1760–1769

1765

#1766.5

A discourse upon the institution of medical schools in America.…

The first American publication on medical education. Morgan founded the first medical school in the United States, in connection with what is now the University of Pennsylvania.

1765

#4841

Observations on the nature, causes, and cure of those disorders which have been commonly called nervous hypochondriac, or hysteric, to which are prefixed some remarks on the sympathy of the nerves.

“First important English work on neurology after Willis” (Garrison).

1765

#3424.2

Remarks on the disease commonly called a fistula in ano.

Probably the greatest English classic of colon-rectal surgery. Pott recommended the practice of simple division rather than the newer, more complicated methods proposed by Cheselden and Le Dran, and audaciously pointe…

1765

#5051

An enquiry into the nature, cause, and cure of the croup.

First clear and complete clinical description of diphtheria.

1765

#100

Saggio di osservazioni microscopiche concernenti il sistema della generazione dei Signori de Needham e Buffon. IN: Dissertazione due… pp. [2]-87.

Spallanzani, a believer in preformation theory, found that he could prevent contamination by microorganisms in strongly heated infusions protected from aerial contamination, but he observed that as soon as air was all…

1766

#308.1

The anatomy of the horse.

The first original work on equine anatomy after Ruini (No. 285). Stubbs, the great painter of animals, prepared his own dissections of horse carcasses, and personally engraved the 24 double folio plates for this work,…

1766

#2527.99

De variolis et morbillis commentarius.

The first medical description of smallpox was written by Rhazes, about the year 910… The above work is the first edition of the Arabic text with a parallel Latin translation by the English pharmacist and scholar, John…

1766

#4302.2

Sur un enfant auquel il manquoit les deux clavicules, le sternum et les cartilages, qui dans l’état naturel l’attachent aux côtes.

First description of cleido-cranial dysostosis.

1766 –1767

#7365

Travels through France and Italy. Containing observations on character, customs, religion, government, police, commerce, arts, and antiquities. With a particularly description of the town, territory, and climate of Nice: to which is added a register of the weather, kept during a residence of eighteen months in that city. 2 vols.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1766

#7808

Descrizione degl'instrumenti, delle macchine, e delle suppellettili raccolte ad uso chirurgico e medico dal P. Don Ippolito Rondinelli...

Catalogue of the private museum of surgical and medical instruments established by Father Ippolito Rondinelli in Ravenna, which Soldo described as “the first museum of medicine and surgery.” Extensively illustrasted. …

1766

#10570

The Aurelian or natural history of English insects; namely, moths and butterflies.

Harris drew and engraved his own illustrations. The second edition (1778) was considerably expanded, and with four more plates than the first, for a total of 45. Some of the hand-colored copies were hand-colored by th…

1766

#12496

Travels through France and Italy. Containing observations on character, customs, religion, government, police commerce, arts, and antiquities. With a particular description of the town, territory, and climate of Nice: To which is added a register of the weather, kept during a residence of eighteen months in that city. 2 vols.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link. "After suffering the loss of his only child, 15-year-old Elizabeth, in April 1763, Smollett left England in June of that year. Together with his wife, he traveled acro…

1767

#2096

An essay concerning the cause of the endemial colic of Devonshire.

Baker demonstrated that the cider of Devonshire contained lead, while that made in other parts of England did not. He further showed that it was common practice in Devon to line cider presses with lead, and proved tha…

1767

#2103

Ricerche fisiche sopra il veleno della vipera.

The starting point of modern investigations of serpent venoms and their antidotes. This work also includes Fontana’s description of the ciliary canal in the eye of an ox. This structure does not appear in the human ey…

1767

#3249

Recherches sur les différens moyens de traiter les maladies des sinus maxillaires, et sur les avantages qu’il y a, dans certains cas, d’injecter des sinus par le nez.

Jourdain reported a method of washing out the antrum of Highmore through the natural opening.

1767

#5090

Von der Ruhr unter dem Volke im Jahr 1765.

The first important monograph on bacillary dysentery. Translated into English by C. R. Hopson as A treatise on the dysentery, with a description of the epidemic dysentery that happened in Switzerland in the year 1765 …

1767

#5420

The present method of inoculating for the small-pox.

