The Transmission of Medical Knowledge: from Book to Journal the Collection of Allan B
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THE TRANSMISSION OF MEDICAL KNOWLEDGE: FROM BOOK TO JOURNAL THE COLLECTION OF ALLAN B. KIRSNER, M. D. RIVERRUN BOOKS & MANUSCRIPTS CATALOGUE THREE THE TRANSMISSION OF MEDICAL KNOWLEDGE: FROM BOOK TO JOURNAL THE COLLECTION OF ALLAN B. KIRSNER, M. D. RIVERRUN BOOKS & MANUSCRIPTS CATALOGUE THREE The earliest writings of Hippocrates and his school date to the late-5th century B.C. Over the course of the next two millenia, doctors communicated their observations in book-length treatises. That practice changed in the late-17th and 18th centuries, with the increasing need for faster and shorter communications – a direct result of the use of the scientific method. The first and most important of these journals, founded in 1665, was The Royal Society’s Philosophical Transactions. Its brief communications covered the range of the natural sciences, and the journal form was born. By the mid-18th centuty, groups of doctors were publishing pure medical journals, one of the first being Medical Observations and Enquiries (item 156). The following decades saw the rise of multiple new medical journals published by groups of doctors., medical societies, hospitals, and medical schools. Finally, subspecialty societies published journals for their own fields. While books continued to be written and published throughout this period, the journal became the most efective tool for quickly disseminating new information. Medical librarians, historians, and collectors focused for many years on the earliest contributions in book form rather than on publications in journals. This was in large part due to the difculty in identifying the major contributions to medicine in the large number of journals and the even larger number of articles they contained. This problem was solved with the pioneering bibliographic work of Fielding H. Garrison (1870-1935) and Leslie T. Morton (1907-2004), whose A Medical Bibliography is now the central reference in the field. Credit for the original idea goes to Sir William Osler. The great physician-collector suggested to the Surgeon General’s Library in 1911 that it segregate its more important material for safekeeping. The librarian Fielding Garrison drew up a list that was published in volume 17 of the Index-Catalogue of 1912. This list evolved into his Introduction to the History of Medicine (1913), the groundbreaking work he saw through four editions. Afer Garrison’s death in 1935, the British librarian Leslie T. Morton sought to expand and correct Garrison’s bibliography. The first edition of Morton’s A Medical Bibliography was published in 1943. In 2014, the copyright of Morton’s Medical Biography reverted to Jeremy Norman, who in 1991 had issued a revised and further expanded fifh edition. Norman has since made the bibliographies freely available on the Internet. This accessibility and the extensive revision, addition, and amplification of materials further develops the ambitions and aims of the original project. For that reason, Norman’s name is added to those of Garrison and Morton in the following references. Collectors and cataloguers of these contributions owe as great a debt to Lee Ash’s Serial Publications Containing Medical Classics (1961). Though unacknowledged in descriptions, this index to Garrison-Morton-Norman remains the key to revealing many serial volumes’ most important papers. When Lee Ash’s work was published in 1961, Dr. Kirsner was a medical student, interested in and collecting medical history for about four years. Using the two reference tools, he was able to identify and acquire all of contributions to medicine during the age of the journal found in this catalogue. He continued to collect books as well, but realized that most of the major contributions to medicine since the mid-18th century were found in journals rather than books. The majority of the items in this catalogue were collected before he entered private practice in 1969. This catalogue thus ofers a collection formed fify years ago, one to which no additions or subtractions have been made over this last half century. Special notice must also be given to the first and early American editions that are featured here. One sees in the 19th century the growth of medical literature in America both in urban and rural locations, and each edition adds some element of the New World to the Old. This can be found in the prefaces, introductions, or approaches to the material that were reworked to address specific American needs. – TFL THE FIRST TEXTBOOK IN NEUROPATHOLOGY 1. ABERCROMBIE, John (1780-1844). Pathological and Practical Researches on Diseases of the Brain and the Spinal Cord. Philadelphia: Carey & Lea, 1831. 8vo. xxii, 464 pp. Contemporary sheep. Spine reinforced with tape, covers rubbed; dampstaining at end. FIRST AMERICAN EDITION. “First textbook of neuropathology. Originally published in a series of articles in Edin. med. surg. J., 1818- 19, and first collected into book form in the German translation, with appendix, by C. Nasse, Bonn, E. Weber, 1821” (Garrison-Morton-Norman 2285.2, first London edition, 1828). Cordasco 30-0002. (401957) $250 2. ALLCHIN, Sir William Henry (1846-1912). Structure and Function. The Harveian Oration. London: Macmillan and Co, 1903. 