Arts Center - Rare Medical History Books

Introduction: 

If you're interested in this early time period, start with Peter Murray Jones' excellent bibliography of resources related to medieval medicine in the Oxford Bibliographies of Medieval Studies (after following the link, search "medicine" to find Jones' bibliography.) In his introduction Jones writes: 

"Classical texts of medicine, particularly on anatomy, surgery, and herbal knowledge, were sometimes illustrated; these illustrations were transmitted to the Middle Ages through Greek or Arabic channels. Original medieval texts also used illustration for teaching or practical purposes, or to add luxury; these illustrations ranged from diagrams to elaborate works of illumination."

Select Rare Book and Manuscript Resources from this time period: 

• Calisphere University of California Index of Medieval Medical Images
• The MacKinney Collection of Medieval Medical Illustrations at UNC 
• Incunables: A collection of all materials in the Linda Hall collection printed before 1501

15th Century 

"During the 15th Century, many of the illustrations in manuscripts served as memory aids with educational and mnemonic functions. If researching this time period, you may notice that the many illustrations serve as diagrams and guides for medical practitioners, "(Kemp, 1997, p.5). 

Notice the diagram of these herbs from the Herbarium Apuleii, dated to the the early 15th Century. "Produced in Lombardy about 1400, Yale Medical Library Ms. 18 is a late illustrated example of a very traditional herbal, a group of texts sometimes called the Herbarius complex, the origins of which go back to the 4th century. It became the most widely used of all anthologies on materia medica available in the early Middle Ages. " (Catalog description, Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library, https://digital.library.ucla.edu/catalog/ark:/21198/zz000100hh)

 

 

 

Source: Yale Medical Library. Manuscript. 18 [Herbarium Apuleii and other works]

ca. 1400

Italy, Lombardy

This beautifully intricate Persian illustration features a diagrammatic composition in the form of a wheel. This is the Kitab-i viladat-i Iskandar (the Book of birth of Iskander) and features the horoscope of a Timurid prince, Iskandar Sultan. Dated to 1411, this piece was written by Iskandar Sultan's court astrologer. (Keshavarz, 1986, https://wellcomecollection.org/works/ua87equq)  

Source:  [Wellcome MS Persian 474]. Public Domain Mark. Source: Wellcome Collection. https://wellcomecollection.org/works/ua87equq

Another wheel-type diagram, this is a page from a manuscript (Venetiis) written and illustrated by Joannes et Gregorius de Gregorlis in 1495. This page features a diagram of the four humors (the sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic, and melancholy) that were observed by physicians using signs such as the color and smell of urine to detect imbalances in the body. (Kemp, 1997, p.13)  

Source: Fasciculus medicine. [F.1a.tit:] Fasciculus medicine in quo continentur: videlicet. ... [F.40b] Hecanothomia fuit emendata ab eximio artium ... Impressum Venetiis per Joannem et Gregorium de Gregoriis fratres. Anno domini Mccccxcv die xv Octobris / [Joannes de Ketham]. Public Domain Mark. Source: Wellcome Collection. https://wellcomecollection.org/works/wbxszkzv

Introduction: 

If you're interested in learning more about medicine in the 16th-18th centuries, a good place to start is Alisha Rankin's entry, "Medicine" in Oxford Bibliographies online-Renaissance and Reformation. You can access the entry here, or by searching for medicine in the Oxford Bibliographies-Renaissance and Reformation resource available through OneSearch. In her entry, Rankin writes: 

"Religious and magical forms of healing remained inexorably intertwined with naturalistic remedies, and this balance remained unchanged after the Protestant Reformation,despite changing ideas toward appropriate forms of religious healing...An interest in finding new medicinal plants meant that medicine played an active role in commerce, global trade, and colonialism, while a rise in literacy and the invention of the printing press helped increase access to texts, both printed and manuscript.This combination of dynamic change and traditional healing structures makes the Renaissance and Reformation a complex and fascinating epoch in the history of medicine." (Introduction, "Medicine," 2013)

16th Century 

During the Renaissance, "the body was a 'miniature world', a microcosm, embodying all the essential aspects of universal design...The skills possessed by Renaissance draughtsmen, spectacularly exemplified by Leonardo Da Vinci [think the Vitruvian Man], meant that illustrations could convince the viewers that they were effectively seeing reality portrayed from life." (Kemp, 1994, p.3-11) 

This image from Andreas Vesalius' Fabrica (1543) established illustration as integral to anatomical learning. At the same time, Vesalius called to attention his predecessors by often posing his illustrations in classical sculptures, "In the anatomy books, the male bodies which always provided the main focus for demonstration characteristically assumed heroic Apollonian or Herculean airs." (Kemp, 1994, p.12)

You can request to view a complete facsimile of this Fabrica in our collection through the Baylor University library catalog. 

