William Beaumont (1785-1853). Experiments and Observations on the Gastric Juice and the Physiology of Digestion, Plattsburgh, 1833. When U.S. Army Surgeon William Beaumont saw the gaping hole in Alex St. Martin’s side, he had every reason to believe the wound was fatal. The 28 year old Canadian voyager was accidentally shot in the stomach byContinue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room: Making the Best of a Bad Situation”
Category Archives: Notes from the Rare Book Room
Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room — Long Before Google
GREGOR REISCH (ca. 1467-1525). Margarita philosophica. 2nd ed., 1504]. Long before there was Google and Britannica, there was Margarita philosophica, which might be called the first modern encyclopedia. Its twelve divisions cover the trivium (grammar, logic and rhetoric), the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy), and the natural and moral sciences. Of particular fascination are theContinue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room — Long Before Google”
News from the John Martin Rare Book Room – Activities of Daily Living
Activities of Daily Living– While fads and fancies in health and medicine come and go, the underlying essentials of wellbeing, including, rest, nutrition, exercise, and moderation have gone unchallenged for millennia. One of the more popular works outlining keys to basic fitness is the Tacuini sanitatis by the eleventh century Iraq physician, Ibn Butlān (d.Continue reading “News from the John Martin Rare Book Room – Activities of Daily Living”
Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room – Birthing in the 16th Century
Birthing in the 16th Century Jakob Rüff (1500-1558) was not the first physician to write a birthing manual for midwives but his book, De conceptu et generatione hominis, first published in 1554 in both Latin and German was certainly one of the most famous and widely used. Lithotomist, surgeon, obstetrician and playwright, was the townContinue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room – Birthing in the 16th Century”
Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room
L’orthopédie The simple image of a crooked tree splinted to a wooden pole is one of the most recognizable symbols in medicine. Its first appearance was as an engraving in Andry de Bois-Regard’s 1741publication, L’orthopédie; ou, “L’art de prévenir et de corriger dan les enfans, les difformités du corps* *Orthopaedia: or the Art of CorrectingContinue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room”
Notes from the Rare Book Room – Bleeding by the Numbers
Pierre Louis’ 1835, Recherches sur les effets de la saignée dans quelques maladies inflammatoires, et sur l’action de l’émétique et des vésicatoires dans la pneumonie is one of the less impressive looking books in the John Martin Rare Book Room, but it was instrumental in laying the foundation for what we now term, “evidence basedContinue reading “Notes from the Rare Book Room – Bleeding by the Numbers”
Notes from the Rare Book Room — The Nuremberg Chronicle
While the production of the Guttenberg Bible in the mid 15th century constitutes the most important milestonetemp in the history of printing, the happy marriage of moveable type and mechanized illustration is best represented by the 1493 book, Liber Chronicarum, more popularly known as the Nuremberg Chronicle. The University Libraries is fortunate to have notContinue reading “Notes from the Rare Book Room — The Nuremberg Chronicle”
Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room — More Than Mickey Mouse
Visitors to the John Martin Rare Book Room are often bemused when they spot a View-Master resting on one of the bookcases. If you’re under the age of sixty-five you probably owned one of these devices along with several View-Master reels depicting far-off countries, cartoon characters or comic book heroes rendered in 3-D. But whyContinue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room — More Than Mickey Mouse”
Rare Morphological Work Added to Rare Book Collection
Recently, the John Martin Rare Book Room acquired a rare copy of Edward Tyson’s 1699 book, Orang-outang, sive, Homo sylvestris, or, The anatomy of a pygmie compared with that of a monkey, an ape, and a man… The book constitutes of the most important works in the history of comparative morphology. Physician, Edward Tyson, studiedContinue reading “Rare Morphological Work Added to Rare Book Collection”
Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room
The Well-Equipped Surgeon’s Chest — Don’t Leave Home Without It Woodall, John (1570–1643). The Surgeons mate or military & domestique surgery. 2nd edition, London, 1639. The John Martin Rare Book Room recently acquired a 1639 copy of John Woodall’s, The Surgeon’s Mate, the second and greatly expanded version of the work first published in 1617.Continue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room”