Gärtner, Andreas.MareMagnum
16,584 results
(6), 110 pp. With engr. frontispiece (M. Rein sc.). Modern marbled boards. 8vo. First edition in book form (parts had been published in 1720 in the periodical "Berlinische und Cölnische ordinaire Post-Zeitung"): descriptions of lamps capable of burning for prolonged periods without having to be refueled, invented by the Saxonian court mechanic Andreas Gärtner (1654-1727). Gärtner, a cabinet maker and mechanic, had learned his trade over twelve years travelling throughout Germany and Italy (Venice, Bologna, and Rome). By 1686 he was royal cabinet maker to the Dresden court, and later also royal mechanic. Delighting in complicated machanical models and devices, he soon became known as the "Saxon Archimedes". Unfortunately, most of his works perished in a fire at the Wackerbarth Palace in 1728. Gärtner's famous world clock (c. 1700), boasting 365 dials, has survived and still draws crowds at the Dresden Zwinger. The frontispiece shows some of his newly-invented lamps. - Rare; KVK locates 4 copies in Germany (Erlangen, Augsburg, and Munich); OCLC locates no copies in the U.S.; not in COPAC. - Insignificant browning. A very good, clean copy. Thieme/Becker XIII, 37ff.
(16), 940, (4) SS. Halbpergamentband der Zeit. Verblasster dreiseitiger Farbschnitt. 4to. Erste Ausgabe. - Frühes medizinisches bio-bibliographisches Standardwerk. Ein Reprint erschien 1971 bei Olms. Der thüringische Arztsohn Kestner (1694-1747) studierte in Jena zunächst Theologie, dann "wegen seiner schwächlichen Gesundheit" Medizin "und brachte seine Zeit, weil er keine Lust zu practiciren hatte, mit Untersuchung der Historie der Gelehrsamkeit, und vornehmlich der Artzneykunst zu" (Jöcher). - Einband berieben; Ecken und Kanten bestoßen; oberes Kapital leicht eingerissen. Innen wie meist teils etwas gebräunt. Aus der Bibliothek des Nürnberger Chirurgen Karl Daniel Nopitsch (um 1795-1838; vgl. Hirsch IV, 382) mit dessen Besitzerstempel am Titel. ADB XV, 664. Petzholdt (Bibliotheca bibliographica) 575. Jöcher II, 2073f. Jöcher VII, 498. Nicht bei Besterman.
(6), VI, 122 SS. Marmorbroschur. Dreiseitig gesprenkelter Rotschnitt. 8vo. Seltene Abhandlung über die Lungenentzündung. Leipziger Habilitationsschrift des Arztes und Reiseschriftstellers Friedrich Ludwig Kreysig (1769-1839), der im selben Jahr einer Berufung als ao. Professor der Medizin und Chirurgie nach Wittenberg folgte. "Sein Ruf als Gelehrter und Arzt verbreitete sich bald über weitere Kreise und veranlaßte seine Ernennung zum Leibarzte am Hofe des Kurfürsten (späteren Königs) Friedrich August von Sachsen nach Dresden, wohin er 1803 übersiedelte. Mit voller Hingebung an seinen königlichen Herrn hat er an allen Schicksalen desselben Theil genommen; er begleitete den Fürsten auf seinen Reisen nach Polen und folgte ihm in die Gefangenschaft während der Jahre 1813-15 in Berlin" (ADB). - Durchgehend gebräunt bzw. braunfleckig. Blake 247. Vgl. ADB XVII, 154.
