A biobibliographical survey to 1755, including dentistry.

First recorded excision of the head of the humerus.

Rutty kept continuous records of weather and diseases in Dublin from 1724-64. On page 75 of this work is the first clear description of relapsing fever. Digital facsimile from the Hathi Trust at this link.

First description of the worm Loa loa. Mongin was a French surgeon working in the West Indies. English translation in Kean (No. 2268.1).

"The first philosophical, secular medical ethics in the English language" (Lawrence, Paul. "(John Gregory." Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.). "Gregory divided the practice of medicine into four parts, or branches: 'the art of preserving health, of prolonging life, of curing diseases, and making death easy' " (Vanderpool, Palliative care [2015] 19). Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Rush inaugurated the first regular course of lectures on chemistry taught in America, at the College of Philadelphia. Includes much on pharmaceutical chemistry. Facsimile reprint with an introduction by L. H. Butterfield, Philadelphia: Friends of the University of Pennsylvania Library, 1954.

Posthmously published; vol. 1 contains a life of the author. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

On p. 34 Ellis published with a separate part title, A botanical description of the Dionaea Muscipula, or Venus's Fly-Trap. A newly-discovered sensitive plant: In a letter to Sir Charles Linnaeus, Knight of the Polar Star, Physician to the king of Sweden, and Member of most of the learned societies of Europe from John Ellis, Fellow of the Royal Societies of London and Upsal. This included the first published image of the Venus Fly-Trap. Digital facsimile from huntbotanical.org at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

This book excited great attention and ran through eight editions in one year. Cadogan’s advice on moderate exercise and moderation in drinking as a cure for gout caused much criticism. 

In papers 2 and 3 of this set of 3 contiguously published papers Hewson was the first to describe fibrinogen. "Before Hewson, although the fibrin mesh had been recognised and admired from as far back as Plato, it was thought that the secret of clotting lay in the red cells rather than the plasma. Hewson had ample opportunity to study coagulation; so common was the practice of ‘cupping’. He saw it clot as he beat it with a glass rod, thought that clotting was accelerated when blood came in contact with air (a theory disproved by John Hunter who showed that it could occur in a vacuum) and postulated that the its secret lay in the ‘coagulable lymph’ as he described plasma, making him the first to describe fibrinogen" (Derek Doyle, "William Hewson (1739-74): the father of haematology", British Journal of Haematology, April 2006.

Unzer was probably the first to employ the work “reflex” in connection with sensory–motor reactions. T. Laycock translated his book into English for the Sydenham Society in 1851.

This was the first of the several bibliographies compiled by Haller, one of the greatest figures in the history of medicine. The work contains the most exhaustive and thorough information of the writings in the field of botany then extant. Choulant considered that the bibliographies on botany and anatomy were the best of Haller’s works.

In Frapolli’s careful description of pellagra, the disease was first given its present name. This book is also the first Italian account of the malady. Partial English translation in No. 2241.

This is a detailed study of the mouth, jaws and teeth with exceptionally accurate plates. Hunter correctly understood the growth and development of the jaws and their relation to the muscles of mastication. He coined the terms cuspids, bicuspids, molars and incisors.

One of the earliest accurate descriptions of diphtheria. Osler considered the book “an American classic of the first rank”.

Bard was personal physician to George Washington.

“Very valuable reports on artistic anatomy and the history of anatomic illustration” (Choulant).  Probably represents the first history of medical portraiture. Digital facsimile from Googe Books at this link.

First accurate description of retroversion of the uterus.

"Between 1768 and 1774, he [Pallas] led an expedition to central Russian provinces, Povolzhye, Urals, West Siberia, Altay, and Transbaikal, collecting natural history specimens for the academy. He explored the Caspian Sea, the Ural and Altai Mountains and the upper Amur River, reaching as far eastward as Lake Baikal. The regular reports which Pallas sent to St Petersburg were collected and published as Reise durch verschiedene Provinzen des Russischen Reichs (Journey through various provinces of the Russian Empire) (3 vols., 1771–1776). They covered a wide range of topics, including geology and mineralogy, reports on the native peoples and their religions, and descriptions of new plants and animals" (Wikipedia article on Peter Simon Pallas, accessed 09-2017).

Digital facsimile from the Hathi Trust at this link. English translation as Travels Through the Southern Provinces of the Russian Empire in the years 1793 and 1794. 2 vols. London, 1802-1803. Digital facsimile of the second edition (1812) of the translation from the Hathi Trust at this link.

Vitet was a medical doctor who later became mayor of Lyon. Baas, Outlines of the history of medicine III, 716 writes that he "introduced the experimental method into veterinary medicine."  Volume 3 contains both an analysis of available medications and their applications and an analytical bibliography, with unusually long notes, of prior writings on veterinary medicine. Digital facsimiles of the set from the Hathi Trust at this link.

