1720–1729

1720 CE

#13743

A natural history of English insects. Illustrated with a hundred copper plates, curiously engraven from the life: And (for those who desire it) exactly coloured by the author.

"Little is known of Albin’s early life, though he was probably born in Germany to a family named Weiss. By 1708 he had changed his surname to Albin and was living in London with his family. His profession of art…

1720 CE

#3217

A new theory of consumptions : more especially of a phthisis, or consumption of the lungs.

Marten believed that an infectious micro-organism was the cause of tuberculosis, thus forecasting the existence of the tubercle bacillus 162 years before its actual discovery. Though Leeuwenhoek reported seeing bacter…

1720 CE

#5123

A short discourse concerning pestilential contagion, and the methods to be used to prevent it.

In 1719 Mead was asked for advice concerning an outbreak of plague in Marseilles, and replied with the above tract of 59 pages, which has been called the first epidemiological report produced by a physician at the com…

1720 CE

#303

Amphitheatrum zootomicum.

“First extensive work on the comparative anatomy of vertebrates” (Casey Wood).

1720 CE

#976

Dissertatio anatomica qua novum bilis diverticulum circa orificium ductus choledochi ut et valvulosam colli vesicae felleae constructionem ad disceptandum proponit.

Following Vater’s classic description of the ampulla of the bile duct, it was named the “ampulla of Vater”.

1720 CE

#4281

Lithotomia Douglassiana; or, an account of a new method of making the high operation, in order to extract the stone out of the bladder.

Douglas accused Cheselden of plagiarizing his work, although the latter had acknowledged his indebtedness to Douglas. It is possible that this was the reason which prompted Cheselden to drop the high operation in favo…

1720 CE

#4487

Observations concerning the nature and due method of treating the gout.

1720 CE

#1828.2

Pharmacopoeia Londinensis; or the London dispensatory…

The first herbal printed in North America, and the first full-length medical book published in North America. From the 1653 London edition.

1721 CE

#9521

A Collection of Very Valuable and Scarce Pieces relating to the last Plague in the year 1665. viz. I. Orders drawn up and published by the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of the City of London to prevent the spreading of the infection. II. An account of the first rise, progress, symptoms and cure of the Plague, being the substance of a letter from Doctor Hodges to a person of quality. III. Necessary directions for the prevention for cure of the plague, with divers remedies of small charge by the College of Physicians. IV. Reflections on the Weekly Bills of Mortality, so far as they relate to all the plagues which have happend in London from the year 1592 to the Great Plague in 1665, and some other particular diseases. With a preface shewing the usefulness of this collection: some errors of Dr. Mead, and his misrepresentations of Dr. Hodges and some authors. To which is added An Account of the plague at Naples in 1656, etc. [Compiled by William Beckett.].

Attributed to William Beckett by OCLC. Digital facsimile of the 1721 second edition from the Internet Archive at this link.

1721 CE

#11173

Bibliotheca chirurgica sive rerum ad artem Machoanicam quoquô spectantium thesaurus absolutissimus quo omnes prorsus humani corporis affectiones chiurgi manum, aut aliam aliquam eiusdem operam exposcentes, ordine alphabetico explicantur. 4 vols.

A compilation of mostly complete surgical treatises, representing what Manget considered an essential surgical library of then-modern as well as classical texts-- a surgical library in 4 large volumes. Digital facsimi…

1721 CE

#11314

Catalogus rerum memorabilium quae in theatro anatomico academia, quae Lugduni Batavorum floret, demonstantur per Franciscum Schuyl.

Numerous editions and translations of the catalogue of the anatomical museum of the University of Leiden were published, probably to supply the needs of medical students from various countries. Digital facsimile of th…

1721 CE

#10651

Relation des différentes espèces de peste qui reconnaissent les orientaux, des précautions & des remèdes qu'ils prennent pour empêcher la communication & le progrès; et ce que nous devons faire à leur exemple pour nous en préserver, & nous en guérir.

Gaudereau worked as a missionary in Turkey, Armenia, Persia, and India, facing plague outbreaks several times. In Turkey he almost succumbed to the plague, himself, but was cured using local remedies. These remedies a…

1721 CE

#5410.1

Some account of what is said of inoculating or transplanting the small pox by the learned Dr. Emmanuel Timonius, and Jacobus Pylarinus. With some remarks theron. To which are added, a few queries in answer to the scruples of many about the lawfulness of this method.

An abridgement of Nos. 5409 & 5410 together with Boylston’s remarks. From internal evidence this 24-page pamphlet would appear to be the first North American publication on inoculation. See No. 5415. Digital fac…

1721 CE

#5411

Some observations on the new method of receiving the smallpox by ingrafting or inoculating.

