First editions, all very rare, of four early works on animal motion and physiology by the outstanding Renaissance anatomist and surgeon and founder of embryology. They were issued separately from 1614 to 1618; after Fabrici’s death in 1619, the treatises were reissued together by Meglietti with a general title page... More about De respirationes & eius Instrumentis. Padua: Antonio Meglietti, n.d. [colophon: Lorenzo...
Item #4467

Cologne: Arnold Birkmann, 1562. First edition, second issue, of the greatest Italian anatomical book of the sixteenth century (first published in 1561, see below).   “Rather than a complete study of the whole of anatomy, Falloppio, who was a pupil of Vesalius, designed this work as a critical commentary of... More about Observationes anatomicae.
Item #4023

Lyon: Thibauld Payan, 1561. Second edition, almost four times the length of the first (1556), with 25 new illustrations including 22 instruments and three full skeletons. This is Franco’s major work, very rare, a copy in an untouched contemporary binding and with a fine provenance. “Pierre Franco, creator of suprapubic... More about Traité des hernies: contenant une ample declaration de toutes leurs especes, & autres...
Item #4490

[Vienna: Karl Gerold’s Sohn, 1877]. First edition, extremely rare separately-paginated offprint (journal pagination 15-27), of Freud’s first published paper. In 1876, three years after entering the University of Vienna as a medical student, Freud joined the laboratory of the eminent physiologist Ernst Brücke where he began studying the histology of..... More about Uber der Ursprung der hinteren Nervenwurzeln im Ruckenmark von Ammocoetes (Petromyzon Planeri)....
Item #4111

Leyden: Johann Maire, 1639. Third, but second complete, edition of the single most important and famous medical book ever published, containing Harvey’s discovery and experimental proof of the circulation of the blood, which created a revolution in physiology comparable to the Copernican revolution in astronomy. Harvey’s discovery was to become..... More about De motu cordis & sanguinis in animalibus, anatomica exercitation: cum refutationibus Aemylii...
Item #3607

[1813-1850]. An extraordinary collection of works by Sir John Herschel (1792-1871), the outstanding astronomer and physical scientist of his day, assembled for presentation to his son William James Herschel (not to be confused with John’s father, the astronomer Frederick William). The collection includes offprints of Herschel’s three most important publications..... More about On the chemical action of the rays of the solar spectrum on preparations of silver and other...
Item #4321

Washington: Carnegie Institution. First edition, the very rare offprint issue, of the first of the papers documenting McClintock’s discovery of ‘control elements,’ for which she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 1983. “Between 1948 and 1951, McClintock carried out a series of sophisticated experiments with variegated maize..... More about Mutable loci in maize. [Offered with:] Some parallels between gene control systems in maize...
Item #3910

[Venice: Tacuino, 1519 (colophon of part I dated September 1518)]. First edition of one of the greatest rarities in the alchemical and chemical literature; this is an exceptionally interesting copy, bound with twelve leaves of contemporary script conveying an all-encompassing ‘tree of human endeavours’, charting the features and visually suggesting... More about Ars Transmutationis Metallicae ... [with, as issued] Commentarium theoricae Artis Mettalicae...
Item #4395

Paris: André Wechel, 1572; 1568. First editions of two of Paré's most important works, both very rare, and in fine condition. “The Cinq livres contains all new material. It had been called by several serious writers Paré's chef d'oeuvre ... in it appears the first description of the fracture of..... More about Cinq livres de chirurgie. 1. Des bandages. 2. Des fractures. 3. Des luxations, avec une Apologie...
Item #3697

A fascinating letter with significant scientific content, providing material for an article in the French newspaper La Revue. Pasteur begins by providing Drion with a curriculum vitae up to the end of 1854: - Louis Pasteur was born in Dole (Jura) on the 27th of December1822 - Commenced studies at... More about Autograph letter signed (“L. Pasteur”), in French, Lille, 18 July, 1856, to Charles Alexandre...
Item #3809

Paris: Victor Masson, 1860. First edition, unopened in original printed wrappers, of Pasteur’s definitive proof that alcoholic fermentation is due to the action of a living organism (yeast), and is not a purely chemical process as most chemists since Lavoisier had believed. “What did this memoir add to the first..... More about Memoire sur la fermentation alcoolique.
Item #3700

Paris: Mallet-Bachelier, 1858; 1860. First printings, in the very rare offprint form (first paper inscribed by Pasteur), of these two landmark papers, “often considered the beginning of bacteriology as a modern science, [which constitute] the first demonstration of the connection between a specific fermentation and the activity of a specific... More about Mémoire sur la Fermentation appelée lactique; Memoire sur la Fermentation alcoolique.
Item #3688

First edition. St. Petersburg: I. N. Kushnereff & Ko. 1897. A fine copy, in contemporary Russian binding, of this famous work on digestive juices by the demonstrator of the ‘conditioned reflex’. ❧PMM 385; Grolier/Horblit 83; Dibner 135; Grolier/Medicine 85; Lilly Library Notable Medical Books 241. “Mouth-watering is a familiar experience... More about Lektsii o rabotie glavnikh pishtshevaritelnikh zhelyos.
Item #4196