Oblong folio (555 x 385 mm). Tinted lithographed title-page and 30 tinted lithographed plates (555 x 385 mm, one slightly smaller: 350 x 505 mm), all in fine contemporary hand colour. Loose in modern clamshell box. Extremely rare first edition of an impressive series of lithographed views showing the zinc mines, foundries and factories in Belgium and Germany owned by the "Société Anonyme de Mines et Fonderies de Zinc de la Vieille Montagne". The series includes views of Moresnet, Welkenraedt, Rabotraedt, Angleur, Saint Léonard (Liège), Valentin-Cocq and Bray, all beautifully rendered by the French landscape painter Adolphe Maugendre (1809-1895). The Vieille Montagne society was founded in 1837. Its history goes back to 1806, when Jean-Jacques Daniel Dony (1759-1819) was granted the sole mining rights to the calamine deposits of Vieille Montagne (or Altenberg), between Liège and Aachen. Dony had invented a new method for extracting zinc and casting it in ingots. In 1809 he established a rolling mill at Saint-Léonard, apparently the first plant for the industrial production of zinc. The series shows the complete process of producing zinc, from the zinc ore extraction to the stoking, pouring and refilling of the crucible, and finally the production of sheets of zinc in a rolling mill. It includes four detailed views of the Saint-Léonard plant (one, surprisingly, featuring a woman and two children). In the 20th century the Vieille Montagne society, together with a number of other mining and smelting companies, evolved into "Umicore", a global materials technology and recycling group still active today. A second edition was published in 1855 as Album des usines et etablissements de la société and is much less rare than the present first edition. - Some light marginal spotting, the title-page more severely, title-page with a tiny tear, otherwise in very good condition. An important visual record of the history of the zinc industry. WorldCat (only a catalogue entry, not listing any copies); no further copies in KVK. For Dony: Biographical Dictionary of the History of Technology, pp. 376-377; for Maugendre: Benezit VII, p. 273.
Messing, vergoldet und graviert. Oktogonalform mit zentral eingelassener, verglaster Kompassdose. Aufstellbarer Schattenwerfer mit Stellzeiger für Polhöhen. Auf der Unterseite des Bodens Polhöhenangaben und Monogramm "L.T.M". 49 x 53 mm. Hübsche Taschensonnenuhr des Augsburger Instrumentenmachers L. T. Müller (1710-70), auf der Unterseite des Deckels sind die Polhöhen von 9 Städten eingraviert, darunter Lissabon, Venedig, Wien, München und Krakau. Tadellos erhalten mit intakter Stundenskala und Gradbogen. Vgl. Syndram, Wissenschaftliche Instrumente und Sonnenuhren, Kataloge der Kunstgewerbesammlung Stiftung Huelsmann Bd. 1, Nrn. 182/183.
21 SS. 8vo. Bedr. OBr. Erste Ausgabe. - Unaufgeschnittenes, etwas gebräuntes Exemplar.
4to. (16), 170, (20) pp., final blank. With engraved vignette to title, printed in red an black. (With:) Ettmüller, Michael. De virtute opii diaphoretica dissertatio. Leipzig & Jena, Krebs for Bielcke, [1682]. 48 pp. Contemporary marbled half vellum. Second edition of this early monograph on the pharmacological and therapeutic aspects of opium. "The main text is a reissue of the 1674 edition" (Krivatsy). Wedel not only evaluates the medical literature but also all available travel reports. The chapter entitled "An aphrodisiacum sit opium & mulierem excitet?" provides an overview of the various opinions, including Saar's account from his East Indian journeys noting the use of opium in Batavian brothels, as well as Garcia's contradictory information that opium leads to infertility and impotence (p. 128f.). The title vignette depicts a Turkish opium picker: scratching the poppy seed capsule with his knife, he collects the sap. The appendix contains the first printing of a dissertation on the qualities of opium, written by Michael Ettmüller (d. 1683), who dedicated his work to his colleage Wedel. - G. W. Wedel (1645-1721) was one of the principal physicians of his age. He authored 49 books and was the teacher of several progressively minded medical men. He is credited with the timeless aphorism that "medicine is nothing but the incessant renewal of ignorance." His "Opiologia" won him admission to the Academy of Naturalists, the still-extant "Leopoldina" in Halle. "Wedel stood midway between medieval and modern world views, defending astrology and alchemy and championing iatrochemistry" (DSB XIV, 212). "Wedel appears to have been one of the first to employ the word physiology in its present restricted sense" (Thorndike VIII, s. v.). - Evenly browned throughout; binding slightly rubbed. A fine copy. VD 17, 12:166680Q. Krivatsy 12664. Pritzel 10054. Ferchl 570. Hirsch/H. V, 875.
