambition was to reform the system of medicine by questioning traditional me…

1670

#9286

Catalogus plantarum Angliae, et insularum adjacentium: tum indigenas, tum in agris passim cultas complectens.

Includes some ethnobotanical notes regarding medical remedies. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1671

#12881

Thermarum Aquisgranensium et porcetanarum descriptio. Congruorum quoque ac salubrium usuum balneationis et potationis elucidatio, opera.

An extenisvely illustrated work promoting the medicinal value of the sulphur springs of Aachen and Burscheid. Blondel devoted his life to the promotion of the medicinal value of these springs, becoming inspector of th…

1683

#13076

Hortus medicus Edinburgensis, or, A catalogue of the plants in the Physical Garden at Edinburgh: Containing their most proper Latin and English names; with an English alphabetical index.

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

1690

#11472

Florae Lugduno-Batavae flores sive enumeratio stirpium horti Lugduno-Batavi methodo, naturae vestigiis isistente, dispositarum, & anno 1689 in lectionibus tam publicis quam privatis expositarum a Paulo Hermann. Nunc vero in gratiam botanophilorum primum in lucem editarum opera Lothari Zumbach.

In this treatise on the flowering plants in the Hortus Botanicus Leiden Hermann coined the term Angiospermae as the name of one of his primary divisions of the plant kingdom. This division included flowering plants po…

1694

#8930

Trattado unico da constituiçam pestilencial de Pernambuco, offerecido a ElRey N.S. por ser servido ordenar por seu Governador aos Medicos da America, que assistem aonde ha este contagio, que o compusessem para se conferirem pelos Coripheos da Medicina aos dictames com que he trattada esta pestilencial febre.

The first scientific description of yellow fever in Brazil by the first European physician to treat the disease in Brazil, and perhaps in all of Latin America. It includes the description of the first autopsy of a yel…

1698

#11471

Paradisus Batavus, continens plus centum plantas affabrè aere incisas & descriptionibus illustratas. Cui accesit catalogus plantarum, quas pro tomis nondum editis, delineandas curaverat Paulus Hermannus, M. D. In Academia Lugduno-Batava nuper medicinae ac botanices professor. Opus posthumum.

Catalogue of the plants in the Hortus Botanicus Leiden, posthumously edited from Hermann's unpublished manuscript, and reproducing 111 of Hermann's botanical illustrations, by William Sherard. Digital facsimile from R…

1703

#8870

A description of the Western Islands of Scotland.: Containing a full account of their situation, extent, soils, product, harbours, bays, tides, anchoring places, and fisheries. The ancient and modern government, religion and customs of the inhabitants, particularly of their druids, heathen temples, monasteries, churches, chappels, antiquities, monuments, forts, caves, and other curiosities of art and nature. Of their admirable and expeditious way of curing most diseases by simples of their own product. A particular account of the second sight, or faculty of forseeing things to come, by way of vision, so common among them. A brief hint of methods to improve trade in that country, both by sea and land. With a new map of the whole, describing the harbours, anchoring places, and dangerous rocks, for the benefit of sailers. To which is added a brief description of the Isles of Orkney, and Schetland.

Martin, who graduated MD from Leiden, included throughout his book detailed and non-judgmental documentation of folk medicine practices and ethnobotanic remedies then in use in the region. Digital facsimile of the 170…

1726

#9073

Aquilegio medicinal em que se dá noticia das agoas de caldas, de fontes, rios, poços, lagoas, e cisternas, do Reyno de Portugal, e dos Algarves, que ou pelas virtudes medicinaes, que tem, ou por outra alguma singularidade, são dignas de particular memoria.

The first inventory of Portuguese hot springs, fountains, rivers, wells, lakes and reservoirs reputed to have medicinal properties, including some with allegedly supernatural powers of healing. For the 337 entries, Fo…

1739

#11613

Pharmacopoeia Matritensis, Regii, ac Supremi Hispaniarum protomedicatus auctoritate, jussu atque auspiciis nunc primum elaborata.

The first national pharmacopoeia issued in Spain, also controlling drug preparation and use for the Spanish empire. It included botanical, mineral and animal substances, and substances obtained from the Spanish empire…