An listing of 431 medical museum specimens, including those preserved in liquid as well as dried specimens, prepared for their sale.  Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Largely based on specimens he had access to from the British collections of Thomas Pennant and Anna Blackburne, this was Forster's attempt to systemize on the Linnean model the fragmented field of natural history studies from the Americas. It includes important directions for collecting and preserving specimens. Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

This work is a series of 21 letters that Bossu wrote to the Marquis de L’Estrade describing his life and travels in the vast Louisiana country from 1751 to 1762. His ventures ranged from Fort Chartres, in present-day Illinois, to Mobile, and along the Mississippi. His visit to New Orleans took place only thirty years after its founding, and he was able to gather considerable information from the memories of locals. “Bossu wrote well and his letters not only give an interesting picture of life in the Mississippi Valley and the Mobile Country to the east at the beginning of the second half of the eighteenth century, but incorporated also are many sketches of events in preceding years” – Streeter. “The first volume is almost entirely filled with historical and personal sketches of the Southern Indian Tribes of the present United States” – Field. Forster devoted nearly of all of the second volume to the catalogue of plants. This catalogue, based on specimens that Forster saw in England, and on the work of the Swedish botanist Pehr Loefling, did not appear in the original French edition of 1768.

Digital facsimile from the Hathi Trust at this link.

A catalogue of "over 1100 quadrupeds, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish, insects, worms and mollusks native to Lorraine. Buc’hoz follows the classification schemes of Argenville, Brisson, Buffon, Daubenton and Geoffroy, and often highlights SPECIES’ GASTRONOMIC AND MEDICINAL USES. After the catalog of fauna he gives a WHO’S WHO OF ANATOMICAL SPECIMEN AMATEURS AND INVENTORIES THE CONTENTS OF THREE PRIVATE CURIOSITY CABINETS formed by local collectors — abbé Besse, apothecary Jean-Baptiste Bécœur (1718-77) and lawyer Jean-Baptiste Villiez....Buc’hoz offers the only account of Villiez’s Wunderkammer with some 1600 specimens of shells, fossils, an 8-foot narwhal tusk, stunning coral, a Nile crocodile, precious gems, NEW WORLD BEETLES and a rhino horn" (Bruce McKittrick, Short Stack 51 (2020) no. 2).

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

This was probably the first natural history treatise published in England that employed binomial nomenclature. Semi-facsimile edition edited by Alfred Newton and published by The Willoughby Society in 1880 as Tunstall's Ornithologia Britannica. Digital facsimile of the 1880 edition from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

The isolation of oxygen was first achieved by Priestley. He also demonstrated that plants immersed in water give off oxygen and that this gas is essential for animal life.

Discovery of nitrogen.

Lavater was the last of the descriptive physiognomists. He expanded the above work into Physiognomische Fragmente zur Beförderung der Menschenkenntnis und Menschenliebe, 1775-78. This was translated into English by H. Hunter as Essays on physiognomy, 3 vols. in 5, London, 1789-98 [i.e. 1788-99] and other editions. His work was very influential on portraiture.

Scarpa’s first scientific work, a comparative anatomical investigation of the ear, in which he offered a more accurate and complete description of the osseous labyrinth and demonstrated the true function of the round window. See also No. 1553.

This classic description of angina pectoris is the substance of a paper read on July 21, 1768. Although descriptions of angina are to be found in the works of earlier writers, these mention only dyspnoea in their cases. The merit of Herberden’s account (in which, incidently, he used the name “angina pectoris”) lies in the fact that he was the first to include a description of the paroxysmal oppression in the thorax. Reprinted with other writings by Heberden in An Introduction to the Study of Physic, New York, 1929.

Leake insisted on the contagious nature of puerperal fever. Reprinted, London, Sydenham Society, 1949.

Digital facsimile of the first edition from Google Books at this link.  Digital facsimile of the corrected, enlarged, and more elegant second edition of 1774 from the Internet Archive at this link.

The leading 18th century French work on these subjects; some copies were issued with hand-colored plates. Digital facsimile of an uncolored copy from BnF Gallica at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

The first accurate study of the electrical organs of the torpedo fish were made by Walsh, who was given the Copley Medal of the Royal Society for his work on the subject. Walsh proved that the shock of the torpedo was electrical, and that the fish could only send the shock through a conductor.

Discovery of urea, independently of Boerhaave. Rouelle isolated urea as the alcohol-soluble substance from urine. He was the first to present proof of the high nitrogen content of urea.

An English summary of No. 2028.51, and the first detailed report on the society’s work published in England. Johnson proposed the formation of a similar society in England. The Royal Humane Society was formed by T. Cogan and W. Hawes in 1774.

This work on the human figure, published more than 100 years after the death of Rubens, is one of a handful of anatomical treatises illustrated by an artist of the first magnitude.

