Among the French surgeons of the 19th century, Roux was second in importance only to Dupuytren. He performed staphylorrhaphy in 1819 and sutured the ruptured female peritoneum in 1832; he is also remembered on account of his method of resection of bone.

Müller’s most important histological work. In it he described the microscopic anatomy of a large series of secreting glands. Müller’s greatest influence was not so much through his own work as through the influence he had upon his pupils at Bonn and Berlin. English translation, 1839.

Sharpey was the first occupant of the chair of anatomy and physiology at University College, London, this chair being the first official recognition of physiology in any English medical school. He wrote a memorable paper on cilia and ciliary motion. Through his students Sharpey was the founder of the British school of physiology. Among his pupils were Michael Foster, Burdon-Sanderson and Edward Schäfer.

German writers usually credit Steinheim with the first description of parathyroid tetany.

Both a doctor and a minister, Smith, physician to the London Fever Hospital, called himself, “physician to body and soul.” He argued that the poor are impoverished by fever and that fever was preventable. This book influenced Edwin Chadwick’s later achievements with the Poor Law Board, moving the ethos of public health away from the voluntary, philanthropic, individualistic eighteenth-century approach, into the imperative, community-oriented Victorian mode. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

The most important early Persian pharmacological work, first published in print in Latin translation. Muvaffak flourished in Herat (current Afghanistan), under the Samanid prince Mansur I ibn Nuh, who ruled from 961 to 976. He was apparently the first to think of compiling a treatise on materia medica in Persian; to obtain the information he travelled extensively in Persia and India. Between 968 and 977 CE he wrote the Book of the Remedies (Kitab al-abnyia 'an Haqa'iq al-adwiya), the oldest prose work in modern Persian. It deals with 585 remedies (of which 466 are derived from plants, 75 from minerals, 44 from animals), classified into four groups according to their action. The above epitome was taken from a MS of 1055 CE, one of the oldest surviving texts in Persian. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link. A German version appeared in 1893 under the direction of R. Robert.

Records Bell’s demonstration that the fifth cranial nerve has a sensory-motor function, his discovery of “Bell’s nerve” and the motor nerve of the face, lesion of which causes facial paralysis (Bell’s palsy). Bell was preceded in some of these discoveries by Mayo (No. 1390). Also includes the first description of myotonia. First edition, 1824.

Includes description of the “canal of Schlemm”, the circular canal at the junction of the cornea and the sclerotic.

Contains the first illustrations of microscopic sections of cancer; however, Home drew no worthwhile conclusion from his microscopic studies. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Randolph was the son-in-law of Philip Syng Physick. Physick’s method “consisted in the application of a carved splint, which would keep the limb strictly at rest, and prevent the least possible motion of the joint; and also in the prosecution of a course of active and long continued purging”.

The first American treatise on orthopedics. In his autobiography Gross wrote that, “The title was unfortunate; it should have been A practical treatise on fractures and dislocations, with an account of the diseases of the bones and joints”.

Proof that glanders in the horse is communicable to man.

First record (p. 149) of the use of emetine in the treatment of amoebiasis.

In this book Mackenzie, one of the foremost ophthalmologists of his time, included a classic description of the symptomatology of glaucoma, and was probably the first to draw attention to the increase of intra-ocular pressure as a characteristic of the condition. He introduced the term “asthenopia”, and was the first to describe sympathetic ophthalmia as a distinct disease.

In 25 vols. and and 8-vol. supplement, Callisen’s great medical bibliography of writings by physicians, surgeons, obstetricians, pharmacists, and naturalists then living gives a complete view of the literature of the period from about 1780 to about 1830, describing over 99,000 items. As Garrison pointed out, it is one of the greatest bibliographical achievements of a single man. Reprinted, Nieuwkoop De Graaf, 1962-64.

The principle of the modern microscope was worked out by Joseph Jackson Lister, father of Lord Joseph Lister. His important improvements in achromatic lenses make him one of the most prominent figures in the history of modern microscopy.

The largest and most splendidly produced atlas of neuroanatomy originally published in English, with plates that remain unsurpassed as works of art. Later editions were in reduced format.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

By numerous authors, many unidentified. All published. From the Preface to part I: "The present Volume... completes the series of Hunterian Catalogues. The specimens included in it consist of Plants and Invertebrate Anaimals, many of which, brought home by Cook, Banks, and White, and other voyagers, were presented to Mr. Hunter. To these is added a large collection of Corallines and Zoophytes, purchased by him at the sale of the effects of Mr. John Ellis. Numerous and valuable specimens have been obtained, both by donation and purchase, since the Collection was entrusted to the care of the Council of the College.

"Many of the lowest forms of Plants, such as the Algae and Nullipores, were the property of Mr. Ellis, and their names are still preserved in the handwriing of that genteman and of Dr. Solander."

Digital facsimile of parts I-II  from the Internet Archive at this link.  

Digital facsimile of part III from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile of part IV, Fasciculus 1 from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile of parts V-VI from Google Books at this link.

Gunn intended his book to serve as a guide for frontier and rural families who lived far away from any sort of medical care so it contained instructions on how to treat a wide variety of illnesses.  While the first edition was a relatively modest 440 pages, subsequent editions ballooned to over 1000 pages that included advice on everything from the proper behavior of wives to how to cope with a child who indulges in the “solitary vice.”  Gunn’s work became well-known enough to merit a mention in both Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn, as one of the books at the Grangerford residence, and is described as, “[telling] you all about what to do if a body was sick or dead.” 

Digital facsimile of the 1835 fourth edition from Google Books at this link.

The printer or publisher of part 7 is not identified. Digital facsimile from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

“The first successful operation for rectal cancer was performed by Lisfranc in 1826. This consisted of excising the anus and rectum via the perineum, which resulted in the functional equivalent of a perineal colostomy” (Warren, History of Excision of the Rectum, Proc R Soc Med. 1957, 50, 599-600).

“In the pre-anesthetic era Jacques Lisfranc (1790-1847) of Paris was the first to perform a planned operation for cancer of the rectum. Lisfranc's operation was a limited excision of the lower end of the rectum from a perineal approach and was first performed in 1826. A few years later in a paper read before the Académie Royale de Médecine, he reported the results in 9 patients, 6 of whom survived and were more or less continent” (Tebala, History of colorectal surgery, Int J Colorectal Dis, 2015, 30, 723-748).

In this work Ehrenberg first published his classification of infusioria, including the naming of bacteria for the first time. The work published two papers based on his expeditions. The first, read on January 10, 1828, was "Die geographische Verbreitung der Infusionsthierschen in Nord-Afrika und West-Asien, bebachtet auf Hemprich und Enrenbergs Reisen". This was the work in which Ehrenberg first published his classification of infusoria, and named bacteria. In it he set out his findings from travels through north Africa and Arabia in 1820-1825, during which he accumulated some 34,000 zoological and 46,000 botanical specimens. Considering the enormous amount of material accumulated, it must have taken Ehrenberg a few years to organize and summarize some of the findings.

Ehrenberg's second paper, read on March 4 and 18, 1830, was "Beiträge zur Kenntniss der Organisation der Infusorien und ihrer geographischen Verbreitung, besonders in Sibirien." In this lectures he recounted findings during his travels through Russia, which were patronized by Alexander von Humboldt, and financed by Czar Nicholas I.

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

"Guthrie's experiences during the Peinsular War enabled him to make considerable improvements in practical surgery. These included introducing the practice of ligaturing both ends of a divided artery.... Guthrie made further surgical advances after Waterloo, where he successfully divided the muscles of the calf to tie the main artery" (ODNB 24, 305).

Digital facsimile from the Hathi Trust at this link.

Hall's experiments on the physiological effects of therapeutic bleeding provided compelling evidence that bleeding could cause significant harm and even death. Digital facsimile from wellcomecollection.org at this link.

In this conceptual anticipation of later ideas in psychopharmacology Newnham argued that dreams, visions, apparitions and other apparently spiritual manifestations, whether good or bad, arose from physiological rather than supernatural causes. He provided evidence that the effects on the brain from disease, medications (including nitrous oxide and opium) and trauma, causing "disturbance of brainular function", could produce such experiences. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

An early attempt at a comprehensive analysis of sleep from the medical point of view, including topics such as "Night-Mare", "Day-Mare", "Sleep-Walking," Sleep-Talking," Sleeplessness, Waking Dreams, Drowiness, Trance, etc.
Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

“The first treatise to attempt a scientific synthesis of the botanic practice....The first significant attempt to synthesize and systematize the prevailing botanic practice and plant materia medica” (Berman & Flannery, America's botanico-medical movements (2001) 46-49, 72, 73)

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Newnham argued that argued that apparitional experiences, dreams and spiritual visions had a physiological rather than a supernatural basis. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

The first important American presentation of the case for polygenesis in support of slavery. Caldwell presented the first important American critique of the monogenist theories of human ancestry promoted by Samuel Stanhope Smith (No. 156.1)  and James Prichard. Caldwell "presented, with all the appearance of scientific objectivity, the case for 'polygenesis' or the separate creation of the races as distinct species . . . employing the accepted Biblical chronology of Archbishop James Ussher, [he] argued that Negroes were known to have existed 3,445 years ago, or only 743 years after Noah's ark--not enough time for a new race to come into existence through the effects of climate" (George M. Fredrickson, The Black Image in the White Mind [1987], p. 73). 