I: Vering, Joseph Ritter von. De convalescentia ejusque cura. Wien, Karl Gerold, 1816. 51 SS. II: Eissner zu Eissenstein, Anton Ritter von. Observationes XXV alteras docimasiam pulmonum hydrostaticam illustrantes. Edba., Mechitaristen, 1824. XVIII, (2), 69, (1) SS. III: Zebisch, Johann. Observationes XXV. tertias docimasiam pulmonum hydrostaticam illustrantes. Ebda., Mechitaristen, 1825. 6, 57, (1) SS. IV: Czermak, Joseph Julius. Observationes XXV. docimasiam pulmonum hydrostaticam illustrantes. Ebda., Mechitaristen, 1823. VIII, 64, (2). Mit 1 gest. Tafel. V: Kassowitz, Joseph. Observationes XV. docimasiam pulmonum hydrostaticam illustrantes. Ebda., Mechitaristen, 1827. (6), 36, (2) SS. VI: Sistens expositionem generalem anatomicam organi auditus per classes animalium. Ebda., 1818, Anton Pichler. (6), 48 SS. 5 lith. Tafeln. VII: Schäffer, August von. De lusus et ludorum vi diaetetica. Ebda., Anton Pichler, 1816. 48, (2) SS. VIII: Koppi, Alexander. Fontes generales merita medicorum dijudicandi sistens. Pest, Thomas Trattner, 1817. 30, (1) SS. IX: Rinna von Sarenbach, Ernst. De nutrice optima. Wien, Georg Überreuter, 1816. 68 SS. Reichhaltiger Sammelband medizinischer Dissertationen angehender Medizinier des 19. Jahrunderts. So z.B. jene Joseph von Verings (1793-1826) über die Wiedergenesung. Sein Vater Gerhard von Vering (1755-1823), Dermatologe und Audiologe behandelte unter anderen auch Ludwig van Beethoven wegen seines rapiden Gehöhrverlusts. Da der Behandlung kein Erfolg beschieden war, wandte sich der Komponist an Dr. Johann Adam Schmidt. Weiters findet sich ein Werk des angesehen Prager Mediziner Joseph Julius Czermak (1799-1851), welcher durch seine Dissertation einen Grundstein für sein weiteres Forschungsgebiet der vergleichenden Anatomie setzt. Während seiner Professur in Wien besuchten u.a. Nikolaus Lenau seine Vorlesungen. - Titelblatt zum ersten Band am Oberrand teilweise ausgerissen. Durchgehend wasserrandig, gebräunt und stockfleckig. Zu Band IV: Wurzb. III, 99.
4to. (6), 372 pp. Engraved additional pictorial title with letterpress explanatory leaf, 3 hand-coloured engraved plates. Contemporary tree calf, spine gilt, marbled edges. First edition of this rare monograph on snakes. Text printed intwo columns throughout in Dutch and French. The fine plates, drawn from nature by W. Veltman and engraved by J. C. Philips, show an unidentified snake, a viper, and a slow-worm. A printed explanation is provided opposite the engraved title. - Johannes van Lier was a politician, lawyer, tax collector and Deputy of Drenthe. He wrote several treatises on a wide variety of subjects including history, archaeology and natural history. - Marginal adhesion mark to L4 and M1, very faint dampstaining to some gatherings. Extremities lightly rubbed, head- and tailcaps more heavily, spine label slightly defective. Nissen ZVB 2509.