White was the first to state clearly in a text on midwifery the necessity of absolute cleanliness in the lying-in chamber, the isolation of infected patients, and adequate ventilation. He instituted the principle of uterine drainage, placing his patients in a sitting position shortly after delivery using a special bed and chair. In this he preceded Fowler (No. 5623). White was also the first after Hippocrates to make any substantial contributions towards the solution of the etiology and management of puerperal fever.

Digital facsimile of the third edition, "revised and enlarged" (1793) from the Internet Archive at this link.

In four memoirs on the dynamics of the circulatory system  resulting from 337 experiments recorded in this workSpallanzani studied the role of the circulation in every stage from embryo to adult, and it was through his researches on the vascular system in the umbilical cords of embryo chicks that he first established the existence of arteriovenous anastomoses in warm-blooded animals. He also investigated the effects on the circulatory system of growth, gravity, and the consequences of wounds, as well as the changes affected in the failing circulation of dying animals. He determined that the arterial pulse was causedb y lateral pressure upon the arterial wall from cardiac impulsions conveyed by the blood column.

Digital facsimile of the 1773 edition from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Translated into English as Experiments upon the circulation of the blood, throughout the vascular system: On languid circulation: On  the motion of the blood, independent of the action of the heart: And on the pulsations of the arteries. With notes, and a sketch of the literary life of the author. By J. Tourdes. Translated into English, and illustrated with additional notes by R. Hall. London, 1801. Digital facsimile of the English translation from Google Books at this link.

In this work Müller arranged the Infusoria into genera and species for the first time. Digital facsimile from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Probably the first book on whooping cough, proceeding Watt's book by 40 years. Butter proposed hemlock as a treatment for whooping cough.
Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

(Thanks to Webb Dordick for this reference.)

Haller is one of the greatest names in medical bibliography. While pursuing his monumental scientific career he found time to compile bibliographies of botany, anatomy, medicine and surgery which together form the most exhaustive summary of previous writings on these subjects. Reprinted, Hildesheim, G. Olms, 1969.

Hewson gave the first complete account of the anatomical peculiarities of the lymphatics. He divided the lymphatics into two groups – superficial and deep. He described the leucocytes as derived from the lymphatic glands and thymus.

"Hewson's studies of the lymphatics are models of skill and ingenuity. He studied them in vitro and in vivo (observing them through a hand‐held magnifying glass in the web of a frog's foot). Disproving the current theory, he showed that the lymphatics are not part of the blood system, that nodes are stopping stations along lymphatic vessels and that every cavity of the body, and not just the lacteals of the small intestine, is drained by the lymphatic system. He demonstrated the absorptive properties of the lymphatics by injecting a dye or noxious substance into experimental animals and then demonstrating it in the lymphatics in a distant part of the body. It was this theory – that the lymphatics, and not just the intestinal lacteals, are a vast and highly effective absorption system – that brought him into conflict with Monro secundus (Wintrobe, 1980).

"Hewson went further, suggesting that noxious agents could enter the body via the lymphatics. ‘The axillary glands are likewise frequently observed to swell in consequence of cancers in the breast and it is found of no use to extirpate the breast itself unless the affected glands can likewise be removed; for otherwise the cancerous tumour of the glands may renew the disease.’ (Hewson, 1774a).

"This work inevitably led him to study further the villi of the gut and their lacteals. He demonstrated how villi in the small intestine differed from those in the colon, and then went on to compare the lacteals of fish, amphibians and turtles (Hewson, 1774b)." (Derek Doyle, "William Hewson (1739-74): the father of haematology", British Journal of Haematology, April, 2006).

Peyrilhe was the first to attempt an experimental study to determine the nature of cancer. He injected fluid from human mammary cancer into a dog; however, the dog howled and aggravated his housekeeper, who drowned it. Peyrilhe recognized for the first time the essential unity of the many different forms of cancer. French edition, 1776. English translation, London, 1777. Digital facsimile of the 1774 edition from Google Books at this link.

Pp. 85-100: “Lists 191 semeiological varieties of syphilis described in the period” (Garrison).

Esper was the first to record the finding, in Gailenreuth Cave, of human bones alongside the remains of unknown and probably extinct animals. The implications of this dramatic observation published in a color plate book about unusual fossil animal bones seem to have been unnoticed by the scientific establishment. Also French translation, Nuremberg, Knorrs, 1774. 

Esper's book also included the first published description of disease in ancient bones, a possible bone tumor affecting a fossil cave bear. 

Records (Vol, 1, pp. 153, 160) the first successful operation for mastoiditis, performed by Petit in 1736. “Petit’s hernia” and “triangle” described (vol. 2, pp. 256-58). (See also No. 3357.) A lumbar hernia had previously been described by R. J. C. de Garengeot, Traité des opérations de chirurgie, 1731, 1, 369-71.

Reprinted, Hildesheim, G. Olms, 1971.

Rush was the first American physician to publish a detailed study of native American medicine. Digital facsimile from the Medical Heritage Library, Internet Archive, at this link.