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Denis discovered the presence of cholesterol (“cholestérine”) in the blood. This he announced on p. 110 of his Recherches expérimentales.

Syme, teacher and father-in-law of Lister, was one of the greatest of the Scottish surgeons. He is remembered for his method of amputation at the ankle (see No. 4459), for his speedy adoption of anesthesia and antisepsis, and for the above book, which showed that excision of joints is usually preferable to amputation – a principle soon generally adopted.

First description of the neurotic spinal arthropathies.

Dance’s important early description of parathyroid tetany followed closely on that of Steinheim.

Marshall Hall clearly distinguished arterioles and venules from capillaries, and he described arteriovenous shunts.

The most comprehensive treatise on malformations of domesticated animals, as well as an important contribution to general teratology. The superb atlas illustrates many rare animal terata. See also his Uber thierische Missgeburten, ein Beitrag zur pathologischen Anatomie und Entwicklungsgeschichte. Berlin, A. Hirschwald, 1877. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Experimental proof of the Bell-Magendie law (see Nos. 1254 & 1256) of the spinal nerve roots.

Soubeiran, like Liebig and Guthrie, discovered chloroform; it is difficult to determine who was first, as each may have allowed an interval of time to elapse between discovery and publication.

The first systematic publication in Great Britain on industrial disease and its prevention. For comprehensiveness, first-hand clinical experience and constructive proposals for improvements, Thackrah’s monograph is superior to that of Ramazzini. It attracted attention from both medical men and laymen at the time that it appeared, and played an important part in stimulating the factory and health legislation which mitigated some of the worst features of the Industrial Revolution. The book also includes important information on the harmful effects of child labor. The second edition (1832) was doubled in length. A reprint of the 2nd edition, with a life of the author by A. Meiklejohn, was published in 1957.

Goethe believed that in 1784 he demonstrated the presence of the intermaxillary (premaxillary) bone in man, proving an anatomical connection between man and the lower animals, and certifying to Goethe that there is no fundamental difference between man and apes. He was one of the pioneers of evolution and the first to use the term “morphology”. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link. See George A. Wells, "Goethe and the intermaxillary bone," British Journal for the History of Science, 3 (1967) 348-61. (Available from JSTOR at this link.)

The “first clear and complete” anticipation of the Darwinian theory of evolution by natural selection. The appendix to Matthew’s work actually uses the expression, “natural process of selection”. See W.J. Dempster, Patrick Matthew and natural selection: A nineteenth century gentleman-farmer, naturalist and writer, Edinburgh, Paul Harris, 1983.

Elliotson was the first to ascertain that pollen was the cause of hay fever.

First attempt at operative treatment of aneurysm.

Dupuytren devised an operation for the treatment of contracture of the palmar fascia (“Dupuytren’s contracture”). Reprinted, with translation, in Med. Classics, 1939, 4, 127-50. The condition was first mentioned by Platter, No. 4297.9.

Axmann of Wertheim described osteogenesis imperfecta occurring in himself and his two brothers. He referred to the occurrence of articular dislocations and blue sclerotics. See also No. 6367.

With over 2000 pages of text and 726 lithographed plates (incorporating 3604 individual figures), this work is the most comprehensive, and perhaps the most beautiful anatomical surgical atlas of the 19th century. It was published in parts over 23 years and represented the life work of Bourgery, who died before completion. Some copies were issued with the plates in black and white at half the price of the colored copies. The black and white images lack much of the visual drama of the hand-colored plates.

The artist who directed the massive program of prosection, and who was responsible for 512 of the spectacular illustrations, was Nicholas-Henri Jacob, a student of the neo-classical painter of the French Revolution, Jacques-Louis David. Bourgery considered Jacob his full collaborator in the project. The influence of the highly finished style of David is evident in the plates for this work. Before embarking on this project Jacob had gained considerable experience drawing on stone for lithographic publications. Jacob's artistic collaborators on the project were his wife, Charlotte Hublier-Jacob, Lean Baptiste Leveillé, Edmond Pochet, E. Roussin, and others. The physiologist Claude Bernard did dissections and anatomical preparations for only two of the images and a few captions. Bernard played a somewhat greater editorial role in the slightly expanded second edition published from 1866 to 1871. For both versions the precisely-detailed hand-coloring was done by an elaborate system of stencils; otherwise the time involved in the intricate hand-coloring of all the large plates might have made the edition impossible.

The first two volumes were translated into English and issued in Paris by Delaunay in 1833 and 1837. Before this English edition was terminated the publisher also issued a fragment of volume 4. Presumably only a small number of copies of the English version were issued, as relatively few have survived as compared to the original French edition.

All the plates were reproduced in color in a modern single-volume tri-lingual folio edition: Bourgery et Jacob, Atlas of human anatomy and surgery, edited by Jean Marie Le Minor and Henri Sick (Cologne: Taschen, 2005).

Discussion of various specimens in the anatomical museum of  Medical Faculty of the Rheinischen Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität, Bonn, highlighting a number of embryological, teratological and obstetrical items, some of which are illustrated. Digital facsimile from Universität Bonn at this link.

Probably the first book specifically on the skin diseases of the feet, including the functions and nature of the skin of the feet and the manner in which perspiration takes place in the feet. Nothing is known regarding the author; even his first name is unknown. He may have been an army surgeon as he pays particular attention to the feet of soldiers.  Digital facsimile of the 1845 second edition from the Internet Archive at this link.

A comprehensive annotated bibliography in Japanese of Chinese medical literature, including materia medica. The bibliography includes works for which the author had references, but could not locate copies. According to Lu & Needham, Taki's work was finished c. 1825, first printed in 1831, reprinted in Tokyo in 1933-35, and reprinted in Shanghai, 1936. There was also a reprint in Beijing in 1956. Limited (search only) access  to the 1933-35 reprint from the Hathi Trust at this link.

Includes 185 hand-colored plates. Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Digital facsimile from Universiteit Utrecht at this link.

The first book devoted entirely to exhumation and decomposition of bodies. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

On December 5, 1831, the notorious London "resurrection men" John Bishop and Thomas Williams were executed for the murder of an itinerant fourteen-year-old (known only as the "Italian Boy"), whose corpse they had then attempted to sell to the anatomical demonstrator at King's College. Five days later, the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons-whose members included such luminaries as Astley Cooper, William Lawrence, Benjamin Collins Brodie, Charles Bell and Benjamin Travers-sent the present letter to Viscount Melbourne, the British Home Secretary, urging reform of the antiquated British laws governing procurement and possession of cadavers for dissection in medical schools. 

Since the mid-eighteenth century, obtaining cadavers for teaching purposes had been regulated in Britain by the Murder Act of 1752, which stipulated that only the corpses of executed criminals could be used for dissection. By the beginning of the nineteenth century, however, improvements in medical science, coupled with a substantial drop in the number of executions, caused the demand for cadavers to far outstrip the legal supply. This situation was ripe for exploitation by "resurrection men," criminals who robbed the graves of the newly deceased and sold their corpses to teachers of anatomy, who of necessity turned a blind eye to the illegality of these transactions. Some grave-robbers even resorted to murder, including the infamous William Burke, who in 1828 was tried and executed in Edinburgh for the murders of over a dozen victims whose corpses he and his partner Hare sold to an anatomical demonstrator connected to Edinburgh University.

Calls for reform of the 1752 Murder Act began to arise as early as 1810, and in 1828, the year of Burke's execution, Parliament appointed a select committee to "enquire into the manner of obtaining subjects for dissection by schools of Anatomy and the State of law affecting persons employed in obtaining and dissecting bodies." The horrific nature of the crimes committed by Burke, Bishop and Williams aroused public sentiment in favor of reform, a sentiment echoed in the present letter from the RCS Council, which spells out in detail the untenable position of students and teachers of anatomy under the then-current law. In 1832 Parliament passed the Anatomy Act, granting licenses to teachers of anatomy and giving physicians, surgeons and medical students legal access to corpses unclaimed after death. Digital facsimile of the reproduction of the "letter" in The Lancet from Google Books at this link

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

This was the first law passed in the United States consigning the bodies of those who died in workhouses, hospitals, and similar institutions, the bodies of whom were "unclaimed," to medical schools for dissection. "Such measures assured the 'respectable' classes that their graves would not be plundered to provision the dissecting table, while providing anatomists with a steady suppply of free cadavers, and rescuing the profession from the taint of association with unsavory lower-class body snatchers...." (Sappol, A traffic in dead bodies, 4). John Collins Warren spearheaded the effort to get this legislation passed.

