History of the RSM - July 2011
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.The oldest book in the RSM library is Johannes MESUE, the younger. Opera. Liber de complexionibus, proprietatibus, electionibus...Grabadin Joannis filii mesue...Practica de medicines particularium aegritudinum...Petri Apponi addition. 1471. No place of publication is given, but William Osler, in his Incunabula medica of 1923, speculates Venice or Florence.
Yahya ibn Masawaih or Mesue the younger is said to have been a Jacobite Christian living at Maradin on the Euphrates in the 10th-11th centuries. However none of his writings has ever been found in their original language and no Arabian bio- or bibliographer knows him and it is now believed that a Latin author of the early 13th century assumed the name. At any rate, these works soon gained authoritative importance as the pharmacological quintessence of Arabic therapeutics, and the esteem in which they were held is shown by the fact that they belonged to the first medical books to be printed. The 'Grabadin', or apothecary's manual was the most popular compendium of drugs in medieval Europe, and was used everywhere in their preparation. It was also used in compiling the first London Pharmacopeia.
This book and others from the RSM's collection of fifteenth-century books will be on display in the Library from July 18th to August 26th 2011.
Previous features of the month:
- June 2011 - Occult Physick
- May 2011 - William Harvey Lecture
- April 2011 - Improvised bookmarks
- March 2011 - The Blitz
- February 2011 - The RSM Library
- January 2011 - Albert J. Edmunds
- December 2010 - Edward Law Memorial Fund
- November 2010 - George Francis Home
- October 2010 - Herbals
- September 2010 - Florence Nightingale's letters
- August 2010 - Florence Nightingale
- July 2010 - Robert Lee
- June 2010 - William Withering