8vo. 16 pp. Original printed wrappers, bound within modern boards. With the author's three-line-autograph inscription to his friend Friedrich Schwandner, with whom he had studied at Tübingen and formed an illicit students' union, the "Corps Guestphalia", for which reason the two had been arrested in 1837. Both works, "Über die Torricellische Leere" and "Über Auslösung", were separately published in 1875 and 1876 within the "Beilage des Staatsanzeigers für Württemberg". Eisert 29.
Small folio (210 x 342 mm). 38, (2) pp. With engr. title vignette and 12 engr. plates by J. C. Berndt. Contemp. marbled boards. Only edition of this profusely illustrated collection of human malformations. "Achondroplasia is first described on page 30 and pictured on plate 11" (Garrison/M.). An English translation appeared in 1932 in R. H. Major's "Classic Descriptions of Disease". The versatile German anatomist S. T. von Soemmerring (1755-1830), one of the first members of the Senckenbergian Society, is hailed as the discoverer of the eye's Macula lutea, one of the earliest scholars to describe the Pterodactyl, and inventor of a telescope as well as of an electrical telegraph. He also was an early champion of smallpox vaccination. - Binding bumped at extremeties. Ms. inscription (c. 1820) on flyleaf: "Zum Beweise der reinsten Achtung | Aug. v. Tournier" [?]. Corners of flyleaf clipped; slight worming throughout (insignificant loss to text; more pronounced near beginning and end), otherwise fine. Extremely rare; last recorded on a German auction in 1964. Garrison/Morton 4306. VD 18, 14590689-001. E. Goldschmid, Entwicklung und Bibliographie der path.-anatom. Abbildung 78. OCLC 67960624.
4to. 2 vols. (out of 10). XVI, 222 pp. IX, (1), 256 pp. With 2 hand-coloured, engraved title pages and 225 hand-coloured, engraved plates (some folding), numbered 1-222, with a/b numbers for 114, 172, 198). Contemporary half calf with giltstamped green spine labels. Marbled endpapers. All edges sprinkled in red. The first two volumes of this rare work of decorative plates showing flowers and other plants, including fruits. Contains the first 225 of a total of 1090 engravings published until 1820. The Viennese physician Vietz, who combined artistic talent with a penchant for botany, began publication of this monumental ten-volume work in 1800; only the first three volumes were edited by him personally. The Natural History Museum, London, described its own copy thus: "Today, the work appears to be of extreme rarity, not being held in any other of the United Kingdom's national or public library collections. Only three copies have been found in North American libraries, of which two are certainly fragile and in need of conservation. One copy is in the Austrian National Library" (Great Flower Books [1990], p. 147). - Clean and well-preserved throughout. Nissen, BBI 2062. Stafleu/Cowan 16.153. Pritzel 9764. Wurzbach 50, 282f.
Large 8vo. XIV, 138 pp. With 2 folding lithographed plates. Contemporary marbled boards with giltstamped label to spine. First edition of the first German monograph on gas lighting; preceded only by Lampadius's translation of Accum's "Practical Treatise on Gaslight". J. J. Prechtl (1778-1854) initiated the foundation of the Vienna Polytechnical Institute in 1815, the first educational institute of its kind in the German-speaking countries, and served as its first director. The institute became a decisive force in the industrialization of Austria. In the autumn of 1815, Prechtl and the engineering professor Johann Arzberger developed a lighting apparatus based on coal gas, thus becoming a pioneer of continental gas lighting. He introduced the system at his Polytechnical Institute in 1817. - The plates are lithographed by the trained engraver Ignaz Kühn, later to become director of the Vienna Lithographic Institute (cf. Schwarz, 43); in 1817, when Senefelder left Vienna, he became Friedrich Kunike's principal assistant (cf. Thieme/B. XXII, 58). He took his life in 1822. - One corner slightly bumped; otherwise a good, clean copy. Poggendorff II, 519. Feldhaus 357. Ferchl 423. Engelmann (Bibl. mech.-tech.) 291. Not in Winkler.