Digital facsimile from the U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Perhaps the earliest essay by a professional historian on the pre-Harveian history of the circulation. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

This was the text for Aububon's The birds of America. Audubon wrote it with the assistance of William Macgillivray, though he did not credit him on the title page. The text included Audubon's accounts of his travels and adventures in America scattered through the volumes in the bird descriptions, and as separate anecdotes. Audubon recounted his experiences in the Florida Keys, along the Mississippi, and in Louisiana and Kentucky in the 1820s and 1830s.

Audubon published the text separately from the double elephant folio plates in order to avoid a stricture of the British Copyright Act of 1709 which would have required him to deposit a set of the very expensive double elephant folio plates with each of nine depository libraries in the United Kingdom.

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

In this work Snell described and illustrated his "operating chair," the first reclining dental chair with adjustable headrest. The chair also had a convenient mirror mounted on one of the arms for the patient to look at his own teeth. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Youatt was one of the most widely published writers on veterinary medicine during the 19th century. This very practical work, originally published via the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, underwent many editions and revisions in England and the U.S. through the early 20th century. It may have been the most widely republished of the many books published by the SDUK, which formally existed from 1826 to 1846. The treatise on draught, or the uses of horses to perform work, included as a final chapter, was written and published anonymously by the civil engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

First edition, 1824. Founded in 1732/33, this institution became known in the 19th century as "Old Blockley" after it moved to the Blockley Township in West Philadelphia. It was renamed Philadelphia General Hospital in 1919; closed in 1977.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Isolation of creatine from muscle.

Description of the pars flaccida (“Shrapnell’s membrane”) of the tympanic membrane.

Cooper, the most popular surgeon in London during the early part of the 19th century, was connected with both Guy’s and St. Thomas’s Hospitals. Among his best works is his description of the thymus; he described the “reservoir” of the thymus as lined by smooth mucous membrane and running spirally, not straight, through the gland.

Rathke’s most notable discovery was of structures homologous with gill slits in bird and mammalian embryos. He discredited the vertebral theory of the skull.

Isidore, the son of Étienne (See No. 534.57) organized all known human and animal malformations taxonomically. Many principles governing abnormal development were enunciated for the first time in this work. It also introduced hundreds of names for specific malformations, many of which are still in use. For comprehensive coverage of rare anomalies it is still of value as a reference source.

Guthrie in America, Liebig in Germany, and Soubeiran in France discovered chloroform independently of one another. Guthrie discovered the modern method of making chloroform by distilling alcohol with chlorinated lime. The second paper has the title: On pure chloric ether.

Discovery, in 1831, of chloroform and chloral. Independently chloroform was discovered by Souberian and by Guthrie.

Isolation of codeine.

“Fielding’s membrane”, the tapetum of the retina.

For the treatment of chlorosis Blaud prescribed a pill (Blaud’s pill) composed of sulphate of iron and carbonate of potassium. Preliminary report in Bull. gén. Thérap.,1832, 2,154-55.

Foedisch showed chlorotic blood to be deficient in iron. See also Gaz. méd. Paris, 1837, 2 sér. 5,7.

Hope did much to advance the knowledge of heart murmurs, valvular disease, and aneurysm; he described the second sound of the left side of the sternum in mitral stenosis as “altered” – losing its short, flat clear sound and becoming a prolonged bellows murmur. From his description this became known as “Hope’s early diastolic murmur.” His classic descriptions of cardiac asthma, valvular disease (pp. 307-45 above), and cardiac neurosis are reprinted in Willius & Keys, Cardiac classics, 1941, pp. 405-15. Probably published in 1831 (see review in Lond. med. phys. J., 1831, p. 513-22 (Dec.)) although “all known copies seem to have cancel title page dated 1832” (Wellcome Catalogue).

In his wonderfully clear account of aortic insufficiency, Corrigan described the “water-hammer pulse” now commonly known as “Corrigan’s pulse.” He recognized that the hypertrophy of the heart present in this condition is compensatory and not a disease. Corrigan was the last of the famous band forming the “Irish School of Medicine” in the 19th century. Reprinted in Med. Classics, 1937, 1, 703-27.

First full description of lymphadenoma, which Wilks in 1865 referred to as “Hodgkin’s disease”. This is more typically designated as Hodgkin's lymphoma. In 1666 Malpighi had vaguely outlined the condition. Hodgkin was pathologist at Guy’s Hospital. The paper is reproduced in Med. Classics, 1937, 1, 741-70.

First recorded example of cardiac catheterization, performed during an unsuccessful attempt to obtain blood from a patient suffering from cholera (p. 100). Second edition as separate pamphlet with a new Foreward, Güstrow, 1834. Digital facsimile of the 1834 edition from Google Books at this link.

This includes the first published illustration of Alibert’s famous “family tree” for the classification of skin diseases, a concept which Alibert borrowed freely from Torti (No. 5231). This classification was never widely adopted. The book contains an important description of dermatolysis.

Parkin suggested the water-born character of cholera and the use of charcoal filters for water purification.

Dupuytren was born in poverty and died a millionaire. He became the best surgeon of his time in France. He was a “shrewd diagnostician, an operator of unrivaled aplomb, a wonderful clinical teacher, and a good experimental physiologist and pathologist” (Garrison); his greatest contributions were in the field of surgical pathology. Vol. 1, p. 424 contains Dupuytren's classification of burns. English translation by A. S. Doane, Boston, 1833.

In its time this was the most comprehensive work on operative surgery in France; it contains some useful historical information. The first English translation appeared in New York, 1835. The atlas for that edition was never published. The best edition was the English translation annotated and significantly expanded by Valentine Mott (1785-1865), 3 vols. and atlas, New York, 1845-47.

A study of the dancing mania of the Middle Ages. An English translation (see No. 1678) appeared in 1835.

First edition published privately and anonymously. Second edition, with additions, Boston, 1833. Many times reprinted. Republished by Charles Bradlaugh and Annie Besant, 1891. Edited, with an introductory notice by Norman E. Himes, and with "medical emendations" by Robert Latou Dickinson (1937). Digital facsimile of the 1891 edition from the Internet Archive at this link.  See Michael Sappol, "Anatomical Performance, Medical Narrative, and Identity in Antebellum America," Bull. Hist. Med., 83 (2009) 460-49, which primarily concerns the life of Knowlton through the examination of his autobiography.

This compendium contains one of the first world charts of a disease, tracing the spread of cholera from two main sources, India (1817) and China (1820), across Asia and the Middle East via trade routes, to France and England in 1832, from which it spread to North America. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Medical Heritage Library, Internet Archive at this link.

The first modern critical edition of the text, which collated medieval manuscripts against the previous printed editions. Digital facsimile of the 1832 edition from the Internet Archive at this link

Includes 42 hand-colored plates. Digital facsimile from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Trebuchet's work sets out the rules and regulations governing dangerous and unhealthy work environments (particularly those involving steam engines) and public nuisances. Pages 281-301 contain a table of businesses classed by their products, listing their specific offenses against public health and citing the laws governing their activities. As far as we have been able to determine, Trebuchet’s work was far more comprehensive than any individual book published in the English language at this time. 

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

"At first engaged in a Rochdale bank, in 1824 he [Kay-Shuttleworth] became a medical student at the University of Edinburgh. Settling in Manchester about 1827, he was instrumental in setting up the Manchester Statistical Society. He worked for the Ardwick and Ancoats Dispensary. While still known simply as Dr. James Kay, he wrote The Moral and Physical Condition of the Working Class Employed in the Cotton Manufacture in Manchester (1832), which was cited by Friedrich Engels in Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844. The experience which he thus gained of the conditions of the poor in the Lancashire factory districts, together with his interest in economic science, led to his appointment in 1835 as poor law commissioner in Norfolk and Suffolk and later in the London districts. In 1839 he was appointed first secretary of the committee formed by the Privy Council to administer the Government grant for the public education in Britain" (Wikipedia). Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

In his study of the spread of cholera in Poland in 1831 Brière de Boismont used a map to show the progression of the disease from a central point through the country along a red line through principal towns and the date in which the disease appeared in each town. Digital facsimile from BnF Gallica at this link.

Hamett privately published this report after it was rejected for publication by the British government. He included hospital admission tables in his book and produced perhaps the first map based on hospital reports of disease incidence. He identified clusters of hospital-certified cholera that originated in "close, low and dirty alleys or places in which the air is penned up" (p. 132).  Digital facsimile from the U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.

Corbyn mapped the history of cholera in India within British regimental stations. He included the date of each reported outbreak in a table of British regimental locations to describe the temporal progression of the disease. His map shows routes connecting British garrisons within the landscape of Indian towns and cities. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Tanner, a prolific cartographer, wished to provide a geographic account of the spread of the worldwide cholera epidemic of 1817.  Statistics concerning the epidemic, he complained, were "given in such a loose and unconnected manner as to render a reference to them at once irksome and unprofitable." His publication included global, national and local maps, data tables showing number of deaths in different localities by country, and detailed maps of the United States and New York City with small red dots indicating points where the disease had broken out. Digital facsimile from the U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link unfortunately does not include the maps.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

“Watson's major botanical endeavour was producing several versions of a work first entitled Outlines of the Geographical Distribution of British Plants (1832); it reached its most extensive form as Cybele Britannica, or, British Plants, and their Geographical Relations (4 vols., 1847–59). Volume four contains his most detailed phytogeographical conclusions. After publishing several supplements, he summarized his data in Topographical Botany: being Local and Personal Records towards shewing the Distribution of British Plants (2 vols., 1873–4). He was working on a second edition of it when he died; it was completed by John G. Baker and William W. Newbould (1883)” (ODNB).

