MONTE, Giovanni Battista, da.In Primi Lib. Canonis Avicennae
Venice, Vincenzo Valgrisi and Baldassare Constantini, 1557
£3,250.00
8vo. pp. [32], 651, [1], last two blank. Italic letter, little Roman. Printer’s device to title and last recto, decorated initials and ornaments. Age yellowing, thin water stain along upper edge, single worm hole to upper blank margin of last dozen gatherings, increasing to three towards
end, touching the odd later and page number. A good copy in contemporary sheep, worn, double blind ruled, blind roll of tendrils, a.e.r., spine lost exposing C14 vellum ms used as lining. Crossed-out, illegible early ms inscriptions to fly, C18 ms ‘Ex Libris Sigismundi De’ Bartolomeis Medici sospitellensis [Sospello]’ to title, occasional early ms marginalia, c.1600 ms recipe to penultimate leaf, and ms acquisition note Rome, 1563 to last blank.
Second, enlarged edition of this commentary on Avicenna’s ‘Canon of Medicine’ (‘al-Qānūn fī aṭ-Ṭibb’). In a charming contemporary binding with C14 vellum ms lining including a few lines from Constantine of Orvieto’s legend of Dominic, in particular the apparition of a demon in the shape of a large, horrid cat, among the Cathars to whom the saint was preaching.
Giovanni Battista da Monte (1498-1551) was a major Renaissance physician, professor at Padua, and acquainted with Vesalius. He was a prolific author of commentaries on ancient Greek medical texts, while his numerous commentaries on Rhazes and Avicenna’s (Ibn Sina, 980-1037) Arabic ‘Qanūn’, in G. of Cremona’s Latin translation, contributed to the continuing circulation of Arabic medical theories in the C16. ‘Avicenna’s “Quanūn” […] is a compendium of Greek and Arabic medical knowledge […] coordinating the teachings of Galen, Hippocrates and Aristotle. It superseded all previous works – even […] Rhazes – and in its Latin translation became the authoritative book in all universities’ (PMM 11). The present treatise – with 3 additional chapters as compared to the first ed. (1554) – focuses on Book I, Part I, of the ‘Qanūn’, concerned with the definition of medicine, its subdivision into theoretical and practical – a question which much interested da Monte, who was a supporter of the use of clinical medicine in universities – body physiology based on the four humours, and the causes of illness. Among the dozens of topics discussed are whether the art of medicine is also a science, the nature of the four elements, whether blood is sufficient for generation and nutrition, the kinds of bile, body heat in children and adults, gonorrhoea, death causes, ‘mumia’, melancholy, fevers, and poison, as well as more specific questions on complexion and humours, such as why the teeth of Ethiopians are white, but not their nails. An early annotator jotted down a recipe for an oil against paralysis and tremor.
Sigismondo de’ Bartolomeis was a C18 Italian physician from Sospel, Piedmont. He defended his thesis, later printed, in Turin in 1757.
EDIT16 CNCE 15943; Durling 3273; Wellcome I, 4428 (1558 ed.). Not in Heirs of Hippocrates.
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MONTE, Giovanni Batista, da.
COMMENTARY ON ARABIC MEDICINE
MONTE, Giovanni Battista, da. In Primi Lib. Canonis Avicennae
Venice, Vincenzo Valgrisi and Baldassare Constantini, 1557£3,250.00
8vo. pp. [32], 651, [1], last two blank. Italic letter, little Roman. Printer’s device to title and last recto, decorated initials and ornaments. Age yellowing, thin water stain along upper edge, single worm hole to upper blank margin of last dozen gatherings, increasing to three towards
end, touching the odd later and page number. A good copy in contemporary sheep, worn, double blind ruled, blind roll of tendrils, a.e.r., spine lost exposing C14 vellum ms used as lining. Crossed-out, illegible early ms inscriptions to fly, C18 ms ‘Ex Libris Sigismundi De’ Bartolomeis Medici sospitellensis [Sospello]’ to title, occasional early ms marginalia, c.1600 ms recipe to penultimate leaf, and ms acquisition note Rome, 1563 to last blank.
Second, enlarged edition of this commentary on Avicenna’s ‘Canon of Medicine’ (‘al-Qānūn fī aṭ-Ṭibb’). In a charming contemporary binding with C14 vellum ms lining including a few lines from Constantine of Orvieto’s legend of Dominic, in particular the apparition of a demon in the shape of a large, horrid cat, among the Cathars to whom the saint was preaching.
Giovanni Battista da Monte (1498-1551) was a major Renaissance physician, professor at Padua, and acquainted with Vesalius. He was a prolific author of commentaries on ancient Greek medical texts, while his numerous commentaries on Rhazes and Avicenna’s (Ibn Sina,
980-1037) Arabic ‘Qanūn’, in G. of Cremona’s Latin translation, contributed to the continuing circulation of Arabic medical theories in the C16. ‘Avicenna’s “Quanūn” […] is a compendium of Greek and Arabic medical knowledge […] coordinating the teachings of Galen, Hippocrates and Aristotle. It superseded all previous works – even […] Rhazes – and in its Latin translation became the authoritative book in all universities’ (PMM 11). The present treatise – with 3 additional chapters as compared to the first ed. (1554) – focuses on Book I, Part I, of the ‘Qanūn’, concerned with the definition of medicine, its subdivision into theoretical and practical – a question which much interested da Monte, who was a supporter
of the use of clinical medicine in universities – body physiology based on the four humours, and the causes of illness. Among the dozens of topics discussed are whether the art of medicine is also a science, the nature of the four elements, whether blood is sufficient for generation and nutrition, the kinds of bile, body heat in children and adults, gonorrhoea, death causes, ‘mumia’, melancholy, fevers, and poison, as well as more specific questions on complexion and humours, such as why the teeth of Ethiopians are white, but not their nails. An early annotator jotted down a recipe for an oil against paralysis and tremor.
Sigismondo de’ Bartolomeis was a C18 Italian physician from Sospel, Piedmont. He defended his thesis, later printed, in Turin in 1757.
EDIT16 CNCE 15943; Durling 3273; Wellcome I, 4428 (1558 ed.). Not in Heirs of Hippocrates.