13 pp. Disbound. First edition of Thomas Paine's final work: his essay on the cause of yellow fever, written during the summer of 1805 while Paine was at New Rochelle. "As he explained, 'the fever breaking out in the city prevented my sending it for publication'. Although he had intended to let his house in New Rochelle 'to some New Yorker for the summer', the outbreak of fever in New York led to his spending most of the latter half of 1805 and the first half of 1806 at home" (Speck, A Political Biography of Thomas Paine, p. 190f.). Paine held that the illness (now known to be transmitted by the yellow fever mosquito) was generated by "the impure air or [pernicious] vapour [issuing] from the [...] new made earth, raised on the muddy and filthy part of the river". - One of the Founding Fathers of the United States, Paine in 1776 authored the electrifying pamphlet "Common Sense", inspiring Americans to declare independence from Britain. The present treatise, first published in newspapers in 1806, bears witness to the strong scientific interests that Paine maintained beyond his many political activities. He died in 1809, his health having been failing for some time. - Very rare: WorldCat records only eight copies worldwide (seven in the U.S. and one in the National Library of Australia); no copy in British Library or COPAC. This copy removed from the Norwich & Norfolk United Medical Book Society (their stamp on title page), inscribed in a contemporary hand above the title: "Presented by the Hospital Medical Board". Sabin 58232. Not in Wellcome, Waller or Osler.
8vo. X, 462 pp. With woodcut illustrations in text. Contemporary full calf with spine gilt in six compartments, giltstamped green spine label, gilt inner dentelle, leading edges gilt. Marbled endpapers; all edges marbled. First edition. - Presentation copy from the library of the British architect William Cecil Marshall (1849-1921), inscribed to him on the half-title ("From the Author") by a clerk at the publisher's, and with Marshall's autograph ownership above that. Darwin and Marshall had corresponded over insectivorous plants the previous year (cf. Darwin Correspondence Project no. 9627F, letter dated 7 Sept. [1874]). In 1876 Darwin would engage the architect's services to build an extension to Down House on the north side (a billiard room with dressing room and bedroom above). - Extremeties worn; front marbled flyleaf weakened. Still an appealing copy.
8vo. (10), 143, (9) pp. With fine woodcut frontispiece showing saw and pruning knife, 1 engraved folding plate, and 30 woodcut text illustrations. Contemporary half calf and speckled boards, spine richly gilt with gilt lettered label. The first western book on the cultivation of dwarf trees, or "bonsai". Georg Liegelsteiner was court gardener to the Archbishop of Salzburg in Austria, Count Franz Anton Harrach. His book on dwarf trees, although now largely forgotten and overlooked in botanical and horticultural literature, proved extraordinarily successful in its day, achieving six editions including the original edition of 1705. Liegelsteiner "writes about dwarfing trees so that they look like a very beautiful big tree, but only much smaller. He understands tree physiology like only a small minority of bonsai enthusiasts today. He explains in detail how to shorten roots and transplant trees often, how to shorten branches, how to correct a one-sided tree. He explains how to cut back a tree to a stump, let the new shoots grow, cut them back at strategic points, let the new shoots grown again and cut them back. It is exactly the 'Chinese' clip-and-grow technique. He makes drawings which explain the development of a dwarf tree in a way that could not be improved" (Walter Pall, Dwarf Trees of George Liegelsteiner, in: Bonsai Magazine 3 [2000]). The edition offered here is the final one, published after the death of its author, with a very interesting new preface which attempts to sketch a history of dwarf trees in Europe. It suggests that the art of growing Bonsai trees came to Versailles in the late 17th century. One of the Versailles gardeners, Grottendorf, settled in Berlin and experimented more on it. Eventually he was appointed head gardener to the wealthy merchant and Councillor Georg Bose's garden, the "Kleinbosischer Garten", in Leipzig. Liegelsteiner received advice from Grottendorf about the art of growing dwarf trees. - OCLC locates the 2 copies in US: Berkeley and National Agriculture Library; also: Berkeley (1703 ed.); Delaware, Agricult. Library, and Berkeley (1716); Berkeley and Cincinnati Museum Centre (1725)]; COPAC locates only British Library (1702 ed.) and Kew Gardens (1702 ed., their 1716 ed. 'is lost at binders' ). A very good copy. Not in Dochnahl, Hunt, Lindley Lib., Nissen, Plesch, Pritzel, Oak Sprink Sylva.