Digital facsimile of the 1832 edition from the Hathi Trust at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

From 1845 to 1854 this enigmatically titled work was pubished under the title, Nouvelle encyclographie des sciences médicales.  Rather than an encyclopedia, it was a series of reprints of books and periodicals to which physicians in Belgium subscribed, sometimes reproducing elaborately illustrated works, such as Cruveilhier's atlas of pathology. It was neither an encyclopedia nor a periodical in the conventional sense. The list of volumes and links to digital facsimiles are available from Universiteits Bibliotheek Gent at this link.

For this work Lear drew portraits of mostly live specimens directly on stone, creating artistic masterpieces that established his reputation as a natural history painter. Lear issued only 175 copies and ran out of funds after completing 12 of the 14 parts, selling only 125 subscriptions, and selling the remaining 50 copies and the rights to the plates to John Gould. Concerning this work see the exceptionally informative Wikipedia article at this link. Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this liink.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link

Manec was head of anatomy at the Facultè de Médecine de Paris and a surgeon at the Salpetrière. He wrote text of his atlas on ligations of arteries in the first person based upon his experience performing the operations. Manec's atlas is illustrated with 13 lithographed plates drawn by Nicolas-Henri Jacob, the illustrator of Jean-Baptiste Bourgery’s magnificent multi-volume atlas of human anatomy.

 I. Organs of motion and digestion. 1833.--II. Absorbent, circulating, respiratory, and urinary systems. 1834.--III. pt. I. Nervous system and organs of sense. pt. II. Connective and tegumentary systems and peculiarities. 1836.--IV. Organs of generation. 1838.--V. Products of generation. 1840. 

When John Hunter died his museum was cared for by his faithful assistant and amanuensis, the artist and anatomist, William Clift, who persuaded the Government to purchase it. Richard Owen later became curator and his monumental catalogue is still of value today. A history of the museum from its foundation to its partial destruction by a high-explosive bomb in May 1941, is given in G. Grey Turner’s Hunterian Museum, 1946.

Alexis St. Martin, a Canadian half-breed who had sustained a gastric fistula, was treated and investigated by Beaumont. With his human medium, Beaumont as the first to study digestion and the movements of the stomach in vivo. His work on the subject was the most important before Pavlov. Edinburgh imprint, 1838. Second edition, corrected, Burlington, Vt., 1847. Facsimile reprint, Cambridge, Harvard Univ. Press, 1929.

Digital facsimile from digitalcollections.nypl.org at this link.

Classic work on the anatomy, physiology, bio-mechanics, comparative anatomy, and adaptive importance of the hand. Issued as a volume in a series entitled the "Bridgewater Treatises." The first edition has 288pp. An enlarged second edition with 314pp. was also published in 1833, without notice on the title page

“Hall showed that reflex activity could be distinguished from other types of movement, that it produced what today we call ‘muscle tone,’ that it included sneezing coughing, and vomiting, and that it could be influenced by disease. The discovery of these characteristics, and the general formulation of the reflex concept, remain Hall’s outstanding contributions… [Hall and Johannes Müller] were able to rely entirely upon their experimental findings, and, unlike their predecessors, could discount the intervention of the soul and so exclude the metaphysical miasma that had clouded much of the previous work on the subject of reflex activity” (Clarke and O’Malley, 1996, p. 347). 

Mein isolated atropine in pure form in 1831. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

A physician from Delft, Schmerling found extensive human remains and artifacts associated with the remains of extinct animals in the caverns around Liège. These human remains were distinctively different anatomically from Homo sapiens. Schmerling concluded that these findings were evidence for human antiquity, and suggested that they might be a different species. Although Schmerling’s findings were widely acknowledged, it was only when the Neanderthal 1 remains were published by Fulrott and Schaafhausen that scientists recognized the anatomical differences. 

Introduction of the principle of dividing a stricture outside the sac in cases of strangulated hernia.

Diagnostic liver puncture.

Kramer’s first and best work. English translation, 1837.

In his day Mott was the ablest exponent of vascular surgery in the U.S.A. This was the first attempt in America to ligate the subclavian within the scaleni muscles. The procedure had been tried at least twice previously in Europe.

Heurteloup designed the best lithotrite of the time. He was one of several claimants to the distinction of having introduced modern lithotrity. See Lancet, 1831-32, 2, 567-70.

Successful tenotomy for clubfoot established the reputation of Stromeyer as an orthopedic surgeon.

Trousseau popularized tracheotomy.

Hilton described Trichinella spiralis and suggested its parasitic nature.

Based on lectures delivered by Lawrence at the London Ophthalmic Infirmary. He was a surgeon to St. Bartholomew’s Hospital; he succeeded Abernethy as lecturer on surgery and did much to advance the surgery of the eye.

Boivin and Dugès practiced amputation of the cervix for chronic ulceration. On page 648 of vol. 2 is the first recorded case of cancer of the female urethra. English translation, 1834.

On p. 371 commences the first description of lymphogranuloma venereum, which Wallace called “indolent primary syphilitic bubo”.

Although of limited scientific value, this extensively annotated work is the most humorous bibliography of medical literature ever published, even if the humor is of a "rarified" nature. Atkinson, surgeon to the Duke of York and senior surgeon to York County Hospital, published this work when he was 74 years old. There is nothing in it to indicate that he ever intended to continue the work beyond the letter B. Most copies were issued with a cancel title, London, John Churchill, 1834.  Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Pioneering study of art and medicine based on collections at Montpellier.