Hunter originally trained as Smellie’s assistant. Once he achieved brilliant professional and financial success he became a great collector of rare books and manuscripts, coins, paintings, minerals, shells, and antiquities. Reflecting Hunter’s interests in anatomical art and fine printing, this work contains 34 copper plates depicting the gravid uterus, life-size. It is William Hunter’s best work and one of the finest anatomical atlases ever produced, “anatomically exact and artistically perfect” (Choulant). Except for J. Dalby’s little book, Virtues of cinnabar and musk against the bite of a mad dog, 1762, Hunter's atlas is the only medical publication produced by the famous Baskerville Press. The letterpress is in both Latin and English. The plates were engraved by several artists from drawings by Jan van Rymsdyk, the original sepia drawings for which are preserved in the Hunterian Collection at the University of Glasgow Library. In 1851 The Sydenham Society published a reprint of the atias. See J. L. Thornton’s Jan van Rymsdyk, medical artist of the eighteenth century, Cambridge: Oleander Press, 1982. 

Dujardin seems to be the first European to discuss acupuncture within its historical context as an ancient remedy still found to be of practical value. His section on Chinese and Japanese medicine appears on pp. 75-104 of Vol. 1, and includes reproductions of Ten Rhijne’s plates. Volume 2 was edited by Bernard Peyrilhe. Digital facsimile from BnFGallica at this link.

The first translation of any Western medical text into Japanese. "Kaitai Shinsho represented the beginning of two epoch-making developments. First and most directly Gempaku's work set in motion the modern transformation of Japanese medicine, revealing not only many anatomical structures hitherto unknown in traditional [Japanese] medicine, but also and more fundamentally introducing the very notion of an anatomical approach to the body--the idea of visual inspection in dissection as the primary and most essential way of understanding the nature of the human body. Second and more generally, Kaitai Shinsho inspired the rise of Dutch studies (Rangaku) in Japan, thus giving birth to one of the most decisive influences shaping modern Japanese history, namely the study of Western languages and science" (S. Kuriyama, " Between Mind and Eye: Japanese Anatomy in the Eighteenth Century," IN: Leslie & Young [eds.] Paths to Asian Medical Knowledge [1992] 21).

Kaitai Shinsho was drawn largely from Gerard Dieten's 1773 Dutch translation of Johann Adam Kulmus's Anatomische Tabellen (1731) although its Western-style title-age was copied from Valverde's Vivae imagines partium porporis (1566), and the last four anatomical woodcuts were taken from the 1690 Dutch edition of Bidloo's anatomy. Images from Kaitai Shinsho from the website of the National Library of Medicine at this link. For further details see the entry at HistoryofInformation.com at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Hathi Trust at this link.

One of the most spectacular works of medical botany ever published, in 3 folio volumes with 472 hand-colored plates and 3 hand-colored engraved title pages. Many of the plates by by Genéviève de Nangis Regnault. Digital facsimile from BnF Gallica at this link.

First demonstration of the importance of perspiration in the maintenance of constant body temperature.

Santorini died before the completion of these anatomical plates which he intended to be his chef d’oeuvre. This elegantly printed volume is the only significant medical book printed by the celebrated Giambattista Bodoni for the Duke of Parma.

De Bordeu first conceived the idea of internal secretion by his hypothesis that every organ, tissue, and cell discharges into the blood products which influence other parts of the body. His work was published in a collective volume by three physicians from his family: Antoine de Bordeu, Théophile de Bordeu, and François de Bordeu. Théophile's Analyse médicinale du sang appeared as part six of the book (pp. 346-588). In the first edition he was not specifically credited as author. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Werlhof, a contemporary and friend of Haller, is remembered for his classic description of purpura haemorrhagica (see No. 3052). He was Court physician at Hannover.

Includes the first description of occupational cancer. By describing chimney sweeps” cancer of the scrotum, Pott was the first to trace the origin of a type of cancer to a specific external cause. The above work also includes his description of senile gangrene, sometimes referred to as “Pott’s gangrene”.

The first surgical work written by an American and printed in North America. Jones’s work was the accepted guide to surgical practice during the American Revolutionary War.

Blumenbach was the founder of anthropology. In this, his doctoral dissertation, he classified mankind into four races, based on selected combinations of head shape, skin color and hair form. In the second edition (1781) he found it necessary to expand this division into five races, but his famous terms “Caucasian, Mongolian, Ethiopian, American, and Malayan” were not used until the third edition of 1795. English translation in Blumenbach, The anthropological treatises…, translated by T. Bendyshe, London, 1865.

Rigby differentiated between premature separation of the normal placenta (accidental hemorrhage) and placenta praevia (unavoidable hemorrhage).