8vo. 39, (1) pp. Papered spine. Rare Berlin anatomical dissertation about the female breast. With a life of the author (born in Oppeln in 1802; died 1852), a son of the professor of obstetrics, Jacob Dziatzko, on pp. 38f. - Some brownstaining and waterstaining throughout. OCLC 257740654. Not in Kayser, Engelmann, Wellcome or Waller.
8vo. 42 pp., final blank. With a lithographic plate. Contemporary wrappers. Very rare study of the defects of the umbilical cord, with a plate (showing embryos) lithographed after the author's own drawings. With this habilitation, Froriep (1804-61) gained a Professorship of Medicine in Berlin, but he had to forsake this career in 1845 when his father, himself once a great surgeon and obstetrician, fell ill and Robert had to take over the publishing house "Landes-Industrie-Comptoir" which Ludwig Friedrich v. Froriep - the son-in-law of and successor to the famous publisher Bertuch - had headed. A correspondent with Goethe, Robert Froriep also taught anatomic drawing at the Academy of Fine Arts. "Obgleich er in den von ihm besonders cultivirten Wissenschaften, der beschreibenden und pathologischen Anatomie, keine hervorragenden Entdeckungen gemacht hat, hat er durch seine zahlreichen Unternehmungen [...] die Wissenschaft wesentlich gefördert und namentlich zur Popularisierung von kostspieligen ausländischen Abbildungswerken, die ohne ihn daselbst nur wenig bekannt geworden wären, wesentlich beigetragen" (Hirsch II, 455). - Slight waterstaining near end (mainly affecting the plate's lower margin). Only three copies in the U.S. (Johns Hopkins-Welch Med. Library; Coll. of Physicians of PA; CRL Chicago). Hirsch II, 454. OCLC 258086847. Not in Kayser, Engelmann, Wellcome or Waller.
4to. (4), 44 pp. Papered spine. Very rare dissertation on the female breast and human lactation, written by the versatile J. G. Günz (1714-54) from Königstein, who went on to become an eminent surgeon and ophthalmologist, Professor in Leipzig, and personal physician to the Elector of Saxony (cf. ADB X, 181; Hirsch II, 685). His large medical library was dispersed by sale in 1755. - The author describes the locale of breasts, their size, shape, and structure, noting that they are mainly composed of fatty tissue. He gives an account of the milk ducts, the areola and nipple, as well as of the blood vessels and their connection with other parts of the body. Separate chapters treat the chests of newborn babies and the development of breasts around the 14th year. The final part of the thesis is devoted to human breast milk, its composition, and the lactation process. - Title page slightly duststained, with old library shelfmark label and ms. subject headings. A single copy in the U.S. (Countway Library of Medicine - Harvard University). OCLC 312080582. Not in Hirsch, Blake, Wellcome or Waller.
