Complete Record - Heirs of Hippocrates No. 377

GIROLAMO MERCURIO (1540-1616) La commare o' raccoglitrice. Per Domenico Louisa 1713 [xxxii] 390 pp., illus. 23.4 cm.

Mercurio, a native of Rome, studied medicine at Bologna and Padua before entering the Dominican monastery at Milan. He studied theology and philosophy for a time but preferred medicine and eventually left the monastery to travel and study in other European countries. After several years, he returned to Venice where he practiced medicine until his death. First issued in 1596, this was one of the earliest works on obstetrics to be published in Italy. It maintained an authoritative position in Italy and Germany for more than one hundred and twenty-five years, and Mercurio's writings remain as the outstanding contribution to Italian obstetrics during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The work is divided into three parts: the first deals with natural labor and care of the mother and child, the second with abnormal presentations, and the third with diseases that complicate pregnancy and affect the newborn. It is interesting to note that the illustrations are taken from the 1596 edition and have been used again in this edition more than one hundred years later. This work also contains a treatise by Pietro de Castro (1603-ca. 1657) on colostrum and skin diseases of children and a treatise on the diseases of women by Giovanni Marinelli (fl. 1560).

Cited references: Cushing M297 (1601 ed.); Garrison-Morton 6144 (1596 ed.); Waller 6494 (1618 ed.); Wellcome 4259 (1601 ed.)

Gift of John Martin, M.D.