This work offers general support for the practice of Zabdiel Boylston, detailing some of Boylston’s cases, including accounts of occasions when patients died. Reprinted with additional material by Daniel Neal, a…

1721 CE

#13695

The farriers dispensatory, in three parts. Containing I. A description of the medicinal simples, commonly made use of in the diseases of horses, with their virtues and manner of operation, distributed into proper classes, &c. II. The preparations of simples, vegetable, animal and mineral ; with an explanation of the most usual terms, both in the chymical and galenical pharmacy. III. A number of useful compositions and receipts suited to the cure of all diseases, never before published; as also those of greatest account from Solleysell, Ruini, Blundevill, and other most celebrated authors, digested under their proper heads of powders, balls, drinks, ointments, charges, &c. The proper Method of compounding and making them, with many other useful observations and improvements tending to their right administration. To which is also added, a compleat index of all the medicines contained in the book, whether simple or compound, with a table of diseases pointing to the remedies proper in each malady.

1721 CE

#13879

The virtue and use of coffee, with regard to the plague, and other infectious distempers: containing the most remarkable observations of the greatest men in Europe concerning it ... To which is prefix'd an exact figure of the tree, flower, and fruit taken from the life.

Digital facsimile from wellcomecollection.org at this link.

1721 CE

#6150

Traité complet des accouchemens.

Mauquest de la Motte applied podalic version to head presentations. English translation, prepared at the suggestion of William Smellie, 1746.

1722 CE

#10199

A journal of the plague year: Being observatrions or memorials, of the most remarkable occurrences, as well publick as private, which happened in London during the last great visitation in 1665. Written by a citizen who continued all the while in London. Never made publick before.

Though he may be most widely remembered as a novelist--especially for Robinson Crusoe, Defoe was an English trader, writer of non-fiction as well as fiction, journalist, pamphleteer and spy. This book is an account of…

1722 CE

#10703

A treatise of the hypochondriack and hysterick passions.

Probably the first psychiatric self-help book. Hunter and Macalpine call Mandeville's work "the first book on minor mental maladies `writ by way of Information to Patients' rather than `to teach other Practitioners' .…

1722 CE

#5414

An account of the method and success of inoculating the small pox in Boston in New England.

Mather republished reports of earlier writers on inoculation. He persuaded Boylston to adopt the practice in June 1721, and he supported Boylston during a period of great opposition to inoculation.

1722 CE

#1728

Corpus juris medico-legale.

This reprints Valentini’s Pandectae medico legales (1701) and Novellae medico-legales (1711) with the addition of Authentica iatro-forensia.

1722 CE

#5412

Inoculation of the smallpox as practised in Boston.

1722 CE

#5414.1

Mr. Maitland’s account of inoculating the small pox.

Maitland inoculated the children of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu in 1721, and also inoculated six condemned prisoners as part of the so-called “Royal Experiment”. Success with these trials lead to his inocula…

1722 CE

#5827

Nouveau traité des maladies des yeux.

Records the removal of a cataract “en masse” from a living subject. English edition, 1741. Digital facsimile of the 1722 edition from Biu Santé at this link.

1722 CE

#5413

The abuses and scandals of some late pamphlets in favour of inoculation of the small-pox.

Douglass at first opposed inoculation for smallpox, but by 1730 he had changed his views and had become an advocate of inoculation.

1723 CE

#1689

A letter … containing, a comparison between the mortality of the natural small pox, and that given by inoculation.

Jurin was an enthusiastic supporter of inoculation against smallpox, and proved statistically that the fatality of inoculated smallpox is very much less than the fatality of natural smallpox. This is one of the earlie…

1723 CE

#4282

A treatise on the high operation for the stone.

Cheselden was surgeon to St. Thomas’s Hospital and an outstanding figure in British surgery in the first half of the 18th century. The above work describes his method of performing suprapubic lithotomy, a method…

1724 CE

#12698

An impartial history of Michael Servetus, burnt alive at Geneva for heresie.

Authorship of this early English account of Servetus and his martyrdom for heresy has never been determined, according to Geoffrey Sill, "The authorship of An impartial history of Michael Servetus," Papers of the Bibl…

1724 CE

#13643

Atrocis, nec descripti prius, morbis historia: Secundum medicae artis leges conscripta.

Boerhaave's syndrome: complete, transmural laceration of the lower part of oesophagus with exit of the gastric content into the mediastinum in the patient with a pre-existing oesophageal disease. This typically occurs…

1724 CE

#6016

Ausführliche Abhandlung von den Zufällen und Kranckheiten des Frauenzimmers.

1724 CE

#3354

Instrument pour seringuer la trompe d’Eustache par la bouche.

Guyot, postmaster at Versailles, also physician, cartographer, inventor, etc., was the first to attempt catheterization of the Eustachian tube. This he did by way of the mouth.

1724 CE

#1595

Medicina gerocomica; or the Galenic art of preserving old men’s healths.

The first English book devoted to gerontology. Digital facsimile of the second edition (1725) from the Internet Archive at this link.

1724 CE

#392.1

Myotomia reformata.

This work made a modest first appearance in 1694 as an octavo, but Cowper worked until his death on a new edition which was finally published posthumously under the supervision and at the expense of Richard Mead (1673…

1724 CE

#392

Observationes anatomicae.