Dimsdale is notable as having inoculated Catherine of Russia and her son. For this he received a fee of £10,000 and a life pension. His reputation and the exalted rank of his patient helped in popularizing the measure…

1767

#6156

Practical directions, shewing a method of preserving the perinaeum in birth, and delivering the placenta without violence.

Harvie, Smellie’s successor, advocated external expression of the placenta instead of traction on the cord, anticipating Credé in this connection by almost a century (see No. 6183). Reprinted in H. Thoms: Classic cont…

1767

#5196

De gonorrhoea virulenta.

Balfour is said to have been the first to re-affirm the duality of gonorrhoea and syphilis.

1767

#6324

An essay on the diseases most fatal to infants.

One of the best pediatric works of the period. Armstrong is noteworthy as the founder of the first children’s dispensary in Europe, the Dispensary for Sick Children, London, in 1769.

1767

#7679

Hortus Europae americanus, or, A collection of 85 curious trees and shrubs: the produce of North America, adapted to the climates and soils of Great-Britain, Ireland, and most parts of Europe, &c together with their blossoms, fruits and seeds, observations on their culture, growth, constitution and virtues, with directions how to collect, pack up and secure them in their passage.

Digital facsimile from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link. First published as Hortus Britanno-Americanus (1763).

1767

#10386

Traité sur les maladies des gens de mer.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1767

#12397

An account of the manner of inoculating for the small pox in the East Indies: With some observations on the practice and mode of treating that disease in those parts.

Holwell's account of smallpox variolation in India prior to Jenner has been disputed by historians. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

1767

#12880

Catalogue systématique et raisonné des curiosités de la nature et de l’art, qui composent le cabinet de M. Davila, avec figures en taille-douce. 3 vols.

Describes 8,096 mineral specimens from a wide range places, including a suite of specimens from Potosí, Bolivia, as well as many items from Canada, Mexico, and Paraguay. The catalog also lists 5,253 shells, 600 preser…

1767

#13081

The law of physicians, surgeons, and apothecaries: Containing all the statutes, cases at large, arguments, resolutions, and judgments concerning them. Compiled, by desire of a great personage, for the use of such gentlemen of the faculty as are enemies to quackery, in order to point out the defects in the law, as it now Stands, relative to those professions, and To propose such expedients for remedying them as they shall think necessary, before the next session of parliament, when it is intended to apply for an act for regulating the practice of physick, and suppressing empirical nostrums.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1767

#13557

A comparative history of the increase and decrease of mankind in England, and several countries abroad, according to the different soils, situations, business of life, use of the non-naturals, &c. faithfully collected from, and attested by, above three hundred vouchers, and many of them for a long course of years, in two different Periods. To which is added a syllabus of the general States of health, air, seasons, and food for the last three hundred years; and also a meteorological discourse.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1768

#4634

Observations on the dropsy in the brain.

The first account of the clinical course of tuberculous meningitis in children. This work is notable for its fullness of detail and its accuracy. Whytt divided the disease into three stages, according to the character…

1768

#471

De formatione intestinorum praecipue.

One of the acknowledged classics of embryology. Wolff’s description of the formation of the chick’s intestine by the rolling inwards of a leaf-like layer of the blastoderm was important as proving his theory of epigen…

1768

#101

Prodromo di un opera da imprimersi sopra le riproduzione animali.

In this preliminary to a larger work on regeneration which was never published, Spallanzani described regenerative capacities of remarkable complexity and repetitiveness in the land snail, salamander and toad and frog…

1768

#534.54

Operum anatomici argumenti minorum tomus tertius, De Monstris.

Reprints and updates Haller’s earlier essays on various malformations. This work marks the beginning of scientific teratology, placing it on a foundation of sound anatomical description.

1768

#2028.51

Historie en Gedenkschriften van de Maatschappy, tot Redding von Drenkelingen, Opgerecht Binnen Amsterdam 1768.

AMSTERDAM SOCIETY

The first of many volumes of reports by the first society to save people drowned in the waterways of Amsterdam, established in 1767. Before 1767 anyone taken from the water was presumed dead and no attempts were made …

1768

#2154

Chirurgie d’armée.

One of the most important works on military surgery during the 18th century. Ravaton, a skilful army surgeon, was the first to employ a tin boot, suspended on four rings, for the “hanging” position of broken bones. He…

1768

#2264

An essay on diseases incidental in Europeans in hot climates.

