In This Issue:
Extensive
Drug Information Added to MEDLINEplus
Minority
Scholarships
Health
Disparities Plan
Rare
Items on Display
Medieval
Merriment
Islamic
Manuscripts
"Old"
Books
MEDLARS
Drive
MLA
Annual Meeting
Native
American Youth
Profiles
in Science
Women's
History Month
OCCS
Director Named
Appointments
National
Nutrition Summit
NN/LM
Appointment
Lederberg
Exhibit
"Has
the Laboratory Been a Closet?"
Leiter
Lecture
Monograph
Gaps
Alternative
Medicine Chief
In Every Issue:
Names
in the News
Products
and Publications
NLM
In Print
|
Rare Medieval Medical Books and Manuscripts on
Display
"Life Is Short, Art Is Long..."
To celebrate the return of a long-missing medieval manuscript,
the National Library of Medicine mounted a small exhibit of
treasured medieval manuscripts that date from the 11th through 15th
centuries and printed books that date from the 15th through 17th
centuries. The exhibit was on view in the History of Medicine
Reading Room from May 22nd to July 14th.
"We are grateful to Richard Aspin of the Wellcome Library," said
Dr. Elizabeth Fee, the Chief of the History of Medicine Division at
the Library for identifying the missing manuscript and to the
Rootenberg family for returning it to the Library," said Fee. The
Louise Darling Biomedical Library at the University of California,
Los Angeles, assisted by storing the manuscript while negotiations
for its return were completed.
The Latin manuscript, "Treatises on Medicine," written in England
in the 12th century on vellum (calf skin), mysteriously disappeared
from the Library some 50 years ago. Containing some 40 texts by
different authors, the manuscript, sometimes known as "Recepta
Varia" or "Manuscript 8," typifies medieval attempts to compile all
medical knowledge.
The authors emphasize the practical and have little interest in
speculation. The texts range from guides for diagnosis by pulse and
urine, to recipes, lists of medical substances, and discourses on
blood-letting and surgery. According to Dr. Luke Demaitre, a noted
scholar with the University of Virginia who has studied the
manuscript, the work contains a few magical cures and there are a
few references to astrology and divination, but the predominant tone
is rational. The texts are bound together with some hymns and the
story of an errant monk whom the Virgin Mary saved from eternal
damnation.
"This is a very important manuscript because it represents the
transition between the monastic infirmary and the university faculty
of medicine; and it marks an intermediate stage between the healing
art and bookish science," said Demaitre.
The NLM exhibit also features approximately 25 other books and
manuscripts, including a splendidly illuminated manuscript from
13th- century Oxford, an Arabic text from 1094 (the oldest item in
the NLM collection), and several copies of Hippocrates' Aphorisms,
one of medicine's cornerstones. Much of Hippocrates' medical advice
can be recognized as today's common sense. He focused on prevention,
lifestyle, and dietary medicine -- not magic bullets. "Hippocrates'
medical advice has such a familiar ring in our own time," commented
Demaitre. "For example, he noted the importance of age, gender,
season, and diet on health. He recommended moderation in diet, and
that changes should be made gradually."
Other treasures in the exhibit include works by physicians who
practiced in Salerno, Italy, between the 10th and 12th centuries and
who were famous for their excellent medical knowledge and care;
texts that made up the curriculum in the first faculties of
medicine; and books that demonstrate the flourishing of medical
literature in medieval England.
Treatises on medicine, England, ca. 1150. Missing from the NLM
for almost 50 years, this manuscript was returned in December of
1998. The page on display shows the first Aphorism of Hippocrates:
Vita brevis, Ars aut[em] p[ro]lixa, temp[us] v[ero] velox,
exp[er]imentu[m] au[tem] fallens, determinatio molesta. (Life is
short, the art [of medicine] long, time is fleeting, experience
fallible, decisions difficult.) NLM adapted the title of its exhibit
from this best known Aphorism. Certainly life was short in the
Middle Ages, but the arts and the Art of Medicine endured and
flourished, as these beautiful, skilfully rendered manuscripts show.
|