Santorini was one of the ablest dissectors of his day. In the above work many new discoveries of anatomical details are set forth, together with corrections of some of the errors of earlier anatomists. The work descri…

1725 CE

#1690

Annuities upon lives; or, the valuation of annuities upon any number of lives; as also, of reversions. To which is added, an appendix concerning the expectations of life and probabilities of survivorship.

De Moivre, French Huguenot mathematician and demographer, formulated the hypothesis that among a body of persons over a certain age the successive annual decreases by death are nearly equal.

1725 CE

#11223

Histoire physique de la mer.

The first book devoted entirely to marine science and the first oceanographic study of a single region. Marsigli conducted an intensive investigation of the Gulf of Lyon in the south of France, taking soundings to obt…

1725 CE

#11298

Index supellectilis anatomicae quam Academia Batavae quae Leidae est legativ vir clarissimus Johannes Jacobus Rau...confectus a Bernhardo Seigried Albino.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1725 CE

#8095

Opera omnia anatomica & chirurgica. Edited by Herman Boerhaave and Bernhard Siegfried Albinus. 2 vols.

Vesalius's collected works with the famous woodcuts reproduced as copperplate engravings by Jan Wandelaar (1690-1759). Notably Boerhaave and Albinus had this edition published because Vesalius's works still had practi…

1725 CE

#11387

Theatrum medico-juridicum, continens varias easque maxime notabiles tam ad tribunalia ecclesiastico-civilia, quam ad medicinam forensem, pertinentes materias. Ex diversis optimorum authorum ... voluminibus excerptum .... Opus jctis, physicis, practicis, studiosis, chirurgis, aliisque utile et necessarium.

Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.

1725 CE–1726 CE

#6378

The history of physick; from the time of Galen to the beginning of the sixteenth century. 2 vols.

Freind was the first English historian of medicine, and his book is a classic study of the period with which it treats. Freind dabbled in politics and planned the above work while committed to the Tower of London on a…

1725 CE–1729 CE

#1729

Systema jurisprudentiae medicae. 2 vols.

A work covering the whole field of medical jurisprudence as then understood, and ranking in importance with the work of Valentini. The first supplement was published in Halle, 1733. The much-expanded second edition, i…

1726 CE

#6017

An account of a dropsy of the left ovary of a woman, aged 58, cured by a large incision made in the side of the abdomen.

Houstoun was the first to treat ovarian edema by tapping the cyst, 1701. For biographical note, see J. Obst. Gynaec. Brit. Comw., 1973, 80, 193-200.

1726 CE

#5415

An historical account of the small-pox inoculated in New-England, upon all sorts of persons, whites, blacks, and of all ages and constitutions: With some account of the nature of the infection in the natural and inoculated way, and their different effects on human bodies; with some short directions to the unexperienced in this method of practice .

Boylston was the first in America to inoculate for smallpox, at Boston on 26 June 1721. "During a smallpox outbreak in 1721 in Boston, he inoculated about 248 people[5] by applying pus from a smallpox sore to a small …

1726 CE

#9073

Aquilegio medicinal em que se dá noticia das agoas de caldas, de fontes, rios, poços, lagoas, e cisternas, do Reyno de Portugal, e dos Algarves, que ou pelas virtudes medicinaes, que tem, ou por outra alguma singularidade, são dignas de particular memoria.

The first inventory of Portuguese hot springs, fountains, rivers, wells, lakes and reservoirs reputed to have medicinal properties, including some with allegedly supernatural powers of healing. For the 337 entries, Fo…

1726 CE

#12958

Danubius pannonico-mysicus, observationibus geographicis, astronomicis, hydrographicis, historicis, physicis perlustratus et in sex tomos digestus. 6 vols.

An extensive illustrated work, with 283 copperplate engravings, on the natural history of the Danube river, the longest river in central Europe, which runs from southern Germany into Austria, through Slovakia, Hungary…

1726 CE

#6746

Methodus discendi medicinam.

During 1710 Boerhaave lectured on the Methodus discendi medicinam. In 1726 the first edition was published from notes taken at his lectures but without his permission. Lindeboom, Bibliographia Boerhaaviana (1959) No. …

1726 CE

#7578

Promtuarium rerum naturalium et artificalium Vratislaviense.

Digitall facsimile from the Bayerische StaatsBibliothek at this link.

1727 CE

#7061

A discourse concerning the causes and effects of corpulency, together with the method for its prevention and cure.

The first book on obesity in English.

1727 CE

#3420

A preternatural perforation found in the upper part of the stomach, with the symptoms it produced.

First reported case of perforating gastric ulcer.

1727 CE

#13407

Bibliotheca Riviniana sive catalogus librorum philogico-philosophico-historicorum, itinerariorum, imprimis autem medicorum, botanicorum et historiae naturalis scriptorum & c., rariorum....vendenda in vaporario collegii rubri a die xxvii. Octobr. mdccxxvii more auctionis consueto. Praemissa est vita Rivini descripta per Geo. Sam Hermannum...catalogi autorem.

Auction catalogue of Rivinus's library by Georg Samuel Hermann. Digital facsimile from Google Books at this link.