Foreward by Hahnemann. Translated into English from the second German edition by C. M. Roger, as A Systematic, Alphabetic Repertory of Homoeopathic Remedies. Part First. Embracing the Antisporic, Antisyphilitic, and Antisycotic Remedies, Philadelphia: Boericke & Tafel, 1900.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Discusses all then known posionsous and venomous fishes, including freshwater and marine species, and includes a "thorough review of practically all the early literature on poisonous and venomous fishes, a list of all the species incriminated, symptomatology, treatment, and origin of the poisons in nature" (Halstead, Poisonous and venomous marine animals of the world, 68). Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1. "1833, Natural History of Humming Birds, Part I, (Ornithology Vol. VI) by William Jardine, with memoir of Carl Linnaeus. (online)
2. 1833, Monkeys, (Mammalia Vol. I) by William Jardine, with a memoir of Comte de Buffon (online)
3. Humming Birds Part II, (Ornithology Vol. VII) by William Jardine, with a memoir of Thomas Pennant. (online)
4. 1834, The Natural History of the Felinae, (lions, tigers etc.) (Mammalia Vol. II) by William Jardine, with a memoir of Georges Cuvier. (online)
5. 1834, The Natural History of Gallinaceous birds, (peacocks, pheasants, turkeys, etc.) (Ornithology Vol. III), by William Jardine, with a memoir of Aristotle. (online)
6. 1835, The Natural History of Fishes of the Perch family, (Ichthyology Vol. I), by William Jardine, with a memoir of Sir Joseph Banks. (online)
7. 1835, British Butterflies, (Entomology Vol. III) by James Duncan, with a memoir of Abraham Gottlob Werner.(online)
8. 1836, The Natural History of Parrots, (Ornithology Vol. VI), by Prideaux John Selby, with plates by Edward Lear and a memoir of Thomas Bewick.
9. 1836, Mammalia: Pachydermes, Vol. V., by William Jardine, with a Memoir of Sir Hans Sloane. (online)
10. 1836: Entomology: British Moths, Sphinxes, &c., Vol. IV., by James Duncan, with a Memoir of Madam Maria Sibylla Merian (online)
11. 1837, Mammalia: On the Ordinary Cetacea or Whales, Vol. VI, by William Jardine, with a Memoir of Bernard Germain de Lacépède. (online)
12. 1837. The Natural History of Foreign Butterflies, Entomology, Vol. V., by James Duncan, with a Memoir of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. (online)
13. 1837. The Natural History of the Birds of Western Africa, Vol. II., Ornithology, Vol. VIII, by William John Swainson, with a Memoir of François Levaillant. (online)
14. 1838. The Natural History of the Birds of Great Britain and Ireland, Part I. Birds of Prey. Ornithology, Vol. IX., by William Jardine, with a memoir of Sir Robert Sibbald. (online)
15. 1844, The Natural History of Game Birds, Vol. XXI, (Ornithology Vol. XIII), by William Jardine, with a memoir of Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles (online)
16. 1852, Natural History of Beetles, Vol. XXXV, (Entomology), by James Duncan, with a memoir of John Ray. (online)
17. Pigeons, (Ornithology Vol. IX), by Prideaux John Selby, with a memoir of Pliny the Elder. (online)
18. 1866, Mammalia: Deer, Antelopes, Camels, &c., Vol. XXI, by William Jardine, with a Memoir of Petrus Camper. (online)
19. 1866, Mammalia: Goats, Sheep, Oxen, &C, Vol. XXII, by William Jardine, with a Memoir of John Hunter. (online)
20. 1866, Ornithology: Parrots, Vol. X, by Prideaux John Selby, with a Memoir of Thomas Bewick. (online)
21. 1862. Ornithology: Birds of Western Africa, Part I, Vol. XI., by William John Swainson, with a Memoir of James Bruce. (online)
22. 1838, Flycatchers or Muscicapidae, The Natural Arrangement and Relations, Thirty-three Coloured Plates, Vol.X, by William John Swainson, with Portrait and Memoir of Albrecht von Haller. (online)
23. 1838, British Quadrupeds, A History of, by William MacGillivray, with a Portrait and Memoir of Ulysses Aldrovandi. (online)
24. 1839, Amphibious Carnivora; including the Walrus and Seals, and the Herbivorous Cetacea, Mermaids, &c., Vol.VII by Robert Hamilton, with Portrait and Memoir of François Péron. (online)
25. 1866, Birds of Great Britain and Ireland, Part II., Vol.II Ornithology, edited by William Jardine, with Portrait and Memoir of William Smellie. (online)
26. 1839, Dogs, Canidae or Genus Canis of Authors, including The Genera Hyaena and Proteles, Vol. I., Mammalia Vol.IX, by Lieut-Col. Chas Hamilton Smith, with Portrait and Memoir of Peter Simon Pallas. (online)
27. 1859, Entomology. Bees. Vol.XXXIV Edited by William Jardine, with a Portrait and Memoir of François Huber. (online)
28. 1843, Ichthyology. Fishes, particularly their Structure and Economical Uses, &c, by John Stevenson Bushnan, with Portrait and Memoir of Hippolito Salviani. (online)
29. 1840, Dogs, Canidae or Genus Canis of Authors, including The Genera Hyaena and Proteles, Vol. II., Mammalia Vol.X, by Lieut-Col. Chas Hamilton Smith, with Portrait and Memoir of Don Felix D'azara. (online)
30. 1840, Introduction to Entomology, Vol.I, by James Duncan, with Memoirs of John Swammerdam and Charles De Geer, and Portrait of the latter. (online)
31. 1841, Marsupialia or Pouched Animals, Mammalia Vol. XI, by G. R. Waterhouse, with a Memoir and Portrait of Dr. John BarClay. (online)
32. 1841, Horses. The Equidae or Genus Equus of Authors. Mammalia XII, by Lieut-Col. Chas Hamilton SmithThirty-five Coloured Plates, with Portrait and Memoir of Conrad Gessner. (online)
33. 1841. Ichthyology. Fishes of Guiana, Part I., Vol.III, by Robert H. Schomburgk with an autobiographical Portrait and Account, together with his Voyages and Travels. (online)
34. 1841, Entomology. Exotic Moths, Vol. VII, by James Duncan, with Portrait and Memoir of Pierre André Latreille. (online)
35. 1842, Birds of Great Britain and Ireland, Part III. Rasores and Grallatores, Vol.III Ornithology, edited by William Jardine, with Portrait and Memoir of John Walker, D.D. (online)
36. 1842, An Introduction to Mammalia, Vol.XIII, by Lieut Col Charles Hamilton Smith with Portrait and Memoir of Dru Drury. (online)
37. 1864, Nectarinidae, or Sun-Birds, by William Jardine, with a Portrait and Memoir of Francis Willughby. (online)
38. 1860, Ichthyology. British Fishes, Vol. XXXVI. Part. I, by Robert Hamilton, with a Portrait and Memoir of William Rondelet. (online)
39. 1833, Ichthyology. British Fishes, Vol. XXXVII. Part. II, by Robert Hamilton, with Portrait and Memoir of Alexander von Humboldt. (online)
40. 1843. Ichthyology. Fishes of Guiana, Part II., by Robert H. Schomburgk with, Portrait and Memoir of John Lewis Burckhardt. (online)
41. 1860, Birds of Great Britain and Ireland, Part IV, by William Jardine, with a Portrait and Memoir of Alexander Wilson, D.D. (online)" 

"Jardine made natural history available to all levels of Victorian society by editing the hugely popular forty volumes of The Naturalist's Library (1833–1843) issued and published by his brother in law, the Edinburgh printer and engraver, William Home Lizars.^[11] The series was divided into four main sections: Ornithology (14 volumes), Mammalia (13 volumes), Entomology (7 volumes), and Ichthyology (6 volumes); each prepared by a leading naturalist. James Duncan wrote the insect volumes. The artists responsible for the illustrations included Edward Lear. The work was published in Edinburgh by W. H. Lizars." (Wikipedia article on William Jardine, accessed 03-2018).

Gaskell, a physician, addressed social, political and public health problems that resulted from the Industrial Revolution. Gaskell issued a revised edition of this work in 1836 under a different title: Artisans and Machinery The Moral and Physical Condition of the Manufacturing Population Considered with Reference to Mechanical Substitutes of Human Labour. Digital facsimile of the 1833 work from the Internet Archive at this link; of the 1836 work at this link.

Digital facsimile of this, the first, and later editions from the Hathi Trust at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Brown founded the first US dental school, the first US national dental society, called The American Association of Dental Surgeons, and the first US dental journal, entitled the American Journal and Library of Dental Science.  This work was an unusual type of partnership between Brown and Parmly, with Brown composing the poem, and Parmly, who was also a dentist-poet, composing all the extensive notes which occupied about half the volume. Digital facsimile from U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.

Digital facsimile from wellcomecollection.org at this link.

"During the French occupation of Egypt, Napoleon designated Kasr al-Aini a hospital for his troops in 1799, and then afterwards proposed the opening of a school to teach local Egyptian students the medicine required to treat the troops. This is how, after practicing for a time at Marseilles, Clot was invited by Muhammad Ali, Viceroy of Egypt to direct the Kasr al-Aini (Qasral-‘Ayni) School of Medicine at the Army hospital of Abou Zabel which later transferred to Cairo.^[2]

"The Viceroy of Egypt was determined to keep his army in good health and had sent emissaries to recruit doctors in Europe. On 24 January 1825, Clot sailed for Cairo on the Bonne Emilie with 20 other European doctors destined to assist him. Clot arrived in Egypt with the title of Surgeon-in-Chief of the Armies. As there was no medical care system in Egypt at that time, he began by instituting French Army regulations for the Egyptian army camps.

"The Army Medical School had a difficult beginning with religious officials set against dissection of corpses for anatomy lessons, but this was the foundation for modern medicine in Egypt. Clot was made chief surgeon to Muhammad Ali Pasha, viceroy of Egypt, at Abu Zabal, near Cairo.^[4] He shaped the Kasr El Aini Hospital and schools for all branches of medical instruction, as well as facilities for the study of the French language; and, notwithstanding the most serious religious difficulties, instituted the study of anatomy by means of dissection" Wikipedia article on Antoine Clot, accessed 10-2021).

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

The foundation of modern gymnastics and therapeutic massage. Ling established the Swedish school of physiotherapy with his institute for training gymnastics teachers in Stockholm in 1813. He developed the ancient Greek art of calisthenics into a science based on sound anatomical and physiological principles. “After Ling, scientific body building by rational calisthenics became a recognized procedure not only for the weak child or adult, but, of even greater consequence, as an integral part of the plans for preventative medicine which were taking form in the schools and gymnasia of all civilized nations” (Bick).

The first modern, systematic textbook on physiology, presenting an authoritative and discerning survey of each aspect of the science. This is also one of the best reviews of physiological literature during the first part of the 19th century. Through an extensive series of publications and the Arch. Anat. Physiol, wiss. Med. which he edited, Müller made fundamental contributions to anatomy and physiology, pathological anatomy and histology, embryology, and zoology. Vol. 1 was issued in parts, 1833-34, and Vol. 2 was issued in parts, 1837-40. A somewhat abbreviated English translation was published, 1838-42.

Accurate clinical description of tuberculous meningitis.

Proof that air is necessary in the development of the embryo. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Carbolic acid first prepared from coal-tar.

Includes Weber’s law on the relationship between stimulus and sensation. English translation of De tactu, New York Academic Press, 1978. Weber's hearing test is on p.41.

First English work on ocular anatomy.

Hope left a fine pathological atlas with brilliantly hand-coloured lithographs from his own drawings. While the book does not equal the atlases of Cruveilhier and Carswell, it is important as being a great stimulus to the study of pathology in England.

Hérisson invented an instrument for recording blood pressure. Translated into English as The sphygmometer, an instrument which renders the action of the arteries apparent to the eye. A memoir... with an improvement of the instrument and prefatory remarks by the translator, E.S. Blundell. London: Longman, Rees, 1835. Digital facsimile of the translation from Google Books at this link.

Morton published an important collection of illustrations delineating pulmonary tuberculosis which epitomized the knowledge of his time. It was also the first book on the subject published in the United States. Digital facsimile from the National Library of Medicine, Internet Archive at this link.

