Complete Record - Heirs of Hippocrates No. 421

WILLIAM HARVEY (1578-1657) Exercitatio anatomica de motu cordis & sanguinis. Ex officina Arnoldi Leers 1648 [40] 216 [3] 219 [8] pp., 2 plates. 12.1 cm.

For more information on this author or work, see number: 416

This edition of Harvey's classic work has here been edited by Zacharias Sylvius (1608-1664). At the request of the publisher and Jacobus de Back (ca. 1594-1658), Sylvius not only corrected a number of textual errors in earlier editions but also wrote the preface to the book as well as a poem in honor of Harvey which appears on the verso of the title page. In England he was known as Zachariah Wood and it is under that name that he is listed on the title page of the first English edition of De motu cordis (see No. 422). Sylvius was chiefly a teacher and classical scholar but had also studied medicine at Leiden where he received his medical degree in 1633. Jacobus de Back's Dissertatio de corde is also present with Harvey's work. De Back practiced medicine in Rotterdam where he served for a number of years as city physician. This is his only work and was written in support of Harvey's theories. It is based on his own independent study into the physiology of circulation. In the book he denied two of the keystones of traditional physiology--the Galenic spirits and calidum innatum ("innate heat"). Harvey later accepted these views without crediting de Back. The book went through a number of editions, was translated into Dutch, and appeared in English in 1653 (see No. 422).

See Related Record(s): 422 476

Cited references: Cushing H150; Keynes 7; Osler 695; Russell 356; Waller 4091; Wellcome III, p. 219

Gift of John Martin, M.D.