Source: De humani corporis fabrica libri septem / [Andreas Vesalius]. Public Domain Mark. Source: Wellcome Collection. https://wellcomecollection.org/works/mv74d54w

The book of surgery [shown behind the model] by Girolamo Fabrici (AKA Hieronymus Fabricius) is a fascinating example of early surgical technology and machinery. The book was published in 1565, and "underscored the view of the body as a piece of machinery itself." (Kemp, 1997, p.17) Fabrici (c. 1553-1619) was professor of anatomy at the University of Padua, Italy. 

Source: Unknown maker [model only]. “Iron Model of the Joints in a Human Skeleton, Italy, 1570-1700.” Iron Model of the Joints in a Human Skeleton, Italy, 1570-1700 [Co135801], 1570-1700. JSTOR, https://jstor.org/stable/community.26320420. Accessed 28 Aug. 2024.

17th Century 

The movement from the 1500s to the 1600s was paved with major technological advancements. While it became increasingly common to see the body as a piece of technology or machinery (as exemplified in the texts above), the development of new medical technology allowed medical practitioners to see parts of the body that had previously been impossible to view. For example, Zacharius Janssen is credited with inventing the earliest compound microscope in the year 1600 (Science Museum, 2019). 

This is a page from the Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis in Animalibus illustrated by William Harvey (1578-1657) and published in 1628. The highly technical style that William Harvey exemplifies here is thought to be a precursor to the 'non-style' of Gray's Anatomy (1858). (Kemp, 1997, p.6) 

Source: Public Domain Mark Exercitatio anatomica de motu cordis et sanguinis in animalibus / Guilielmi Harvei. Source: Wellcome Collection.

This image is from Anatomia humani corporis by Govard Bidloo, a Dutch anatomist and doctor born in 1649. Three years after med school (1685) Bidloo wrote Anatomia humani corporis and commissioned artist Gerard de Lairesse to provide its highly graphic illustrations. Bidloo and de Lairesse are praised for "breaking the mold" from the Vesalius style (shown above), "whereas the Vesalius plates were in classical poses...and so "clean" that you easily forget that they depict dissected bodies, the Bibloo plates are utterly realistic, so much so that you sometimes have to turn away from their frankness," (Ashworth, W., 2020, Linda Hall Library)

Source: The spinal cord: five figures. Line engraving by A. Bell after G. Bidloo, 1798. Wellcome Collection. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Introduction

In the United States, the first medical hospital did not open until 1751 and the first medical school did not open until 1765 (Numbers, R. (2014). Medicine. In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the History of American Science, Medicine, and Technology.) The study of anatomy was an essential element of medical school, and the form of anatomical illustration which isolated specific parts of the body in space (think Bidloo) rather than the fully composed, and scenically situated human forms (think Vesalius) became standard and is still the standard for anatomical illustrations today, "as the teaching of medicine became more institutionalized, so there was a demand for a manner of illustration which breathed an air of sober truth, without visual flourished and without overt signs of the artist's transformative eye and hand," (Kemp, 1997, p.6).  Additionally, while medical illustrations in the 16th and 17th centuries primarily highlighted idealized typologies, depicting the human body as a work of art, the 18th and 19th centuries brought a fascination with abnormal types. Medical atlases were produced not only for medical practitioners, but for mass audiences to gaze upon with "horrified fascination," (Kemp, 1997, p.15). 

William Hunter (1718-1783) a male midwife who became famous during his tenure as Professor of Anatomy at the Royal Acedemy of Arts (1768-1783) after he published Anatomy of the Human Gravid Uterus, a graphic anatomical atlas of the pregnant female form. "There is some debate about whether Hunter deliberately tried to achieve artistic or visceral impact,¹ but unlike the birthing sheet, which hid the woman’s body from the midwife, the atlas rendered the female form more than denuded: It was naked of flesh, severed in places, the internal matter laid open for observation," (Brandy Schillace, 2014).  Multiple artists including Jan Van Rymsdyk made the drawings for Anatomy of the Human Gravid Uterus. (Netter, F, Friedlaender, G, 2014). 

Credit: Anatomia uteri humani gravidi tabulis illustrata ... The anatomy of the human gravid uteris exhibited in figures / [William Hunter]. Public Domain Mark. Source: Wellcome Collection.

If you are not familiar with any of the works on this page, you have likely at least head of Grey's Anatomy (1858), a seminal atlas in the study of anatomy. "Henry Gray's utilitarian text for students of surgery is supported by Henry Vandyke Carter's clear and functional line drawings, reproduced in plain woodcuts, in conscious contrast to the visual magnificence of earlier picture­ books of the human body," (Kemp, 1997, p.8). Used (to this day) to aid medical students in memorizing the parts of the body, "the avoidance of any appealing views of the whole body—even depictions of the complete skeleton—and [Carter's] functiontional setting of the illustrations of the detailed parts of the body within the pages of printed text consistently negate any tendency to think that we are dealing with the 'arty' production of a picture book," (Kemp, 2010, p.205-206). 

