PARACELSUS (1493-1541)

Von der Bergsucht oder Bergkranckheiten drey Bücher , inn dreyzehen Tractat verfast unnd beschriben worden. Darin[n]en begryffen vom ursprung und herkom[m]en derselbigen francktheiten, sampt ihren warhafftigen Preservativa unnd curren. Allen Ertz unnd Bergleiten, Schmeltzern, Probierern, Müntzmaitern, Goldschmiden unnd Alchimisten, auch allen dene[n] so inn Metallen und Mineralien arbayten, hoch nutzlich tröstlich unnd notturfftig... Anno Domini 1567. [Colophon] Getruckt zu Dilingen durch Sebaldum Mayer

Dillingen: Sebald Mayer, 1567.
4to: [maltese cross]--2[maltese cross]4 (blank 2[maltese cross]4), A--Q4, 72 leaves, ff. [8], 62, [2] (last preliminary leaf blank). Gothic letter, title printed in red and black. Leaf size and condition: 195 x 150mm. A good clean copy. Binding: Re-cased in contemporary vellum boards taken from another book (ré-emboîtage) made from a fifteenth-century vellum manuscript leaf. Provenance and annotation: Walter Pagel (1896--1983), signature, undated; B. E. J. Pagel (1930--2007). References: Sudhoff 88; VD16 ZV 12161; Durling 3476; Waller 7124; Wellcome 4762. Garrison--Morton 2118.1.
First edition.
§ 'The year 1533 found [Paracelsus] in the land of Appenzell -- a poor lay preacher and healer among poor Swiss peasants. In the same year he visited the mining districts of Hall and Schwaz. Here his work on the Miners' diseases was conceived and written -- the first treatise in medical literature recognising and systematically dealing with an occupational disease' (Pagel, p. 26). The first section covers miners' diseases, mainly pulmonary affections such as silicosis and tuberculosis which Paracelsus was the first to identify as occupational hazards. The second book describes the diseases of smelters and metallurgists, and the third diseases caused by mercury. 'The treatise on miners' diseases, the result of his observations in Fugger's mines in Tyrol, containing descriptions of miners' phthisis and the effects of choke-damp, was one of the few original contributions of the time to clinical medicine.' (Garrison, History of medicine, 4th ed., p. 407.) Although written around 1533 the book remained unpublished until this posthumous printing, edited by Samuel Architectus. Manuscript leaf used for binding: Germany, fifteenth century, in a formal gothic book hand. Text: Masses for the sanctorale, including part or all of the propers for [?], Heinrich of Bavaria (13 July), Alexis (17 July), [?], the octave of Lawrence (17 August), the octave of the Assumption (22 August), and Cornelius (16 September). Many of the texts are given by cue only, with a reference to a folio number presumably elsewhere in the volume from which this leaf was taken. (Consuelo W. Dutschke). Literature: Walter Pagel, Paracelsus. An Introduction to Philosophical Medicine in the Era of the Renaissance (2nd edition, Basle etc, 1982), pp. 26 and 102, n. 268; George Rosen, The History of Miners' Diseases (New York, 1943), pp. 64--88.

• GBP 15,000.00 > Andere Währungen
• Bestellnummer: 19733

• Antiquariat: Roger Gaskell (GREAT BRITAIN)