Complete Record - Heirs of Hippocrates No. 1379

FRANçOIS MAGENDIE (1783-1855) Précis élémentaire de physiologie. Méquignon-Marvis 1816-1817 Vol. I: vi, 326 pp.; Vol. II: 473 pp. 19.4 cm.

Magendie was the founder of the science of toxicology and a pioneer experimental physiologist in France and therefore the forerunner of such men as Claude Bernard and Louis Pasteur. He was the first to show conclusively that section of the anterior spinal nerve roots affected motility but not sensation, and vice versa as to the posterior roots. This same observation, partially described by Charles Bell (see No. 1301), has long been known as the "fundamental law of Bell and Magendie." This Précis may be considered the prototype of later texts on physiology.

See Related Record(s): 1301

Cited references: Waller 6135 (1825 ed.)

Gift of John Martin, M.D.