First description of “Rust’s disease” – tuberculous spondylitis of the cervical vertebrae.

Guthrie was the first to describe non-prostatic obstruction at the neck of the bladder. On p. 252 of the above work is an account of Guthrie’s prostatic catheter for use in trans-urethral prostatectomy.

Malgaigne was a brilliant lecturer, notable also as a historian of medieval surgery. His Manuel was an important work on operative surgery, and was translated into English, German, Italian, and Arabic.

Gosset repaired a vesicovaginal fistula of eleven years’ duration, using silver gilt-wire, removed after 9, 12 and 21 days respectively.

Roux was the first to suture the ruptured female perineum.

This work contained one of the earliest applications of spatial analysis in epidemiology—an early thematic map by geographer and cartographer Charles Picquet, in which the 48 districts of Paris were represented by gray-scale gradient according to the percentage of deaths from cholera per 1000 inhabitants. Digital facsimile from BnF Gallica at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

This materia medica, with fine hand-colored plates, also includes and illustrates poisonous plants with detailed discussion of their properties.  It includes recommended dosages for pharmaceutical preparations. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Published in the same large folio format as Tuson's Myology (1828), this was the largest work on hernia ever published with multiple hand-colored. lift-up flats on three plates.

Characterizing himself "Surgeon-Accoucheur" on the title page, Dewhurst lectured in 1827-8 on anatomy and physiology, and served as a ship's surgeon, making voyage to Greenland and its surrounding seas in 1824. During that voyage he  studied large Arctic creatures, especially whales. In the decade after his return Dewhurst prepared this description of polar sea life.  Whales were of especial interest in this period, because of the use of their blubber in many household objects, and the value of their oil for lamps, as whale oil burned without soot. Dewhurst's work was one of the first studies to examine the different species of whales, as well as dolphins and other marine life. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

"One of the most valuable works on the subject extant. It is a monument of exact observation, and considering the state of archaeological knowledge at the time, it is in every way admirable" (Dawson, Bibliography of works relating to mummification in Egypt [1929], 97). Surgeon and medical writer as well as antiquary (he vaccinated Queen Victoria), Pettigrew was one of the founding members of the British Archaeological Society, whose early meetings were held in his house. Illustrated with hand-colored plates mostly from drawings by the famous artist / caricaturist George Cruikshank, best known as the illustrator of Dickens' novels.

Digital facsimile from the Hathi Trust at this link.

Perhaps the earliest American monograph on the history of circulation. Keynes characterized this volume as "an elaborate and very learned attempt to belittle Harvey's achievement" Keynes, Life of William Harvey, p. 425.) Digital facsimile from Google Books (at this link.

The first American manual of conchology. The author, John Warren, was an Englishman who sold shells and other collectibles in Boston as well as to other collectors in the United States. His book organized shells according to both the Linnean and Lamarckian systems of classification. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

The first systematic work on homeopathy published in England. A rather late work to be published in Latin.

Raspail first described and illustrated the Sarcoptes scabei, diffrentiating it from the horse's sarcopt and the cheese moth that Galès and Patrix, followed by Alibert, had confused with the scabies parasite. Raspail published this Memoir following experiments by Simon François Renucci, who was the first to extract the acarus and place it under the microscope in August 1834. Renucci published his discovery after the present publication of Raspail in his inaugural thesis on the discovery of the insect which produces the contagion of scabies, prurigo and phlyzacia. (No. 4027). Renucci's thesis was sustained on April 6, 1835. Raspail illustrated his pamphlet with two plates, the first of which, representing the human scabies or sarcopte, was printed his own drawings. 

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Concerns miscarriage and aberrant gestation rather than removal or expulsion of embryo or fetus. Digital facsimile from wellcomecollection.org at this link.

Classical paper on ciliary epithelial motion. Reprinted in Purkynĕ’s Opera omnia (No. 82), pp. 277-371, 1918. English translation in Dublin J. med. chem. Sci., 1835, 7, 279-84.

Contributors included Richard Owen and Thomas Huxley, and physicians James Paget, James Young Simpson, and William Bowman.The discoveries of Purkynĕ and Valentin, together with additional observations by William Sharpey himself were embodied in an article on Cilia written by him and published in odd’s Cyclopaedia 1, 606-38. Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.

Important clinical description.

Anatomical terms used in antiquity, representing to a certain, extent a survey of the literature of ancient medicine available to Hyrtl. Digital facsimile from The Medical Heritage Library, Internet Archive, at this link.

Hunter gave a great impetus to the study of morbid anatomy; he was the veritable founder of experimental and surgical pathology. He was responsible for the commencement of some of the greatest medical museums; the Hunterian museum of the Royal College of Surgeons of England was based on his own private collection; much of it was destroyed during an air raid in World War II. Vol. I of the above work includes Drewry Ottley’s Life of Hunter. A list of the books written by Hunter, and their location in British libraries, was published by W. R. LeFanu in 1946. The biography by Jessie Dobson, Edinburgh, 1969, includes a chronological list of Hunter’s writings. For a detailed analysis of his scientific works within the context of his life see John Hunter…by George Qvist, London, [1981].

Wagner saw and described the nucleolus.

Bigelow was attached to the Massachusetts General Hospital. The above “did more than any other work or essay in our own language to rescue the practice of medicine from the slavery of the drugging system which was part of the inheritance of the profession” (Oliver Wendell Holmes).

Louis refuted Broussais’s system of medicine, his “médicine physiologique.”  Louis was instrumental in establishing medicine as an exact science by the introduction of the numerical or statistical method. English translation by C. G. Putnam, with preface and appendix by James Jackson as Researches on the effects of bloodletting in some inflammatory diseases, Boston, 1836.

Quetelet’s statistical researches on the development of the physical and intellectual qualities of man, and an exposition of his concept of the “average man”, which became the by-word of quantitative studies. "Quételet suggested that the ratio of the subject’s weight divided by the square of the height could be used as a measure of fatness that corrected for differences in height. This unit, the Body Mass Index (BMI), is still known as the ‘Quételet Index’ (QI) in some European countries; BMI has been shown to correlate with body fat content, and to predict risk for several of the comorbidities of obesity" (Bray, History of Obesity, IN: Obesity: Science to Practice Edited by Gareth Williams and Gema Frühbeck [2009]). English translation as A treatise on man and the development of his faculties (Edinburgh: William and Robert Chambers, 1842). Digital facsimile of the 1835 edition from the Internet Archive at this link, of the English translation at this link. See No. 171.

The Constitutio Criminalis of the Emperor Charles V (circa 1533) is probably the oldest European document of any importance dealing with medical jurisprudence. It authorized judges to call expert witnesses in medico-legal cases.

Wallace introduced potassium iodide in the treatment of syphilis, reporting good results in 139 patients.

Bassi preceded Louis Pasteur in the discovery that microorganisms can be the cause of disease (the germ theory of disease). He discovered that the muscardine disease of silkworms--a disease that was destroying the silk industry--was caused by a living, very small, parasitic organism, a fungus that would be named eventually Beauveria bassiana in his honor. To cure and prevent the disease Bassini recommended the use of disinfectants, separating the rows of feeding caterpillars, isolating and destroying infected caterpillars, and keeping the farms clean.

In demonstrating the parasitic nature of the muscardine disease of silkworms, Bassi also founded the doctrine of pathogenic microorganisms. His ideas inspired Henle (1840; No. 2533).

Priessnitz, a peasant farmer in Gräfenberg, Austrian Silesia, is generally considered the founder of modern hydrotherapy, which is used in alternative and orthodox medicine. Priessnitz stressed remedies such as suitable food, air, exercise, rest and water, over conventional medicine, and is also credited with laying the foundations of what became known as the "Nature Cure," though his main focus was on hydrotherapeutic techniques

A classic account, in which the author brought together all that was known about the disease in his day.

Bouillaud applied Laennec's technique of auscultation to diseases of the heart. Vol. 2, page 238: “Bouillaud’s disease” – rheumatic endocarditis. Although not first to note the cardiac manifestations of acute rheumatism, Bouillaud was the first to demonstrate the frequency and importance of heart disease co-incident with acute articular rheumatism. The above work includes the first description of a case of mitral disease with articular rheumatism. Translation of the section on the pathology of endocarditis in Willius & Keys, Cardiac classics, pp. 446-55. 

Kramer was a pioneer German otologist.

This is considered the first accurate account of exophthalmic goitre, later known as “Parry’s disease”, “Graves’s disease”, and “Basedow’s disease”. An interesting fact about the London Medical & Surgical Journal is that after the first five volumes had been published by Renshaw and edited by M. Ryan, these two separated, each continuing to publish a separate edition of the same journal. Graves’s paper appeared in the series published by Renshaw. Reprinted in Med. Classics, 1940, 5, 33-36.

Demonstration of the human itch-mite, Sarcoptes scabiei. It was due to Renucci that the Sarcoptes was recognized as the one cause of scabies and its parasitic nature finally accepted.

“Brodie’s pile”. Reprinted in Medical Classics, 1938, 2, 929-40.

