Hippocrate

1601 · rif. A9FGFK4C5FH3 — Leiden 1601. 12mo. ex Officina Plantiniana by Christopher Raphelengius Contemporay vellum with the manuscript title on the spine remnants of ties. With a woodcut printer's device on the title page and several decorated woodcut initials. 1 1 blank 14 512 16 pp. Rare first edition of the Aphorisms of Hippocrates of Cos 460-370 BCE the father of Medicine edited and translated into Latin by the famous first Leyden professor of medicine Johannes Heurnius. The aphorisms of Hippocrates are the earliest collection of the kind. It is a series of observations from which the patient's affliction could be deduced and treatment prescribed. Their broad application made them exceptionally valuable to medical practitioners of the time. Included are notable and often invoked phrases as: "Life is short the art long" and "The physician must not only be prepared to do what is right himself but also to make the patient the attendants and externals cooperate".Apparently the translation by Heurnius was very successful. Other editions appeared in 1607 in Leiden and Antwerp 1609 and 1611 both by the Officina Plantiniana in Leiden. A "second edition" was published in 1623 by J. le Maire in Leiden. Furthermore it was published in 1615 in Lyon by the widow of A. de Harsy and in Jena in 1690.With manuscript owner's inscriptions on the recto and verso of the front board on the back pastedown and with several manuscript annotations in the margins. The vellum is creased and browned slightly damaged around the spine the bookblock has separated from the binding along the front hinge still attached at the bottom endband the back hinge is somewhat weakened. Occasionally foxed slightly browned throughout.l Krivatsy 5642; NNBW IV cols. 744-5; STCN 058866566 4 copies; not in BMN; Garrison & Morton. hardcover