8vo. 59 pp. Original linen-backed blue printed boards. Front hinge cracked, staining to boards; owner’s name on title. FIRST EDITION, PRESENTATION COPY, inscribed “With the Orator’s Compliments” on the front board, of Allchin’s address to the Royal College of Physicians on 19 October 1903. In 1885, Allchin published the first detailed description of ulcerative colitis (see Garrison-Morton-Norman 3482.2). (402022) $75 3. AMERICAN JOURNAL OF MEDICAL SCIENCES. The American Journal of Medical Sciences. New Series. Vol. LXXI. Edited by Isaac Hays. Philadelphia: Henry C. Lea, 1876. 8vo. 607 pp. Original flexible cloth. Spine reinforced with tape, library label and stamp on title. FIRST EDITION. 4 Includes: MORTON, Thomas George (1835-1903). “A peculiar and painful afection of the fourth metatarso-phalangeal articulation”. Pp. 37-45. First complete description of anterior metatarsalgia (“Morton’s disease”). Garrison-Morton-Norman 4341. See Cordasco 70-2526. WARREN, Jonathan Mason (1811-1867). “Operations for fissure of the hard and sof palate (palatoplastie)”. Pp. 538-47. Warren devised the first operation for closure of complete clefs of the palate. Garrison-Morton- Norman 5745. (402106) $75 4. ANNALS OF MEDICAL HISTORY. Annals of Medical History. Vols. 1; New Series, Vols. 1-6; Third Series, Vols. 1-4; Vol. 4, no. 4 and Vol. 9, no. 5. New York: Paul Hoeber, 1917-1937. Together 11 volumes, 4to. Illustrations in text. Full volumes bound in red library cloth, gilt-lettered on spines; the two final single issues in original printed wrappers. Library stamps on endleaves and fore-edges, generally clean internally. FIRST EDITIONS. A large run of this important journal. Garrison- Morton-Norman 6652. Included in this run are: HYDE, Edward, Earl of Clarendon (1609-1674). “Description of the death of his father, Henry Hyde, being the first recorded case of death from angina pectoris” (p. 210). See Garrison-Morton-Norman 2884. (402076) $400 5. ANNALS OF MEDICAL HISTORY. Annals of Medical History. Vol. VII. Edited by Francis R. Packard. New York: Paul Hoeber, 1925. Folio. Original cloth-backed boards, printed paper spine label, uncut. Small stain on front cover; several leaves creased at beginning, generally in very good condition. FIRST EDITION. Includes: John Ruräh’s essay on William Cadogan’s A dissertation on the gout, and all chronic diseases, jointly considered, as proceeding from the same causes; what those causes are; and a rational and natural method of cure proposed (London: J. Dodsley, 1771). Pp. 67-90. See Garrison-Morton-Norman 4489. J. M. Hayman’s essay on Malpighi’s “Concerning the structure of the kidneys”. Pp. 245-63. See Garrison-Morton-Norman 535 and 1230. (402077) $100 5 6. ARMSTRONG, John (1784-1829). Practical Illustrations of Typhus and Other Fevers: of Pulmonary Consumption, Measles, &c., &c. Notes by P. Washington Leland. Boston: Timothy Bedlington, 1829. 8vo. 559 pp. Contemporary American mottled sheep, red morocco lettering-piece. Slight rubbing. Fourth(?) American edition. “The present volume embraces a great variety of diseases; diseases peculiarly interesting and important from their frequent occurrence, fatal tendency” (Preface by Leland). Earlier American editions were published in 1821, 1822, and 1824. Cordasco 20-0026. (401963) $80 7. BAGLIVI, Giorgio (1668-1707). De praxi medica ad priscam observanci rationem revocanda, libri duo. Lyons: Anisson and Posuel, 1699. 8vo. 407 pp. One engraved plate. Contemporary calf. Provenance: contemporary ink inscription on title. Binding somewhat worn; title slightly cockled. Second edition. “Baglivi, Professor of Anatomy at Rome, had a short but brilliant career. He wrote Praxis medica and De fibra motrice, and originated the so-called ‘solidar’ pathology; he also devoted much time to experimental physiology. Baglivi was a strong advocate of specialism” (Garrison-Morton- Norman 68, for his Opera omnia). The plate shows a tarantula. (401891) $225 8. BAKER, William Morrant (1839-1896). “Erythema serpens”. In: Saint Bartholomew’s Hospital Reports. Edited by Dr. Edwards and Mr. Callender. Vol. IX. London: Longmans, Green, and Co, 1873. 8vo. Baker’s paper is on pp. 198-211. Entire volume: 257 pp., 81 pp. tables at end. Contemporary half cloth, marbled boards. Spine reinforced with tape, library label on pastedown. FIRST EDITION. “First description of erythema serpens, usually called ‘erysipeloid of Rosenbach’, following the latter’s paper in Arch. klin. Chir., 1887, 36, 346” (Garrison-Morton-Norman 4064). (401956) $75 HALSTED’S COPY OF A LANDMARK WORK IN ORTHOPEDICS 9. BAKER, William Morrant (1839-1896). “On the formation of synovial cysts in the leg in connection with disease of the knee joint”. And: “The Formation of abnormal synovial cysts in connection with the joints”. In: Saint Bartholomew’s Hospital Reports. Vol. XIII and Vol. XXI. London: Smith, 6 Elder, 1877, 1885.