4to. 43, (1) pp. Papered spine. Edges sprinkled in red. Very rare dissertation on the female breast and human lactation, written by Georg Friedrich Gutermann (1705-84), later a highly regarded obstetrician and in 1741 ennobled as "Gutermann Edler von Gutershofen". The author describes the healthy human breast, its locale, number, size, and shape, the areola and nipple, characterizes it as a gland, and gives an account of the nerves, milk ducts, and blood vessels. While their principal purpose, writes Gutermann, is that of producing milk for nourishment, he notes that the breasts are also regarded as things of beauty and enumerates those features of the female bust which are considered the most graceful (p. 13). The second section of the dissertation is devoted to pathology: ailments of the nipples, problems with lactation, inflammatory breast cancer, etc. The third and final section gives an account of various possible treatments. - Born in Biberach an der Riss in Swabia, Gutermann later worked in Kaufbeuren and Augsburg. Here he was a fierce adversary of the local obstetrician Johann Andreas Diesch, whose sad record of disastrously failed childbirths (brought about by a stubborn insistence that sharp instruments were necessary) had earned Diesch notoriety as the "butcher of women and children" (cf. Hirsch II, 705). Perhaps most remarkably, Gutermann was the father of the famous writer and salonnière Sophie von La Roche (1730-1807), sometime fiancée of C. M. Wieland. Gutermann saw to it that the young girl enjoyed a strict but encompassing Pietist education: she learned to read and write early and was instructed in languages, art, literature, music, and housewifery (though in spite of her pleas she was denied instruction in Latin). - Some browning and occasional waterstaining throughout, more pronounced in title and final leaf. Only two copies in the U.S. (National Library of Medicine; Cornell University). OCLC 311673497. Not in Hirsch, Blake, Wellcome or Waller.
4to. (6), 32 SS. Papered spine. Edges sprinkled in red. First edition. Very rare anatomical dissertation on the female breast, written by the German physician and botanist A. B. Kölpin (1739-1801). Formerly a theologian, Kölpin had to forsake a career as a preacher due to a thoracic illness, whereupon he took up medicine. From 1765 onwards he served as director of the Greifswald Botanical Gardens before moving to Stettin as professor and county physician. A Freemason, Kölpin corresponded with Carl von Linné and published a German translation of Pehr Löfling's botanical travelogue. - Kölpin discusses the overall structure of breasts, the areola, and the exterior and interior parts of the nipple, noting its faculty for "erection in sexual arousal and other states of irritation" (p. 8). He gives an account of the blood vessels, nerves and muscular tissue throughout the breasts. Also, he describes an experiment by which he drives coloured liquids through various lactiferous ducts, proving by the several colour mixtures that they all branch out from a single papilla. - Very slight browning. Wants the plates and their explanation found in some copies. OCLC 14335139. Not in Blake. Cf. Wellcome III, 407; Engelmann 307 (other editions).
8vo. 35, (5) pp. Papered spine. Rare anatomical dissertation on the human fetus by the gynecologist I. Lasker (born in Breslau in 1811). - Some brownstaining throughout. OCLC 312415523. Not in Engelmann, Wellcome or Waller.
8vo. 26, (2) pp. Papered spine. Only edition of this rare surgical thesis on the history of enterorrhaphy, or the suture of the intestine. With a biography of the author (born in Torun in 1808) on pp. 24ff. - Some brownstaining and a repaired paper flaw. Wellcome III, 483. Callisen XI, p. 217, no. 1375. OCLC 246267418. Not in Engelmann or Waller.
