Latin Medical Compendium, 17th century

Compendium of medicine compiled by an unknown English medical student or physician, arranged by diseases, with recipes and case histories. The nationality of the author seems clear, as he mentions `Avunculus meus Birch' (f.5v.), and occasionally slips an English word into his text (eg. f.80). The most commonly cited authorities are Joannes Heurnius (1543-1601) and Otto Heurnius (1577-1652), successive professors of medicine at Leiden, suggesting perhaps a connection between the author and that university. Subsequently the volume may have come into the possession of a French --- speaker, as there are a handful of recipes in French at the end (ff. 203v.-4). There is also an illustration and description in French of a pessary tipped in at f.194, in an 18th-century hand. 18th-century library number `226' inside front cover, which also bears the epigraph `Vertue is the soules health, health the bodies vertue' in the main author's hand.

17th century

204 ff. 1 vol.: 235 x 170 mm. Original, limp-vellum covers

Purchased at Sotheby's sale, 22 June 1998, lot 324.

Database description transcribed from Richard Aspin and Christopher Hilton's typescript supplement to S.A.J Moorat's Catalogue of Western Manuscripts