A notice of the life and writings of Valescus de Tarenta / by Frederick P. Henry.

  • Henry, Frederick Porteus, 1844-1919.
Date:
1901
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A notice of the life and writings of Valescus de Tarenta / by Frederick P. Henry. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    [Reprinted from Maryland Medical Journal, June, 1901.] A NOTICE OF THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF VALESCUS DE TARENTA. By Frederick P. Henry, A.M., M.D.y Honorary Librarian of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE BOOK AND JOURNAL CLUB OF THE MEDICAL AND CHIRURGICAL FACULTY OF MARYLAND, MARCH 20, 1901. The invitation to a4dress you this evening was accompanied with the suggestion of a subject which, at first, I was strongly inclined to accept. It was a description of the Incunabula in the library of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. Proceeding at once to examine these precious volumes more carefully than I had ever done before, I soon became so exclusively interested in one of them—the Tractatus de Epidemia et Peste of Valescus de Tarenta—that I decided to confine myself to its study. Somewhat later I enlarged my subject by including the only other known work of the same author, the celebrated Philonium. In a certain sense the Philonium might be said to be the only work of Vales- cus, for some of its early editions, among them the one belonging to the College of Physicians, contain the Tractatus; but the first edition of the latter was published about twenty years before that of the former, and is one of the first medical books ever printed; in fact, there is a tradition in the college library that this Tractatus is actually the first printed medical book, and it was for this reason that my attention was first centered upon it. Postponing for the present the brief review of these works which I propose to make, I will now narrate the facts in our possession concerning the life of their author. He is variously known by the names of Valastus, Valescus, Valesius, and Balescon, the latter being probably his Portuguese cognomen. The discrepancies in the spelling and pronunciation of his titular name are equally great, for it is called Tarenta, Taranta, Tharanta, and Tharare. It is impossible to conclude from the diverse orthography of this latter word whether it ^intended to designate an Italian or a French town, for Taranto (ancient Tarentum) is a town in Italy on the north coast of the bay of the same name, and Taranta a town in