4to. 32 pp. With a woodcut title vignette, headpieces and initials. Papered spine. Edges sprinkled in red. First edition. - Very rare anatomical dissertation on female breasts, constituting one of the first monographs on the subject. F. W. Mencel (1697-1773) had not only studied medicine, but also mathematics and physics; he would later serve as physician in his native Magdeburg as well as draw maps and architectural elevations in Prussia before going on to teach medicine in Halle and Zerbst (cf. Jöcher/A.). - In his introduction, the author states that humans at various ages favour different foods, but only at the youngest age can they draw nutrition from the human body alone, "for which purpose the female sex has been given two peculiar organs, which rise as prominences from the chests of young women and have been referred to by anatomists under the name of 'mammae', 'breasts', providing nourishment, called 'milk', to the tenderest of beings. These organs (as such) have not been hitherto dealt with frequently," for which reason he has chosen them as the subject of his thesis. Mencel elaborates on the classical derivation of the term 'mamma' before giving a description of the mammary glands, their different appearance in males and females, and their locale on the body. The author notes that there are usually two such glands, one right, the other opposite, on the left. The reason for this, says Mencel, is both functional and aesthetic: "for one thing, it is prettier that way, and for another, if one of them is injured or cannot produce sufficient milk, the other will serve" (p. 9). He goes on to discuss the varying size, shape, colour, and tissue density of breasts, "not the same in all women, but subject to their age, temper, and region": they develop some time before the first menstrual cycle, then expand (supposedly being bigger among married women than virgins), and are at their largest among pregnant women shortly before childbirth, while they tend to sag among the elderly - and even more so among the women of India and Senegal, where they are reported to droop to the stomach. Even in Europe, however, there are areas (says Mencel) where girls are so well-endowed that their breasts resemble pillows, indeed not little hills but enormous mountains. Mencel points out how it has often been observed that women with large breasts are more libidinous and more exposed to venereal disease, a fact reflective of the adage that "every excess turns into vice" (p. 11), then adds anecdotes about unusually buxom women from Utrecht, Elsinore and other places. Proceeding into anatomy proper, Mencel discusses the veins, arteries and nerves throughout the mammary glands, the milk ducts, and the nipples. Another chapter discusses the movement of the breasts during breathing, their "rise and subsequent fall, alternatingly, as we can observe in girls every day". The reason, he adds, "is not hard to guess, for as the breasts are situated on the thorax, so inhaling causes them to expand, and exhaling to constrict themselves", noting the health risks (including lung constriction) involved in the custom of breast binding (p. 26). After a final discussion of the human milk and lactation, Mencel concludes that much could be added on the subject, in particular about the inflammation of the breast, growths, breast cancer, excessive lactation, breast defects, and similar conditions, but his dissertation purposely omits these, as so many medical men have already written about them that to include them in his thesis would be like once more reheating leftover cabbage, and similarly likely to induce nausea, for which reason he will leave it at that. - Indeed, although Mencel's work is not absolutely the first monograph on the subject, nearly all previous studies had focused on diseases, specifically breast infection or cancer. Moritz Hoffmann had in 1662 published a 32-page dissertation "De naturali ac praeter naturali mammarum constitutione" containing an account of the healthy breast, but the book's second half was entirely concerned with pathology, while Johann Arnold Friderici's more general anatomical disputation "De constitutione mammarum" (Jena 1669) comprised a mere 18 pages. Mencel's dissertation, so frequently couched in a disarmingly coy tone, is thus the most extensive early monograph wholly devoted to the healthy female breast. It was reprinted in Franz Joseph Oberkamp's 1767 collection of excellent Leiden dissertations. - Somewhat browned throughout due to paper; old ink number annotated to title. Only three copies in the U.S. (National Library of Medicine; Cornell University; Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University, Philadelphia). Waller 6462. Jöcher/Adelung IV, 1388. OCLC 14324433. Not in Blake or Wellcome.
4to. (6), 36, (4) pp. With a folding table and a folding engraved map in hand colour, 147 cms in length. Modern marbled boards. First monograph about the just-completed Strömsholm Canal connecting Grangärde (in Dalarna, middle Sweden) with Strömsholm on Lake Mälaren, from where ships have easy access to Stockholm. Work on the 62-mile canal, intended to facilitate transport for the numerous steel works along the waterway, had begun in 1772: based on plans by Johan Ullström, a series of lakes were connected by short canals and a total of 25 locks. The fine map, nearly one and a half metres long, shows the entire stretch of the structure. Earlier the same year, the author Magnus Schenström (1775-1848) had published an eight-page Latin dissertation "De canalibus et catarractis in Svecia generatim, speciatim vero Strömsholmensibus", which he subsequently expanded into the present account of the canal. - Some slight marginal waterstaining, but a good, wide-margined copy. Rare; only four copies listed in OCLC (Baker Library-Harvard Business School; National Library of Sweden; Danish National Library; Staatsbib. Berlin). OCLC 186273921.