The auction catalogue of the celebrated library formed by the physician and classical scholar Askew, third owner of the famous gold-headed cane. Askew attempted to secure a complete series of all the Greek classics ever published; he purchased  Richard Mead's Greek manuscripts, the papers of Dr. Taylor and some fine early classical codices from the library of the Maffei family." Among the principal purchasers of Askew's books were William Hunter, the British Museum, and the kings of England and France. Digital facsimile from the Hathi Trust at this link.

The author characterized himself  on the title page as "a Trader with the Indians and a Resident in their Country for Forty Years." Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile from BnFGallica at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Original description of facial neuralgia. Reprinted in Med. Classics, 1940, 5, 100-06.

Discovery of uric acid. English translation in his Chemical Essays, London, 1786.

Later refutation of the theory of spontaneous generation. Spallanzani’s conclusions were similar to those expressed by Pasteur nearly a century later. His collected works were published in Milan, 2 vols., 1932-33. English translation as Dissertations relative to the natural history of animals and vegetables. 2 vols., London, 1784. Digital facsimile of the "new edition, corrected and enlarged" (1789) from the Internet Archive at this link.

Study of the health conditions and diseases of black slaves in the Americas.  Digital facsimile of the 1776 edition from Google Books at this link. Second edition, expanded to two volumes. Paris: L'Auteur, 1792.

The first detailed account of the anatomy of the cerebellum, which introduced the terms, “tonsil”, “pyramid”, “lingula”, and “uvula”. Reprinted in his Encefalotomia a sia nuova diimostrazione anatomica di tutte le parti contenuto nel cranio umano .... 3 vols., Torino, 1780.

The first flora of Great Britain using Linnean binomial nomenclature, and the first complete scientific classification and description of British plants in the English language. Withering included much information on natural places of growth, time of flowering, economic uses as foods and drugs, and poisonous properties.

Withering's explanatory title page was notably verbose. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Besides his pioneer work in military medicine, Pringle did much to improve the conditions of sailors afloat. See also Nos. 2150 & 3714.

Originally published in the Gentleman’s Magazine, 1751-54.

Following the scurvy-preventing suggestions of James Lind, Cook lost only one man to disease on his second voyage from 1768-1771. Reprinted in Phil. Trans., 1776, 66, 402-06. See No. 2156.

Includes a reprint of the author’s Institution des sourds et muets; ou, recueil des exercices. Paris, 1774.

A classification of skin diseases upon the basis of their clinical appearance. Until the time of Willan, von Plenck’s book was the greatest authority on dermatology. He mentioned 115 different skin diseases, all that were known at that time, and divided them into 14 classes.

Dobson proved that the sweetish taste of diabetic urine was produced by sugar, an observation following on Willis’s discovery of the sweetness of diabetic urine. He also discovered hyperglycemia.

Haller compiled four great bibliographies dealing respectively with botany, anatomy, surgery, and medicine. They formed the most complete reference work of the time, consisting of a classified analysis of over 52,000 publications of all countries. Additions and corrections to Haller’s Bibliothecae were published by C.G. Murr, Adnotationes ad bibliothecas Hallerianas, Erlangen, 1805. 

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Concerning lead poisoning from artists' paints.

Fothergill was "the first physician to suspect on clinical grounds that the heart might be affected in this condition [angina pectoris] and he was the first to record abnormalities of the myocardium and coronary arteries of patients who died suddenly with this disease.... [Fothergill's second paper] contains the first description of calcification of the coronary arteries in a patient suffering from angina pectoris" (Christopher Booth, "Dr. John Fothergill and the agina pectoris," Medical History 1 (1957) 115-122.

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

The first title, in 1 volume, was published in 1776; the second work in 2 vols., supplementing the first work, was published in 1778. In these two bioclimatological and biogeographical studies of disease in Normandy, on which he worked for fifteen years, Le Pecq provided case histories as well as detailed analyzes of epidemics and their relationship to climate, geography, water sources, and local customs, writing in his first work that doctors must study sickness in its natural habitat before they could treat large-scale health issues.

This account of botanical discoveries made by the Forsters in Australia and New Zealand on Cook's second voyage was one of the earliest scientific publications resulting from that voyage. Specimens were illustrated on 78 engraved plates. The regular edition was in quarto form; 8 copies were issued in folio format.

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

One of the earliest medical publications printed in Haiti. Duvivier, Bibliographie générale et méthodique d'Haiti, 2, p. 197.

This work on "Practical medical lessons for field and land surgeons of the Austrian states," includes a 91-page appendix containing 319 recommended pharmaceuticals for the treatments described in the text. The formulae for the pharmaceutical preparations appear in parallel columns in German and Latin.   

First isolation of human gastric juice. Stevens was also the first successfully to perform an in vitro digestion, proving the presence in the gastric juice of the active principle necessary for the assimilation of food. An English translation is included in Spallanzani’s Dissertations relative to the natural history of animals, 1784, vol. 1, pp. 303-16. Digital facsimile of the 1777 edition from Google Books at this liink.  See also Edward Stevens: Gastric physiologist, phyhsician and American statesman. With a complete translation of his inaugural dissertation De alimentorum concoctione...Edited by Stacey B. Day. Montreal, 1969.

