{"id":1797,"date":"2010-03-12T14:04:47","date_gmt":"2010-03-12T20:04:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/?p=1797"},"modified":"2010-03-12T14:04:47","modified_gmt":"2010-03-12T20:04:47","slug":"notes-from-the-john-martin-rare-book-room-james-medicinal-dictionary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/2010\/03\/12\/notes-from-the-john-martin-rare-book-room-james-medicinal-dictionary\/","title":{"rendered":"Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room; James Medicinal Dictionary"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/files\/2010\/03\/james-dict-001.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-1800\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/files\/2010\/03\/james-dict-001.jpg\" alt=\"James Medicinal Dictionary\" width=\"395\" height=\"326\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/files\/2010\/03\/james-dict-001.jpg 1096w, https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/files\/2010\/03\/james-dict-001-300x248.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/files\/2010\/03\/james-dict-001-1024x847.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/files\/2010\/03\/james-dict-001-362x300.jpg 362w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 395px) 100vw, 395px\" \/><\/a>ROBERT JAMES (1705-1776).\u00a0A medicinal dictionary.\u00a03 vols. London: T. Osborne, 1743-1745.<\/p>\n<p>James studied at Oxford and was granted his M.D. from Cambridge by royal mandate in 1728. He settled in London after practicing at Sheffield, Lichfield, and Birmingham. A successful physician, he became quite wealthy and famous when his &#8220;fever powder&#8221; became the most popular nostrum of the day. The chief ingredients were lime phosphate and antimony oxide and the medicine was used as an emetic, purgative, diaphoretic, or alterative depending on the dose and condition of the patient. James authored a number of books but the present work is the one for which he is best remembered.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0It remains the largest, most exhaustive, and most erudite English language medical dictionary written before the nineteenth century. It was published in weekly installments beginning in 1742 and ending in August of 1745. Although never identified or acknowledged by name, there is ample evidence that Samuel Johnson, a close friend and student of James, contributed to the dictionary.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0It is interesting that James includes a detailed\u00a0 entry on the unicorn horn (shown here) at a time when most scientists had begun to doubt its existence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>ROBERT JAMES (1705-1776).\u00a0A medicinal dictionary.\u00a03 vols. London: T. Osborne, 1743-1745. James studied at Oxford and was granted his M.D. from Cambridge by royal mandate in 1728. He settled in London after practicing at Sheffield, Lichfield, and Birmingham. A successful physician, he became quite wealthy and famous when his &#8220;fever powder&#8221; became the most popular nostrum<a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/2010\/03\/12\/notes-from-the-john-martin-rare-book-room-james-medicinal-dictionary\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">&#8220;Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room; James Medicinal Dictionary&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":172,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,15,17],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1797"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/172"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1797\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lib.uiowa.edu\/hardin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}