Lind came near to discovering the connection between malaria and mosquitoes. He is best remembered for his work on scurvy (No. 3713), but the above book is one of the more important early works on tropical medicine.

1768

#2886

Lettre de M. Rougnon à M. Lorry, touchant les causes de la mort de feu Monsieur Charles, ancien capitaine de cavalerie, arrivé à Besançon le 23 février 1768.

Osler, Allbutt, and several other authorities believe this to be the description of an authentic case of angina, thus preceding Heberden’s classic account. Other eminent authorities consider the patient to have suffer…

1768

#4015.1

Observations on cancers.

First recorded description of multiple neurofibromatosis. Akenside was better known as a poet; he was caricatured as the republican doctor of Tobias Smollett's The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle.

1768

#3674

A treatise on the disorders and deformities of the teeth and gums.

Earliest English dental textbook. Berdmore was the first to mention the use of the microscope for the study of the minute structure of teeth.

1768

#4851

Opuscules de chirurgie. Pt. 1.

Records, p. 161, a successful operation for temporo-sphenoidal abscess, 1752. The patient, a monk, had otorrhoea followed by a mastoid abscess, which Morand opened.

1768

#4408

Some few general remarks on fractures and dislocations.

The methods outlined by Pott in his classic work on fractures and dislocations were eventually adopted all over the world. He described (pp. 57-64) “Pott’s fracture” in this book, and he stressed the necessity for the…

1768

#5831

Of the night-blindness or nyctalopia.

A classic description of nyctalopia. Report of a single case.

1768

#5438

On the chickenpox.

In a paper read before the (Royal) College of Physicians on 11 August 1767, Heberden first definitely differentiated chickenpox from smallpox.

1768

#9517

Specimen medicum: Exhibens synopsin reptilium emendatam cum experimentis circa venena et antidota reptilium austriacorum.

"Laurenti is considered the auctor of the class Reptilia (reptiles) through his authorship of Specimen Medicum, Exhibens Synopsin Reptilium Emendatam cum Experimentis circa Venena (1768) on the poisonous function of r…

1768

#10475

La santé des gens de lettres.

Digital facsimile from BnF Gallica at this link. Translated into English by James Kirkpatrick as An essay on the disorders of people of fashion, and a treatise on the diseases incident to literary and sedentary person…

1768

#11710

Dell' azione del cuore ne' vasi sanguigni nuove osservasioni.

In this response to Haller's Deux mémoires sur le mouvement du sang (1756) (No. 11607) Spallanzani outlined his own findings on the action of the heart upon the blood vessels. "Haller's microscopic observations of blo…

1768

#11733

The works of Robert Whytt, M.D. Late physician to his Majesty.... Published by his son.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

1769

#2204

Synopsis nosologiae methodicae.

This work made Cullen’s reputation. In it he divided diseases into fevers, neurosis, cachexias and local disorders. Cullen was the foremost British clinical teacher of his time, one of the first to give clinical lectu…

1769

#1763

A discourse upon the duties of a physician, with some sentiments, on the usefulness and necessity of a public hospital: Delivered before the president and governors of King's College, at the commencement, held on the 16th of May, 1769. As advice to those gentlemen who then received the first medical degrees conferred by that university.

The first American treatise on medical ethics, and the first treatise on medical ethics published in the English language. Samuel Bard was one of the founders of King’s College, New York. Digital facsimile from the Na…

1769

#3167

Observations on the asthma and on the hooping cough.

Includes Millar’s original description of laryngismus stridulus (“Millar’s asthma”).

1769

#3807

An account and method of cure of the bronchocele or Derby neck.

Prosser gave the prescription of a powder containing calcined sponge, to be taken for the cure of goitre. This is probably the first recorded use of an iodine preparation in England.

1769

#5304

Essay on the natural history of Guiana, in South America. Containing a description of many curious productions in the animal and vegetable systems of that country. Together with an account of the religion, manners, and customs of several tribes of its Indian inhabitants. Interspersed with a variety of literary and medical observations. In several letters....

Bancroft was an English physician who lived for many years in South America. He noted the transmission of yaws by flies (p. 385 of his book). Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

1769

#6380

A medical discourse, or an historical inquiry into the ancient and present state of medicine: The substance of which was delivered at opening the medical school, in the city of New York. Printed by Desire.

The first American publication on medical history. Digital facsimile from U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.