Shaping the past: how donors influenced Becker Library's rare book collections.

Rare book collections do not form in a vacuum; they are shaped by the individuals who assemble and curate them. This is certainly the case with the rare book holdings of Becker Medical Library at Washington University in St. Louis School of Medicine. This paper examines some of the most significant donors to Becker's rare book collections in order to explore how these collections are a reflection of the interests and priorities of the physicians who assembled them, and also raises the issue of how the makeup of these collections create a Western-focused narrative regarding the history of medicine.

Medical History's Moment in Art Photography (1920 to 1950): How Lejaren à Hiller and Valentino Sarra Created a Fashion for Scenes of Early Surgery.

Two groups of black-and-white photographs are found in medical rare book rooms and the collections of historically minded physicians. They were created by artists Hiller and Sarra to bring medical history to life for members of the health professions and, to some extent, for a wider public. These were not didactic illustrations for a textbook, but elegant scenes of great figures from Antiquity to the nineteenth century, evocation not documentation even though they were based on research. As pieces of fine art, cherished in portfolios or framed on the wall, the quality prints were intended to stimulate curiosity about the achievements of the figures portrayed. While familiar to some archivists and librarians, these photographs have received almost no attention in the scholarship of medical history. Only one short article examined them in 1983. In recent years these photographers have been given new consideration by scholars of advertising and photography. Using those works and primary sources, this article expands both men's biographies, and it explores their working methods, their artistry, and their achievements. An appreciation of these photographs enlarges our understanding of the place of medical history in American culture during the first half of the twentieth century.

[The copy of De humani corporis fabrica of Andreas Vesalius of the municipal library of Reims]. / L'exemplaire du De humani corporis fabrica d'Andreas Vesalius de la bibliothèque municipale de Reims.

The author presents a copy of the De humani corporis fabrica by Andreas Vesalius; this book is preserved in the department of rare books of the municipal Library in Reims. This copy is a first edition as the author gives positive proofs. This book results of a donation to the Minimes's congregation of Reims by Seigneur Guillaume Le Vergeur, Count of Saint Souplet and Baillif of Vermandois in the 17th century. Guillaume Le Vergeur has also given other precious books to the monastery's library and his name is inscribed on the register of obituaries and on the pediment of the Minimes' Church.

[On the notes of the Xinkan Huangdimingtangjiujing (see text for symbol) in the possession of the National Diet Library].

This paper analyzes the notes of Xinkan huangdimingtangjiujing which are in the possession of the National Diet Library, particularly referring to those notes which include "master said", or "master's theory". Some of those are found in the answers from Manase Dosan (see text for symbol) to Hata Soha (see text for symbol) collected in the Kotei meido kyukyo hushin shosho (see text for symbol) which is the record of the question and answer letters between Manase Dosan and Hata Soha. This research indicates that this volume has a close relation to the acupuncture research of Dosan's or Soha's school. And it indicates that the "master" in the Notes of Xinkan huangdimingtangjiujing refers to Dosan. Acupuncture research has been flourishing since the Edo era and has compiled a lot of volumes on acupuncture. This volume contains some pioneering pieces of this research done in the Azuchi Momoyama era by Dosan and Soha, and is a precious material, showing that some of the state of affairs of the research done in that age still remains today.

Ars scientia mores: science comes to English dentistry in the seventeenth century. 2. Charles Allen's Treatise of 1685/6.

The dental historian is fortunate to have Charles Allen and his Treatise of 1685/6. His value lies less in the practical content of the work but more in his knowledge of general and dental anatomy, and in the evidence of an enquiring mind. The author tackles developmental anatomy, physiology and pathology in his chosen subject. Without its unassailable provenance it would be difficult to believe that it was written in the 17th century.

Wormholes record species history in space and time.

Genetic and fossil data often lack the spatial and temporal precision for tracing the recent biogeographic history of species. Data with finer resolution are needed for studying distributional changes during modern human history. Here, I show that printed wormholes in rare books and artwork are trace fossils of wood-boring species with unusually accurate locations and dates. Analyses of wormholes printed in western Europe since the fifteenth century document the detailed biogeographic history of two putative species of invasive wood-boring beetles. Their distributions now overlap broadly, as an outcome of twentieth century globalization. However, the wormhole record revealed, unexpectedly, that their original ranges were contiguous and formed a stable line across central Europe, apparently a result of competition. Extension of the wormhole record, globally, will probably reveal other species and evolutionary insights. These data also provide evidence for historians in determining the place of origin or movement of a woodblock, book, document or art print.