Grey's anatomy (1858). Image from Wikimedia Commons. 

Despite the photo-realism of the images above, photography was not invented until 1839, and photography on a mass scale did not become possible until the 1870s. Additionally, before color photography was invented, anatomical photographs during dissections would have been difficult to decipher. Once mass-produced photography became possible, "the area colonized most rapidly and successfully by photography was the illustration of some grosser abnormalities and pathologies, particularly those visible on the naked body," (Kemp, 1997, p.5) To the right is Duchenne de Boulougne's Mécanisme de la physiognomie humaine (1862), which contained photographs of facial motions stimulated by electric charges and was connected to the ancient science of physiognomy (Kemp, 1997, p,14) which judges a person's moral and/or ethnic character based on their facial composition (Oxford English Dictionary, 2024). 

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Mécanisme de la physionomie humaine, ou, Analyse électro-physiologique de l'expression des passions / [Guillaume Benjamin Amand Duchenne]. Wellcome Collection. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Until the 20th century,  it was unlikely for artists to gain enough funding to support themselves solely as medical illustrators, however, "the 20th century marked the beginning of a new age of cooperation between art and anatomy resulting in illustrations enriched with artistic beauty and scientific accuracy," (Ghosh, 2015, p.186). However, as the 20th century progressed, so too did technological advancements that aided and sometimes replaced artist's renderings, "the entry of computers and subsequent advances in the software technology during the later part of the 20th century led to computer-assisted digitally-enhanced images which have become the face of anatomical illustrations in the modern times after the prevalence of handmade, woodcut, and wood-engraved art-work for centuries," (Ghosh, 2015, p.186). At the same time, as anatomical illustrations and imagings become more technology-based and less handmade, the 21st century has brought an interest in the emotional and personal aspects of medical encounters, which we can see exemplified in health-related artist books and zines, as well as in the graphic medicine movement. 

By the turn of the century, the broad sweeping force of Enlightenment and scientific rationalist thought imposed further standardization upon the medical system. In the United States, the center of this standardization process was Johns Hopkins University, which became the ideal-type model for medical schools to be measured against with the advent of state licensing standards (Duffy, 2011). Interestingly, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine was the first school to create a Department of Art as Applied to Medicine in the world, which was a huge advancement for the development of medical illustration as a professional path (Ghosh, 2015, p.183). 

The image to the right is an illustration of a rabbit's eye by Max Brödel, who was the first chair of the Department of Art as Applied to Medicine at Johns Hopkins. Image and original data provided courtesy of the National Library of Medicine. Brödel, Max, 1870-1941, artist. [Rabbit’s Eye]. U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM): Images from the History of Medicine, JSTOR, https://jstor.org/stable/community.28550009.

Ashworth, William B. “Govard Bidloo.” Scientist of the day. Linda Hall Library. 12 March. 2020. https://www.lindahall.org/about/news/scientist-of-the-day/govard-bidloo/

Ghoush, Sanjip Kumar. “Evolution of Illustrations in Anatomy: A Study from the Classical Period in Europe to Modern Times.” Anatomical Sciences Education. March/April. 2015. p.183-186. doi:10.1002/ase.1479

Jones, Peter Murray. "Medicine". In obo in Medieval Studies. 3 Sep. 2024. https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195396584/obo-9780195396584-0051.xml

Kemp, Martin. “Medicine in View: Art and Visual Representation.” Western Medicine: An Illustrated History. p.1-22. 1997.

Kemp, Martin. “Style and non-style in anatomical illustration: From Renaissance Humanism to Henry Gray.” Journal of Anatomy. Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland. 2010. 216. P.192-208. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7580.2009.01181.x

Keshavarz, Fateme. “A descriptive and analytical catalogue of Persian manuscripts in the Library of the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine.” London, 1986. https://wellcomecollection.org/works/ua87equq

McCulloch, N.A., D. Russell, S.W. McDonald. “William Hunter’s casts of the gravid uterus at the University of Glasgow.” Clinical Anatomy 14, no. 3 (2001): 210-217.

Netter, Francine Mary, and Gary E. Friedlaender. “Frank H. Netter MD and a Brief History of Medical Illustration.” Clinical Orthopaedics and Related Research, vol. 472, no. 3, 2014, pp. 812–19, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11999-013-3459-8.

Rankin, Alisha. "Medicine". In obo in Renaissance and Reformation. 3 Sep. 2024. https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195399301/obo-9780195399301-0186.xml

Schillace, Brandy. “Naissance Macabre: Birth, Death, and Female Anatomy.” History of Medicine & Public Health. 30 July 2014. https://nyamcenterforhistory.org/2014/07/30/naissance-macabre-birth-death-and-female-anatomy/

Unknown. “The microscope.” Science and technology in medicine. Science Museum. 19 August. 2019. Sciencemuseum.org

Yale Medical Library. “Manuscript 18”. History and Special Collections for the Sciences Collection.