Complete Record - Heirs of Hippocrates No. 602

JAN SWAMMERDAM (1637-1680) Tractatus physico-anatomico-medicus de respiratione usuque pulmonum. Apud Danielem, Abraham. & Adrian, à Gaasbeeck 1667 [14] 121 [22] pp., illus. 15.2 cm.

Despite his short life and a professional career of only about twelve years, Swammerdam of Amsterdam was one of the outstanding comparative anatomists of the seventeenth century. He was a pioneer in microscopic studies, investigating especially the anatomy of insects. At his death after seven years of illness and scientific inactivity, he left a mass of papers and reports of investigations, most of which remained unknown until they were published a century later. The present work, a classic on respiration, was his inaugural dissertation at the University of Leipzig and one of only four works published during his lifetime. He first showed that the lungs of a newborn infant would float if the child had ever breathed, and this discovery was put to legal use in cases of infanticide. The engraved title page illustrates his ingenious, if complicated, device for the study of respiration.

See Related Record(s): 582

Cited references: Cushing S482; Garrison-Morton 1724; Osler 959 (1679 ed.); Waller 9385

Gift of John Martin, M.D.