The ethics of dental practice in London in the sixteenth century. 1. Henry Chettle's Kind-Harts dreame of 1592. An important lay view.

Kind-Harts dreame (Fig. 1) is one of the proto-novels which first appeared in the Elizabethan age of literary wonders. It recounts the dream of the hero - a tooth-drawer (Kind-Hart) - who encounters the shades of five recently deceased characters, each of whom had been a famous star of their day in the London scene. Although short, and with medicine and dentistry occupying only part of the tale, the story contains invaluable detailed information about dental care in late Tudor England as observed by a layman. It is also an amusing read.

Illustrations from the Wellcome Library William Winstanley's pestilential poesies in "The Christians refuge: or heavenly antidotes against the plague in this time of generall contagion to which is added the charitable physician (1665)".

During the Great Plague of London (1665), William Winstanley veered from his better known roles as arbiter of success and failure in his works of biography or as a comic author under the pseudonym Poor Robin, and instead engaged with his reading audience as a plague writer in the rare book The Christians Refuge: Or Heavenly Antidotes Against the Plague in this Time of Generall Contagion to Which is Added the Charitable Physician (1665). From its extensive paratexts, including a table of mortality statistics and woodcut of king death, to its temporal and providential interpretation of the disease between the covers of a single text, The Christians Refuge is a compendium of contemporary understanding of plague. This article addresses The Christians Refuge as an expression of London's print marketplace in a moment of transformation precipitated by the epidemic. The author considers the paratextual elements in The Christians Refuge that engage with the presiding norms in plague writing and publishing in 1665 and also explores how Winstanley's authorship is expressed in the work. Winstanley has long been seen as a biographer or as a humour writer; attributing The Christians Refuge extends and challenges previous perceptions of his work.

[About some medical bibliographical sources of Jacobinic and Napoleonic age]. / Su alcune fonti bibliografiche mediche del periodo giacobino-Napoleonico.

The authors analyze some bibliographical sources of jacobinic and Napoleonic age: books and pamphlets published by Stamperia Italiana e Francese in Milan (Lombardy); the Bullettino del Consiglio Subalpino di SanitY, ossia Giornale Fisico-Medico del Piemonte in Turin (Piedmont); some Charles Botta (1766-1837) books (Storia naturale e medica dell 'isola di Corfù; Mémoire du [...] sur la doctrine de Brown; Vicissitudes de l'instruction publique en Piémont depuis l'an VII jusq'au mois de ventose an XI [...]). They are useful to analyse the spreading of John Brown (1735-1788) theories in Italy, during the jacobinic and napoleonic time.

[Historical research of cinchona cultivation in Japan (1): first trial cultivation in Japan in the early Meiji period recorded in Nomutenmatsu].

Cinchona is known as a magic bullet for malaria and its cultivation was dominated by Java on a global scale in the 19th century. In 1875, in accordance with a suggestion by Takeaki Enomoto, the Meiji government made a request to the Dutch government that cinchona seedlings be distributed to Japan. In response to that request, in 1876, 42 cinchona seedlings arrived in Yokohama from Java. It was the first time cinchona seedlings were shipped to Japan. After that, cinchona seeds and seedlings were shipped to Japan a total of three times between 1876 and 1883. The seeds shipped in 1878 were raised at the Nishigahara Agricultural Experiment Station and then planted at nine places in both Okinawa and Kagoshima Prefectures in 1882. The planter was Yasusada Tashiro. However, all of the planted seedlings had died by 1884. The first national farming plan of cinchona in Japan ended in failure. These matters were found in documents included in Nomutenmatsu compiled by the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce of the Meiji government in 1888.

[Incorrect descriptions about Seicho Kamata in "Seishu Hanaoka and his surgery"].

"Seishu Hanaoka and his surgery" by Shuzo Kure is one of the most important books for the study of Seishu Hanaoka. However, several incorrect descriptions have been pointed out in the book. Therefore, we checked the content about Seicho Kamata, a distinguished disciple of Seishu Hanaoka (p.154-163) in the book, and found three incorrect descriptions. The figure being described as that of Seicho Kamata is his father's. His graveyard being described as "Nyohoji" is truly "Daizenji". Seicho Kamata is also described as the second distinguished disciple of Seishu Hanaoka ; however, authors think that he was the first distinguished disciple from his career. Further investigation into the content of the book is necessary.