From the Wikipedia article on Edward Stevens, accessed 01-2017:

"Stevens was born in St. Croix in the Virgin Islands. Stevens's father, the merchant Thomas Stevens,^[1] would also become the adoptive father of an orphaned Alexander Hamilton.^[2] According to Ron Chernow's Alexander Hamilton,^[3]people would often say that Edward Stevens and Hamilton looked like brothers. Secretary of State Timothy Pickering, who knew both men in adulthood, noted that the men were strikingly similar in appearance and concluded that they must be brothers. Ron Chernow says many aspects of Hamilton's biography make more sense given Stevens's paternity. It would explain why Hamilton was adopted into the Stevens family while his brother, James, was not. It may have also been a factor in Hamilton's supposed father abandoning his family.^[4]"

Howard devoted much of his life to the improvement of the conditions then prevailing in prisons. The publication of his book led to legislation abolishing abuses in prisons and providing for their proper cleaning. The Howard League for Penal Reform is one result of his charitable work. Reprint of 4th ed. (1792), Montclair, N.Y., 1973. See L. Baumgartner, "John Howard (1726-1790) hospital and prison reformer: a bibliography," Bull. Hist. Med., 1939, 7, 486-534, 595-626.

Wrisberg, Professor of Anatomy at Göttingen, is remembered for his discovery of the nervus intermedius (“nerve of Wrisberg”), described in the above treatise.

The first textbook of zoogeography, containing the first world map showing the distribution of mammals. French translation of part 1 only by Jakob Mauvillon: Zoologie géographique. Premier article, L'homme (Cassel: Imprimerie française, 1784.) Digital facsimile of the 1777 edition from the Internet Archive at this link; of the French translation from the Hathi Trust at this link.

Sandifort’s beautifully illustrated work on pathological anatomy included records of ulcerative aortic endocarditis, renal calculi, hemias, bony ankyloses, and congenital abnormalities. A good account of the “tetralogy of Fallot” (No. 2792) is given on pp. 1-38 of Vol. 1. For English translation see Amer. Heart J., 1956, 51, 9-25. In quality Sandifort's work is comparable with that of Morgagni, except that Morgagni's De sedibus was entirely unillustrated. 

A detailed record of Stoll’s practice year by year, between 1777 and 1790, giving numerous case histories and providing descriptions of diseases.

Lorry is regarded as the founder of French dermatology. A pupil of Jean Astruc, his most important work was his Tractatus, in which he attempted the classification of diseases on the basis of essential relations, their physiological, pathological, and etiological similarities. It was the first modern text on the subject, and the last major work on dermatology to be published in Latin.

This is an enlarged and more important (third) edition of his An essay on the diseases most fatal to infants (1767) No. 6324. Page 49: Important description of congenital hypertrophic pyloric stenosis.

First reliable record of color blindness. Written in the form of a letter to Joseph Priestley, who communicated it to the Royal Society. Huddart was a British hydrographer, engineer and inventor.

First accurate description of migraine.

Bourgelat founded the first veterinary school in Lyon, 1761. He later developed the French system of veterinary schools. Digital facsimile from BnFGallica at this link.

Of suicide, "probably the most widely read and most influential philosophical treatment of suicide written in modern times," was written in 1755 and originally intended to be published as one of five essays, including The natural history of religion and Of the immortality of the soul, in that year. Advance copies were printed and sent to friends, but two of the essays, including Of suicide, were withdrawn for fear of official persecution. Clerical critics of Hume knew of the essay and referred to it as evidence of Hume's atheism and immorality; a French translation was published in 1770 without Hume's knowledge, and the English version appeared in 1777, although in that printing neither author nor publisher were named. The first attributed publication came in 1783, under the title, Essays on suicide and the immortality of the soul, ascribed to the late David Hume esq., never before published. With remarks, intended as an antidote to the poison contained in these performances. Full text of the 1777 printing from davidhume.org at this link. Digital facsimile of the 1784 edition from Google Books at this link.