First operation for intussusception in the United States, performed in Rutherford County, Tennessee. The patient was a negro slave; the operation was a complete success. Reported by Wilson’s pupil, W.W. Thompson.

Prichard, better known for his work in the field of anthropology (No. 159), was the first to describe moral insanity. He described a syndrome he called incoherence or senile dementia. Alzheimer (No. 4956) may have described essentially the same disorder. Reprint of Philadelphia, 1837 edition, New York, Arno Press, 1973.

While a first-year student at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, James Paget discovered trichina in muscle during dissection. Richard Owen, his teacher, named it Trichina spiralis and published an account, barely mentioning Paget. It was renamed Trichinella spiralis in 1896. Paget communicated his discovery to the Abernethian Society at St. Bartholomew’s on 6 Feb, 1835; an abstract of his paper is published in the Transactions of the society, vol. 2. Paget recorded the chronology of the discovery in a letter to the Lancet, 1866, 1, 269. This and his unpublished article intended for Lond. med. Gaz., 1835, is reproduced by Kean (No. 2268.1), p. 458-62. The letter is also published in Bull. Hist. Med., 1979, 53, 547.

Silver nitrate for treatment of gonococcal ophthalmia. Digital facsimile from wellcomecollection.org at this link.

“First serious attempt by anyone in the English-speaking world to give a subject classification for medical literature” (Fulton). This was first published in volume 4 of Cyclopaedia of practical medicine, edited by Forbes, A. Tweedie, and J. Conolly, 4 vols., London, Sherwood, 1833-34.

Digital facsimile of the 1835 edition from Google Books at this link.

The first book on domestic homeopathy published in the United States. The names of the medicines are not given, but are referred to by numbers. Digital facsimile from the National Library of Medicine at this link. 

Darwin's teacher, John Stevens Henslow, had some of Darwin's letters to him published for private distribution as a pamphlet while Darwin was on the Beagle circumnavigation. Estimates of the number of copies printed vary from about 25 to about 200.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Wardrop "promoted blood-letting in an era when a few physicians, notably Pierre Louis of Paris, were discouraging the therapeutic approach" (W. Bruce Fye, "James Wardrop," Profiles in cardiology, 91.) Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

A comprehensive manual on forensic psychiatry, preceding Isaac Ray's book by three years. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Lectures for "working men" and women on preventative medicine and self-help.  Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Jackson published this biography of his son, James Jackson, Jr. after his son's premature death in 1834. Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

In this work "Koecker was the first English writer to describe corectly the principle upon which artifical teeth should be applied and constructed" (Thorpe, Biographies of pioneer American dentists and their successors" (1910) 55).

"The Kloss library was the most important collection of early printed books ever made by a medical man." (Note by William Osler in Bibliotheca Osleriana No. 7150). Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

Digital facsimile from U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.

Beschet emphasized "the relevance of anatomic investigation to dermatologic problems" (Crissey and Parish, Dermatology and syphilology of the nineteenth century, 117). In this book the authors first described the anatomy of the human sweat glands.  Digital facsimile from wellcomecollection.org at this link.

In his doctoral thesis Mohl reported his discovery of the multiplication of cells by division, later known as mitosis. Digital facsimile from Bayerische StaatsBibliothek at this link.

The greatest American book on herpetology, and one of the finest American color plate books on natural history. The fourth volume is particularly rare. Digital facsimile from Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.  In 1842 Holbrook issued an expanded second edition in 5 vols.

A pioneering study of the physiology and biomechanics of motion and locomotion. The atlas contains illustrations that were printed directly from actual bones embedded in the printing plates. Translated into English by P. Maquet and R. Furlong, as Mechanics of the human walking apparatus, Berlin: Springer, 1992.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

William Beaumont recognized that the gastric juice contained some other active chemical substance besides hydrochloric acid. Schwann proved this to be pepsin. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

King, sometimes referred to as the “father of endocrinology”, antici-pated the endocrine action of the thyroid.

Bright was the first to describe unilateral (“Jacksonian”) epilepsy.

Magendie, pioneer experimental physiologist, regarded pathology as only a modification of physiology, “medicine the physiology of the sick man”. By him clinical medicine was reconstructed on physiological lines.

The first volume reprints the author's Essai sur les cloaques ou égouts de la ville de Paris (1824). Parent-Duchâtelet wrote that he had visited all the places which he described in the text: ”J’ai surmonté sans hésiter la répugnance et les dangers inséparables de pareilles recherches. ... J’ai fait tout ce que doit faire un homme jaloux de découvrir la vérité, et de jeter quelque lumière sur un sujet obscur."

Traditionally viewed as a classic in public health, this work has also been characterized as the first scientific study in sexology. Third and most complete edition "complétée par des documents nouvelles et des notes" par A[dolphe] Trebuchet [1801-1865] and Poirat-Duval suivie d'un précis hygiénique, statistique et administratif sur la prostitution dans les principles villes de l'Europe. 2 vols, Paris, 1857. Digital facsimile of the 1836 edition from BnF Gallica at this link; of the 1857 edition from the Internet Archive at this link.

Remak identified for the first time the myelinated fiber with its central “band of Remak” (the axon), and the unmyelinated axon or “fiber of Remak.” Fuller account in his Observationes anatomicae (No. 1262).

Marsh method for the detection of arsenic.

The first American work devoted entirely to occupational diseases. Reprinted with introduction, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins Press, 1943.

Important work which stimulated the study of tissue pathology in England. Hodgkin was the first in England to give a regular lecture course in morbid anatomy, which he began at Guy’s in 1827. Vol. 2, pt. 2 was never published.

After performing an autopsy on a strangulation case, Gross set out to study the physiology involved in manual strangulation. He set up a series of experiments on dogs for this purpose and provides autopsy reports on each as well as guidelines for medical examiners investigating strangulations.

The standard English work on the subject for generations, translated, expanded and used worldwide; thirteenth edition, Principles and practice of medical jurisprudence, appeared in 1984. Digital facsimile of the first edition from Google Books at this link.

“A valuable work of reference, containing a large amount of information on the various articles or the materia medica, collected from the best authorities, interspersed with much original matter” (Waring).

Nasse gave the first clear description of anemia in pregnancy; he also noticed erythrocyte sedimentation in certain pathological conditions.

“Ludwig’s angina” first described. English translation and biographical note. Bull. Hist. Med., 1939, 7, 1115-26.

Original description of acute yellow atrophy of the liver.

While most people in Germany still considered splenectomy beyond the bounds of possibility, Quittenbaum performed the operation in 1829, establishing it as a surgical procedure.

The artery was tied in 1808, and the patient died in 1826.

See No. 2929.

Successful ligation of external iliac artery for femoral aneurysm, 1822.

Posthumously published by Sanson, whose method of rectovesical lithotomy is considered here along with the controversial method of lithotrity. Dupuytren tried both but dropped them in favor of continuing the method of bilateral lithotomy. which he invented in 1812, and which was adopted as the normal procedure, with later modifications.

First account of a resection in which Lembert’s suture was successfully employed.

An expansion of Shearhashub Spooner's 32-page dissertation, An inaugural dissertation on the pysiology [sic] and diseases of the teeth. Submitted to the examination of John Augustus Smith, M.D, president, and the trustees and professors of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of the University of the State of New York; and publicly defended for the degree of doctor of medicine, April 6th, 1835. New York: J.& W. Sandford, printers, 1835.  

John Roach Spooner (1794-1838) an American dentist living in Montreal, was the first to use arsenous acid to devitalize the pulp. This discovery was first published in the above work by his brother. Digital facsimile of the 1836 work from the U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.

The first specialized orthodontic work in German, on anomalous positions of the teeth. A French translation was issued simultaneously by the same publisher.

As a result of greater experience on renal disease, Bright rounded off his work on the subject with the above paper, wherein he recorded his extended observations; by this time he had come to more definite conclusions, expecially with regard to the treatment of the condition. Bright’s papers on the subject were reprinted, London, 1937, edited by A. A. Osman.

The first treatise on plastic surgery in general, criticised by Zeis (No. 5743.4) for its bias against the achievements of German surgeons. This is the first commerical edition. The work was published slightly earlier as a thesis with title, De l’autoplastie. Thèse présentée et soutenue…pour une chaire de clinique chirurgicale, Paris, Urtubie, 1836.

Perry correctly described many of the distinctions between typhus and typhoid.

First description of Trichomonas vaginalis, which Donné at first believed to be the pernicious agent in gonorrhoea. He later admitted the organism to be a normal inhabitant of the female genital tract. Donné was, by this work, the first to describe living organisms in pathological conditions, as observed by modern methods. English translation in Kean (No. 2268.1).

Thomsen's work established the "Three-Age system," according to which artifacts were first made of stone, then bronze, and then iron. This basic chronology underpins the archaeology of most of the "Old World.”  

"Dr Frederick Knox was the librarian of New Zealand's first public library. He emigrated from Scotland in July 1840 and within days of arriving in Port Nicholson became involved in establishing the country's first public library.

