''Fasciculus Medicinae'' is a "bundle" of six independent and quite different medieval medical treatises. The collection, which existed only in two manuscripts (handwritten copies), was first printed in 1491 in Latin and came out in numerous editions over the next 25 years.

Johannes de Ketham Johannes de Ketham was a German physician living in Italy at the end of the fifteenth century. Little is known about him, but he has been identified by many as a physician practicing in Vienna in 1460 named Johannes von Kirchheim. Fas ...<br></span></div>, the German physician routinely associated with the ''Fasciculus'', was neither the author nor even the original compiler but merely an owner of one of the manuscripts. The topics of the treatises cover a wide spectrum of medieval European medical knowledge and technique, including <div class= uroscopy Uroscopy is the historical medical practice of visually examining a patient's urine to diagnose diseases or medical conditions. It is an ancient technique that involves the analyzing the color, odor, and sometimes composition of urine. It was wide ...

astrology Astrology is a range of Divination, divinatory practices, recognized as pseudoscientific since the 18th century, that propose that information about human affairs and terrestrial events may be discerned by studying the apparent positions ...

bloodletting Bloodletting (or blood-letting) was the deliberate withdrawal of blood from a patient to prevent or cure illness and disease. Bloodletting, whether by a physician or by leeches, was based on an ancient system of medicine in which blood and othe ...

, the treatment of wounds, plague, anatomical

dissection Dissection (from Latin ' "to cut to pieces"; also called anatomization) is the dismembering of the body of a deceased animal or plant to study its anatomical structure. Autopsy is used in pathology and forensic medicine to determine the cause of ...

, and

women’s health Women's health is an example of population health, where health is defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) as "a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity". Often treated ...

. The book is remarkable as the first illustrated medical work to appear in print; notable illustrations include: a

urine Urine is a liquid by-product of metabolism in humans and many other animals. In placental mammals, urine flows from the Kidney (vertebrates), kidneys through the ureters to the urinary bladder and exits the urethra through the penile meatus (mal ...

chart, a diagram of the

vein Veins () are blood vessels in the circulatory system of humans and most other animals that carry blood towards the heart. Most veins carry deoxygenated blood from the tissues back to the heart; exceptions are those of the pulmonary and feta ...

s for

phlebotomy Phlebotomy is the process of making a puncture in a vein, usually in the arm, with a cannula for the purpose of drawing blood. The procedure itself is known as a venipuncture, which is also used for intravenous therapy. A person who performs a ...

, a

pregnant Pregnancy is the time during which one or more offspring gestation, gestates inside a woman's uterus. A multiple birth, multiple pregnancy involves more than one offspring, such as with twins. Conception (biology), Conception usually occurs ...

woman,

Wound Man The Wound Man is a surgical diagram which first appeared in European medical manuscripts of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The illustration acted as an annotated table of contents to guide the reader through various injuries and diseases ...

Disease Man A disease is a particular abnormal condition that adversely affects the structure or function of all or part of an organism and is not immediately due to any external injury. Diseases are often known to be medical conditions that are assoc ...

and Zodiac Man. In 1495, it appeared in Italian under the title ''Fasiculo de Medicina''. The ten handsome full-page

woodcut Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking. An artist carves an image into the surface of a block of wood—typically with gouges—leaving the printing parts level with the surface while removing the non-printing parts. Areas that ...

illustrations influenced artists for some time – even as late as 1751 when the last of

William Hogarth William Hogarth (; 10 November 1697 – 26 October 1764) was an English painter, engraving, engraver, pictorial social satire, satirist, editorial cartoonist and occasional writer on art. His work ranges from Realism (visual arts), realistic p ...

's Four Stages of Cruelty seems to borrow from the dissection scene (above).

References

Fasciculus medicinae Ik00017000 Scan00007

* Choulant, L. ''History and bibliography of anatomic illustration.'' Trans. and annotated by Mortimer Frank. (New York: Hafner, 1962). pp. 115–119. * Ketham, J. de. ''The Fasciculus Medicinae of Johannes de Ketham, Alemanus : facsimile of the first (Venetian) edition of 1491.'' With English translation by Luke Demaitre; commentary by

Karl Sudhoff Karl Sudhoff (26 November 1853, Frankfurt am Main – 8 October 1938, Salzwedel) was a German historian of medicine, who founded the first institute for the history of medicine in the world. Sudhoff taught for years at the University of Leipzig, ...

; trans. and adapted by Charles Singer. (Birmingham, Ala.: The Classics of Medicine Library, 1988). * ''Morton's Medical Bibliography (Garrison and Morton).'' Ed. By Jeremy Norman. Fifth ed. (Aldershot, Hants, England : Scolar Press; Brookfield, Vt., USA : Gower Pub. Co., 1991). No. 363.1.

External links

Edition review

Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.

Click your mouse on the right side of the book cover to start.
Images from ''Fasciculus Medicinae'' (Milan, 1516)
From The College of Physicians of Philadelphia Digital Library {{Authority control 1491 books Anatomy books History of anatomy Incunabula 15th-century books in Latin