The earliest book devoted entirely to the health and illness of Jews, written by a Jewish physician. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Von Troil’s compilation is the only contemporary printed book steming from Sir Joseph Banks’s pioneering scientfic expedition to Iceland, Banks's first and only expedition as indisputable leader. Having recently returned from the Pacific with Captain James Cook, but having just withdrawn from Cook’s proposed Second Voyage, Banks wrote in his manuscript ‘Iceland Journal’ (now at McGill) that the possibility of an independent voyage to the South Seas in 1773 encouraged him to keep his entourage together and employed ‘to the advancement of science’. Iceland was seldom visited and suggested itself as a suitable terra incognita accessible in the time available: "the whole face of the country new to the botanist and zoologist as well as the many volcanoes with which it is said to abound made it very desirable to explore." On this expedition Banks was accompanied by Daniel Solander, James Lind, and Tobern Bergman, among others. Digital facsimile from Linda Hall Library at this link. Translated into English as Letters on Iceland containing observations on the civil, literary, ecclesiastical, and natural history; antiquities, volcanoes, basaltes, hot springs; customs, dress, manners of the inhabitants ... made during a voyage undertaken in the year 1772, by Joseph Banks, Assisted by Dr. Solander, Dr. J. Lind, Dr. Uno Von Troil, and several other literary and ingenious gentlemen. Written by Uno von Troil. To which are added .... Professor Bergman's curious observations and chemical examination of the lava and other substances produced on the island. (London, 1780). Digital facsimile of the English translation from Google Books at this link.

Although Priestley isolated oxygen, it was Lavoisier who discovered its real significance. He showed the true nature of the interchange of gases in the lungs and exploded Stahl’s phlogiston theory. Lavoisier was guillotined during the French Revolution.

The first accurate enumeration of the 12 cranial nerves, superseding that of Willis (No. 1378). Soemmerring is notable for his accuracy in anatomical illustration. This was his thesis. The same publisher issued an edition for commercial circulation the same year, deleting “Dissertatio inauguralis anatomica” from the title.

The first original pharmacopeia published in the USA. Reproduced in facsimile, with translation, in The Badger Pharmacist, 1938. No. 22-25.

“One of the first achievements of modern brain physiology” (Neuburger). Saucerotte carried out surgical experiments on dogs which convinced him that the anterior part of the cerebrum innervated the lower limbs and the posterior the upper limbs.

A reprint from the Philadelphia Packet, No. 284. The pamphlet was reprinted by the Massachusetts Temperance Alliance in Boston, 1865, for distribution to the Union soldiers.

Gleichen was probably the first to attempt to stain bacteria; he used carmine and indigo.

Richter, lecturer on surgery at Göttingen, in his classic treatise on hernia, first described partial enterocele, or “Richter’s hernia” (Chap. 24).

This and Hunter's The natural history of the human teeth (No. 3675) revolutionized the practice of dentistry and provided a basis for later dental research. Hunter devised appliances for the correction of malocclusion. He described the various stages of inflammation of affected teeth, and gave an accurate description of periodontal disease. In the above work he included instructions with regard to the operation of tooth transplantation from one living person directly to the jaw of another. Hunter’s outstanding reputation made this highly dubious procedure more widely accepted than it should have been.

The first specialist book on oral surgery. The first volume deals with diseases of the maxilla; and the second, with diseases of the mandible. Jourdain was particularly expert in diseases of the maxillary sinus and describes all forms of inflammation, and cystic and tumourous alterations of the sinuses. The appendix to Volume one deals with specific problems exclusive to oral surgery and quotes for the first time case histories of other physicians. English translations, Baltimore, 1849 and Philadelphia, 1851.

This parallel Arabic-Latin edition prepared by the apothecary John Channing is the first printed edition in Arabic, and the first modern edition of the text. Digital facsimile of the 1778 edition from Bayerische Staatsbibliothek at this link.

Important classification of ulcers.

The earliest exhaustive collection of medical biographies, and biographies of scientists working in related subjects. The first edition of this work appeared in 1755; the above edition is the most useful. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

The work covers the "origin of medicine" from the time of the Creation to the Trojan War (6000 – 1184 BCE), and describes both Old and New World medical practices of the period. The lectures were necessarily relatively general, but the footnotes, which occupy more than half of the text, provide full details ("historical illustrations") and identify all of Lettsom's printed sources. Digital facsimile from wellcomecollection.org at this link.

The natural history of Captain James Cook's second voyage in the Pacific; Forster and his son Georg were appointed naturalists to the voyage after Joseph Banks withdrew from the position. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Bayerische StaatsBibliothek at this link.

Strøm's work, which may be translated as "A short instruction about common sicknesses in the area around Bergen and their most common remedies" was "More a report than a doctor book, it describes the living conditions and medical remedies of his time" (Stokker, Remedies and rituals: Folk medicine in Norway and the new land (2007) pp. 112-114).

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Catalogue of Gronovius's museum which was sold at auction starting on October 7, 1778 and on succeeding days. Digital facsimile from docnum.unistra.fr at this link.

Digital facsimile from BnF Gallica at this link.

