Rare Greek Medical Texts and Some Other Books

Details: Category: Collections

The Historia Plantarum collection patiently assembled by the founders of the Institute holds now 15,000+ items on all aspects of medical traditions, with a special focus on the Mediterranean. In it, tanuscript studies can be found aside floras of the Mediterranean, pharmacological handbooks of the late 19th century, journals on the most advanced drug discovery, and, to mention just a few, precious facsimile reproductions of ancient Greek and Latin manuscripts containing medical texts.

Although constantly growing, the Historia Plantarum collection still has lacunas. Over the past months, however, opportunities came up to fill some of such lacunas. One such opportunity was the appearance on the market of a part of the collection of historian of medieval science David Lindberg. Another was an offer made by the German antiquarian bookseller Medicus in Marburg, specialized in the history of medicine. This without speaking of the constant hunting for rare pieces of erudition through the Internet, the many catalogues of antiquarian, and the often splendidly illustrated catalogues of such auction houses as Christie’s and Sotheby’s.

Here are some of the editions of Greek and Latin medical texts of the Corpus Medicorum Graecorum, the Corpus Medicorum Latinorum, and the Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubnerianathat the Historia Plantarum collection has been able to acquire on the market:

Apollonius of Citium, Illustrierter Kommentar zu den Hippokratischen Schrift peri arthrôn, edidit H. Schöne. Leipzig: Teubner, 1896.
Cassius Felix, De medicina, edidit V. Rose (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1879.
Celsus, De medicina, edidit C. Daremberg (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1891.
Galenus, De institutio logica, edidit C. Kalbfleisch (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1896.
Galenus, De usu partium, edidit G. Helmreich (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1907-1909, 2 vols.
Galenus, De victu attenuante, edidit C. Kalbfleisch (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1898.
Galenus (Pseudo-), In Hippocratis de septimanis commentarium, ab Hunaino Arabic versum ..., edidit G. Bergsträsser (Corpus Medicorum Graecorum XI.2.1). Leipzig and Berlin: Teubner, 1914.
Hippocrates, Opera quae feruntur omnia. Vol. 1: Prolegomena. I. Ilberg and H. Kühlewein. Vol. 2 edidit H. Kühlewein (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1894-1902, 2 vols.
Marcellus Empiricus, De medicamentis, edidit M. Niederman (Corpus Medicorum Latinorum III). Leipzig: Teubner, 1916.
Oribasius, Collectionum medicarum reliquiae, edidit I.Raeder (Corpus Medicorum Graecorum VI.1. 1-2). Leipzig and Berlin: Teubner, 1928-29, 2 vols.
Oribasius, Synopsis ad Eustathium. Libri ad Eunapium (Corpus Medicorum Graecorum VI.3). Leipzig and Berlin: Teubner, 1926.
Paul of Aiginia, edidit I. Heiberg (Corpus Medicorum Graecorum IX.1-2). Leipzig and Berlin: Teubner, 1931-24, 2 vols.
Philumenus, De venenatis animalibus eorumque remediis, edidit M.Wellmann (Corpus Medicorum Graecorum X.1.1). Leipzig and Berlin: Teubner, 1908.
Priscianus, Euporiston libri III, edidit V.Rose (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1894.
Scribonius Largus, Compositiones, edidit G. Helmreich (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1887.
Soranus of Ephesus, Gynaeciorum vetus translatio latina, edidit V.Rose (Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana). Leipzig: Teubner, 1882.

Also, the collection has acquired some studies of medical history that have been milestones in the historiography of ancient medicine and therapeutics, among which:

B. Coglievina, Die homerische Medizin.Eine medizin-kuturhistorischen Skizze. Graz, Wien and Leipzig: Leuschner & Lubensky’s Universitäts-Buchhandlung,
H. Grapow, Grundrisse der Medizin der alten Ägupter. Vol. 1: Anatomie und Physiologie; Vol. 2: Von den Medizinischen Texten. Berlin, 1054-1955, 2 vols.
A. Harnack, Die griechische Übersetzung des Apologeticus Tertulian’s. Medizinisches aus der ältestenKirchengeschichte. Leipzig: Hinrichs’sche Buchhandlung, 1892.
O. Körner, Die ärzlichen Kenntnisse in Ilias und Odysee. München, 1929.
O. Schmiedeberg, Über die Pharmaka in der Ilias und Odysee. Strassburg, 1918.
B. Strauss, Die Giftbuch der Sanaq. Eine Literaturgeschichtliche Untersuchung. Berlin, 1934.