"The library lasted for just one year before winding up and handing over its contents to another organisation. But Knox continued to contribute to the cultural development of the country until his death in 1873....

"Records suggest that Knox did not practise as a medical practitioner in New Zealand until after he moved to the Hutt Valley, where he practised between 1851 and 1855. After this time he held various medical positions, including Resident Medical Officer to the Asylum (Karori) from 1855 to 1857, and Coroner at Porirua from 1861 to 1862. But on his death in August 1873 he was best remembered for his contribution as a scientist...." (https://nzhistory.govt.nz/people/frederick-knox)

Knox was the brother of Robert Knox, who became notorious as the client of resurrection men, Burke and Hare.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Hathi Trust at this link. Translated into English by Caspar Bruchhausen and Robert Nelson as Manual of the practice of medicine: The result of fifty years' experience. London: Hippolyte Baiilière, 1844. Digital facsimile of the 1855 New York edition from the Internet Archive at this link.

In this very thoroughly researched, highly documented, and well-illustrated paper Tiedemann demonstrated that there are no significant anatomical differences between the brains and mental capacities of Black people and White people.

"I take the liberty of presenting to the Royal Society a paper on a subject which appears to me to be of great importance in the natural history, anatomy, and physiology of Man; interesting also in a political and legislative point of view. Celebrated naturalists, Camper, Soemmerring, and Cuvier, look upon the Negroes as a race inferior to the European in organization and intellectual powers, having much resemblance with the Monkey. Naturalists of less authority have exaggerated this opinion. Were it proved to be correct, the negro would occupy a different situation in society from that which has so lately been given him by the noble British Government. I propose in this treatise to examine more minutely the most important part of this doctrine, namely, the structure of the brain, the noblest part of the human body, in reference to its functions. A comparison between the brain of the Negro and that of the European and the Orang-Outang, hitherto much neglected, appeared to me most worthy of attention. I shall first of all try to answer the following two questions.

"1st, Is there any impotant and essential difference between the structure of the brain of the Negro and that of the European? and

"2ndly, Has the brain of the Negro more resememblance to that of the Orang-Outang than the brain of the European?

"Should our researches induce us to answer these questions in the affirmative, we should then have reason to consider the opinion given above as true, and founded in nature. Should we be able to pove the falsity of this opinion, we should then be allowed to consider it as a mere literary fancy....(pp. 497-98).

"The intellectual faculties of the Negroes do not in general seem to be inferior to those of the European and other races. Such of them as are not bodily and morally degraded by slavery and oppression, have a pleasing and open xpression of coutenance, and are of a gay and cheeful turn. They exhibit proofs of good natural capacity, good sense, wit and penetration....many instances of Negroes who made a cetain progress in the liberal arts and sciences, and distinguished themselves as clergymen, philosophers, amthematicians, philogians, hsitorians, advocates medical men, poets, and musicians. Many Negroes ahve distingusiehd themselves by their talents in military tacts and politics....

"The principle result of my researches on the brain of the Negro, is, that neither anatomy nor physiology can justify our placing them beneath the Europeans in a moral or intellectual point of view...." (p. 525).

Digital facsimile from the Royal Society at this link.

The first work on vision written by a woman and published in the United States. Griffith published the work anonymously. 

"Griffith’s work had its start in print in 1834, when she published two articles on vision in David Brewster’s prestigious Philosophical Magazine: “Observations of the Vision of the Retina” (4: 43–46) and “Observations on the Spectra of the Eye and the Seat of Vision” (5:192–196). Both contributions appeared under her own name. Brewster, certainly a leading authority in the field of optics at the time, appended an editorial comment to the first article stating that some of the conclusions reached by Griffith were incorrect, but nonetheless he felt that her observations were interesting enough to be printed. Not one to take criticism well, Griffith led off her second article with an attack on Brewster, objecting that he had provided no evidence to back up his claim, and she, for one, continued to believe that she was correct in all particulars. In both the dedication and the preface of Discoveries in Light and Vision, Griffith acknowledges that her conclusions are often diametrically opposed to those held by the leading scientific men of the day, but she is convinced that their soundness will one day be acknowledged even by her harshest critics" (Joseph J. Felcone, private communication).

Digital facsimile from the U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.

"In this volume he [Bouillaud] irrevocably established the etiologic relationship between rheumatic fever and heart disease. Early reports on this relationship had been contributed by Pitcairn, Jenner, and Wells, but Bouillaud's exposition was more authoritative, comprehensive and accurate than theirs" (Willius & Dry, 125).

The merit of Bouillaud's clinical observations was somewhat vitiated by his method of cure: repeated bloodletting at short intervals.

Translated into English by James Kitchen as New researches on acute articular rheumatism in general; and especially on the law of coincidence of pericarditis and endocarditis with this disease, as well as on the efficacy of the method of treating it by repeated bloodletting at short intervals. Philadelphia: Haswell, Barrington, and Haswell, 1837.

Digital facsimile of the 1836 edition from Google Books at this link, of the 1837 edition from the Hathi Trust at this link.

Catalogue of the collection of over 3400 New World, Africa, Asian, Australian and European stuffed birds gather by the ornithologist, botanist and politican, following the order of the display of these specimens in Laugier's gallery. The entire collection was dispersed at auction in 1837, the year before publication of Laugier's Nouveau recueil de planches coloriées d'oiseaux was completed. According to Sharpe's account of the collecting of the ornithology specimens in the natural history departments of the British Museum, the British Museum purchased one-tenth of the collection.

The most ambitious 19th century English anatomy illustrated by lithography. Some copies were issued with hand-colored plates.  The five volumes, containing a total of 201 plates, describe the muscles, blood vessels, nerves, viscera, and bones and ligaments. Wilson designed the plates for this work, and signed some of them, but the plates were actually drawn by other artists, including J. Walsh and William Bagg, a portrait painter in London. Wilson also co-edited the second through fifth volumes. The section on the anatomy of the nerves is especially notable, with thirty-eight plates, including ten elegant colored plates of the brain and spinal cord, and a stunning colored plate showing the distribution of the eighth pair of nerves.

First quantitative analysis of the blood gases. Magnus proved that the arterial blood contains a higher concentration of oxygen than venous blood and that the latter had a higher carbon dioxide content.

Henle first described the epithelia of the skin and intestines, and defined the structure and function of columnar and ciliated epithelium. He applied the term “epithelium” to all mucous membranes in the body. Modern knowledge of the epithelial tissues starts with Henle. English translation and commentary in L.J. Rather, P. Rather, & J.B. Frerichs, Johannes Müller and the nineteenth century origins of tumor cell theory, Canton, Mass.: Science History Publications, 1986.

Skoda’s theory of the heart beat.

First therapeutic employment of static electricity.

Isolation of chondrin and glutin.

Proof that putrefaction is produced by living bodies. Independently of Cagniard-Latour, Schwann discovered the yeast cell. He is regarded as the founder of the germ theory of putrefaction and fermentation.

First description of the visceral arches in vertebrates.

Dutrochet asserted that respiration follows the same pattern in both animals and plants, showing that the minute openings on the surface of leaves (the stomata) communicate with lacunae in deeper tissue. He also demonstrated that only the green parts of the plant can absorb carbon dioxide, thereby transforming light energy into chemical energy. The Mémoires are a collection of all his more important biological papers.

Stokes, most prominent of the Irish school of medicine, established his reputation by his book on diseases of the chest. Important among its contents are his discovery of a stage of pneumonia prior to that described by Laennec as the first, his observations that contraction of the side has sometimes followed the cure of pneumonia and that paralysis of the intercostal muscles and diaphragm may result from pleurisy, and his employment of the stethoscope as an aid to the detection of foreign bodies in the air passages.

Description of the “flask-shaped ganglionic bodies” known as “Purkinje cells”. Reprinted in his Opera Omnia, 1939, 3, 47-9. Also published in Oken’s Isis, 1838, pp. 582-84.

The first North American book on tumors, with 16 hand-colored plates by David Claypoole Johnston (1799-1865).

“Colles’s law” is stated on. p. 304. Colles introduced small doses of mercury in the treatment of syphilis. He was Professor of Surgery at Dublin.

“Schönlein’s disease” (purpura) first described. English translation in No. 2241.

“A clear exposition of diseases of the larynx as known before the invention of the laryngoscope”. (Scott Stevenson and Guthrie, see No. 3342).

A laryngological classic. English translation, 1839.

In his day Liston was the most dexterous and resourceful surgeon in the British Isles. He was the first in the country to remove the scapula and the first – on 21 Dec. 1846 – to perform a major operation with the aid of an anesthetic. On p. 350 Liston suggested the use of a mirror which could be used for viewing edematous tumors of the larynx.

Sobernheim first used the term “myocarditis.”

Second successful reported ligation of the internal iliac artery in the United States.

The first American treatise on colon–rectal surgery.

In this treatise on glanders and farcy in man Rayer showed that glanders is contagious, but is not a form of tuberculosis. Rayer began the work with a thoroughly documented historical chapter. Digital facsimile of the separate edition published from the journal, from Google Books at this link.