This work is divided into four parts:

• "The first, which occupies the first volume, contains a general description of Normandy, considerations about its climate, its people, their morals and habits, and the most common diseases that affect this province.
  Lépecq de la Clôture divided the entire province by region, according to the deposit of the mountains, the course of the rivers, the exposure, the elevation or the depression of the places. He described the character of the early Normans in comparison with the mores and customs of their descendants; the most general endemic diseases and those peculiar to each canton. He gave a brief account of the natural products found there, the nature of the common or mineral waters that flowed there, and the long series of epidemic diseases that were observed there.
  He made a description of the cantons of Rouen and Caen and obtained from his collaborators those of the canton of Évreux. He provided three life tables (Rouen, Lisieux and Évreux over 40 years) and made comparisons and reconciliations.
• The second part includes meteorological observations collected in Caen and Rouen during fifteen consecutive years.
• The third part presents the major constitutions of popular diseases in Caen from 1763 to 1768;
• The last part presents the diseases that reigned in the climate of Rouen from 1768 to 1777, and describes the various epidemics that occurred in Upper Normandy.
  

  "In addition to the epidemics of 1770 described in the first volume, he placed [in the last part] the catarrhal epidemic of the summer of 1763, the bilious putrid of 1764 and 1765, the milium that succeeded it, the atrabilious epidemic of 1766 and 1767, and the epidemic catarrh of 1767-1768 in the territory of Caen. The bilious epidemic of 1769, the catarrhal disease of 1770, the epidemic of Gros-Theil in the Roumois, the verminous and malignant putrid and exanthematous putrid of Louviers, the bilious catarrhal disease of 1771 and 1772, the putrid peripneumonia of 1775, the epidemic outbreak observed in Cottevrard, the influenza of 1775, the putrid catarrhal epidemic of Saint-Georges and the putrid peripneumonia of Dieppe in 1776; finally the putrid scorbutic epidemic of 1776 and 1777 in the canton of Rouen." (Wikipedia article on Louis Lépecq de la Cloture, accessed 3-2022).

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Earliest experiments upon animal calorimetry.

“Without contest the most beautiful of all anatomies for the artist and one of the most remarkable books of its time” (Hahn & Dumaitre). The plates in this work are more fantastic than any other anatomy, suggesting the work of Goya, who may have known or studied with Gamelin since Gamelin taught in Rome during the time Goya was there.

The first systematic treatise on public hygiene. Frank believed the ruler of a state should stand in the relation of a father to his children, among his duties being the safeguarding of the people’s health and the preservation of a healthy race by appropriate laws. The last two volumes were edited by G. C. G. Voigt. Portions were translated into English as A system of complete medical police: Selections from Johann Peter Frank. Edited with an introduction by Erna Lesky. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1976.).

Includes (p. 151) “original account of alcoholism, which is incidentally the first paper on the drug habit” (Garrison).

The “Coventry treatment” for goitre, which introduced the burnt sponge remedy into England, is mentioned on pp. 249-54. Digital facsimile from the Hathitrust at this link.

Frère Côme devised several new instruments for use in suprapubic lithotomy. This operation, placed in retirement when Cheselden adopted the lateral approach, was once more brought to the fore by Frère Côme.  Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Includes a description of Pott’s disease, with post-mortem findings, better than Pott’s own account. This is an important early work on the effect of movement and of rest in the treatment of joint conditions. English translation, 1790.

“Pott’s disease”. Percival Pott, surgeon to St. Bartholomew’s Hospital for more than 40 years, left a classic description of spinal curvature due to tuberculous caries and causing paralysis of the lower limbs. He did not, however, recognize its tuberculous nature. Pott published a further book on the subject in 1782. Reprinted in Med. Classics, 1936, 1, 281-328.

Withering, best remembered for his book on the foxglove, described the epidemics of scarlet fever which occurred in England in 1771 and 1778.

Mesmer promoted his system of treatment, based on his confused doctrine of a universal magnetic fluid influencing tides and men alike, with books and great personal showmanship. His treatment became such a popular health care sensation in France that it was as much a social movement as a medical practice. The ancien régime considered the leaders of the animal magnetism movement to be politically dangerous.The attention Mesmer directed toward hypnosis and suggestion in psychiatry led eventually to its scientific investigation by Braid and others. It also led to the more scientific development of suggestion in treatment, which has been termed after him “mesmerism”. Following an enquiry instituted by Louis XVI, Mesmer’s career came to an abrupt end. English translations by G. Frankau, 1948. Digital facsimile of the 1779 edition from the Internet Archive at this link.

Discovery of photosynthesis. Ingen-Housz showed that the green parts of plants, when exposed to light, fix the free carbon dioxide of the atmosphere, but that in darkness plants have no such power. Thus he proved that animal life is dependent ultimately on plant life, a discovery of fundamental importance in ecology.

Millar promoted mathematical methods for computing the comparative success of different methods of cure. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digitial facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digital facsimile of the Dutch edition from Google Books at this link. Translated into German by Karl Gottlob Kühn as Von den guten Würkungen der Electricität in verschiedenen Krankheiten. Mit eingien Anmerkungen und Zusatzen. 2 vols, Copenhagen: C. G. Prost, 1793. Digital facsimile of the expanded German translation from Google Books at this link.