Reviewing the Medical Books and Journals that constituted Medical understanding a century back.

History of the Book of Medicine

September 9th, 2007 at 4:18 pm

Who Were the People that wrote the Book of Medicine?

I haven't had a lot of time to look into the authors of the book of medicine. One of the side projects I'd like to tackle with this book is identifying, who these people were that authored and edited the book, identify where they lived and worked and where they came from. Fortunately utilizing the powers of sites such as ancestry.com I can actually trace and get access to public records such as census records that might indicate who they were where they lived and what their lives were like. If they were recent immigrants to the United States or if they lived in the United Kingdom or whether they were from Germany or Ireland, etc.

I'd like to also determine where they went to school to learn medicine, I will admit that I have no idea how to go about the second part but I'm hoping that the first inquiry provides more background information that might lead to information on the second part.

Who knows it could even be possible that I will be able to find some people that knew them, maybe some relatives that will be able provides a personal perspective on the authors of this book. Who knows I might even come across these people running a Pigeon Forge vacation rentals company, or teaching at a university today or maybe they're even somebody I know I just haven't made the connection.

Additional Articles from the Book of Medicine:

  • Duty of the Throat

    Duty of the Throat.- the muscular bands of the throat now grasp it and pass it down the gullet into the stomach, beyond our control.  Here it comes into contact with the gastric juice, undergoes the churning motion of the stomach, discarded over by the pylorus, thoroughly saturated in mixed before entering into the intestinal tract, where it is subjected to the action of the file, the pancreatic juice and the intestinal fluid each with its special duty to perform.

     

    Again nothing terribly exciting here in this section but the next one will take us into “Nature’s Treasures Opened to Man”.

  • THE HEART AND ITS WONDERS – What the Blood Is

    THE HEART AND ITS WONDERS.
    What the Blood Is
    .-The blood — the pabulum of life — has not inaptly been termed “Liquid Flesh.” But it is more than that, since it contains materials so essential and so requisite for the building up and repair of every organ tissue of which the body is composed. The blood is the liquid by means of which the circulation in the body is carried on; it permeates every note and corner of the system, and is composed of a pen, colorless fluid, the plasma, filled with red discs, so small, flat and thin that it requires 3,500, placed side by side, to measure 1 inch, and no less than 18,000, placed one upon the other, to make a column 1 inch in height. These discs are continually forming and as constantly dying.

    This section started off very strange with the reference to liquid flash, I think the author would have been wise to describe her point out this reference. As were only 50 pages into the book, I have the suspicion that there are going to be many very peculiar quoted references to sources that we will never know.

    Than the author goes into his rapture about the human body and emotions of being in awe of the blood. That was somewhat to be expected.

    Then we got to something interesting as they started to talk about the red discs. I suspect he’s referring to red blood cells, and the viewer perception that they were discs as they looked at it through a microscope. It probably didn’t really know what they were looking at yet and they could only get a descriptive name.

  • Vitality of the Heart

    Vitality of the Heart.  — its vitality is as amazing as its strength.  While life exists this tireless order never stops.  In disease, as long as a flutter of this wondrous organ exists, we know the spark of life is not altogether vanished, and new Hope is begotten that helped me be restored.  Airing such long lives as we sometimes see, the heart has propelled no less than 500,000 tons of blood; and yet, during all this patient, unfaltering and unflinching labor, it is her.  Self as the waste has occurred.

    Heart Rhythms.  –the rhythm of its beats never fails until death breaks into the casket and seizes the ever thriving pendulum at the command of the great Master Workman,  silencing the quivering muscles of the heart and compelling the wheels of like a standstill.

    ___________

    This closes out the introduction to the workings of the heart, and the author ends the section talking about heartbeats or heart rhythms, but in doing so doesn’t talk about heart rhythms or heartbeats at all.  Notice the capitalize reference to Master Workman.  I’m sure would’ve been some sort of sacrilege not to capitalize those two words and so they are capitalized.  But it’s still a little bizarre.  Next section were heading into the digestive system, which is probably just as mysterious to the author as the working of the heart!

 

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