Lyon et l’édition médicale au 16e siècle: l’exemple des Institutions chirurgiques de Jean Tagault, imprimées par Guillaume Rouillé

Au 16e siècle, Lyon est un des principaux centres d’imprimerie d’Europe, et un vivier important de l’édition médicale. C’est d’ailleurs dans cette ville que Le Guydon de la practique en cyrurgie de Guy de Chauliac est imprimé pour la première fois en français en 1478 par Barthélemy Buyer.

Page de titre avec marque d’imprimeur

Parmi les grands imprimeurs lyonnais de la Renaissance, on trouve Guillaume Rouillé (1518-1589). Né à Dolus, près de Loches, il fait son apprentissage à Venise chez les Giolito de Ferrari, puis s’établit à Lyon en tant qu’imprimeur, à l’enseigne  «A l’écu de Venise».

La bibliothèque Osler possède plusieurs ouvrages imprimés par Guillaume Rouillé, dont les Institutions chirurgiques de Jean Tagault (Osler room – T125cF 1549). Il s’agit d’une traduction en français, d’un ouvrage écrit en latin par le médecin Jean Tagault, et complété par un traité sur la « matière chirurgique » de Jacques Houllier, élève de Tagault.

C’est un manuel pratique de chirurgie, à l’intention notamment des étudiants chirurgiens. De petit format, l’ouvrage pouvait être aisément transporté et

Adresse de Guillaume Rouillé aux étudiants en chirurgie, avec signature manuscrite d’Estienne Picard.

annoté. Il a d’ailleurs appartenu à un certain Estienne Picard, chirurgien, comme semblent l’indiquer plusieurs signatures manuscrites.

L’ouvrage, de 1549, est en langue vernaculaire. Jusqu’ici essentiellement en latin, l’édition médicale se vulgarise et commence à être écrite en langue vernaculaire à partir des années 1530 en France. L’ordonnance de Villers-Cotterêts promulguée en 1539 par le roi François Ier contribue à la diffusion et au développement du français, même si le latin reste la langue du savoir jusqu’au 18e siècle. Ce passage du latin au français ne se fait pas sans difficulté, car il faut trouver des équivalents français pour désigner des termes scientifiques. Ceci explique la présence d’une « exposition de quelques lieux difficiles » au début du livre, qui donne des explications sur certains points jugés compliqués.

Le livre contient quelques illustrations, dont plusieurs vues du squelette humain, des exemples de blessures auxquelles peut être confronté un chirurgien, et des outils nécessaires pour les soigner.

Un corps “blessé en plusieurs sortes”

Vue de face d’un squelette humain

 

Exemple d’outil de chirurgien

Si le sujet vous intéresse, n’hésitez pas à venir voir nos collections : la bibliothèque Olser et le département des « Rare Books and Special Collections » de la bibliothèque McLennan possèdent plusieurs exemplaires de livres du 16e siècle imprimés à Lyon. Par ailleurs, si vous êtes de passage à Lyon, pensez à visiter le musée de l’imprimerie qui retrace toute l’histoire de l’imprimerie lyonnaise.

 

Bibliographie:

Berriot-Salvadore E., « La littérature médicale en français de 1500 à 1600 », Bibliothèque numérique Medic@, BIU Santé Paris, novembre 2010, disponible en ligne.

Claudin A., Histoire de l’imprimerie en France au XVe et au XVIe siècle, volume 3, Paris, Imprimerie Nationale, 1904, disponible en ligne.

Mecking V.,  « La terminologie médicale du XVIe siècle entre tradition et innovation », La revue de l’Institut Catholique de Lyon, 2014, 24, 9, disponible en ligne.

Université de Picardie Jules Verne, « Humanisme et médecine, un exemple de diffusion des savoirs à travers les siècles : la bibliothèque d’Emile et Lucien Bax », [exposition virtuelle], 2010, disponible en ligne.

Vaccination and Its Discontents: Historical and Contemporary Reflections on Vaccination and Vaccine Hesitancy

Want to see what happens when two historians, a folklorist, and virologist come together to discuss vaccination? Please join us for Vaccination and Its Discontents: Historical and Contemporary Reflections on Vaccination and Vaccine Hesitancy, a multidisciplinary discussion panel hosted by the Osler Library for the History of Medicine.

Monday, February 20th, 5:30-7:30PM
3rd Floor McIntyre Medical Building
3655 Promenade Sir-William-Osler
Image of "vaccinating American-bound passengers on a train of the Grand Trunk Railway," by James Marvin, 1885.

“The recent smallpox epidemic in Montreal – vaccinating American-bound passengers on a train of the Grand Trunk Railway,” James Marvin, 1885. Osler Library Prints Collection.

The panel will include:

“Bestiality in a Time of Smallpox: Dr. Jenner and the Modern Chimera,” Rob Boddice, PhD FRHistS (Freie Universität Berlin), Historian of Medicine, Science and Emotions

‘The grease taken from the heels of horses: Collective Memory and Collective Silencing in the History of Vaccination Controversy,” Cynthia Tang, MSc MA (McGill University), PhD student in the History of Medicine

“Vaccination: Legend, Rumour, and Alternative Facts Throughout History,”
Andrea Kitta, PhD (East Carolina University), Folklorist specializing in medicine, belief and the supernatural

“Should vaccination against measles and other infectious agents if proven safe be compulsory?,”
Mark Wainberg, PhD OC OQ FRSC (McGill University), Director of the McGill University AIDS Centre

This panel is being held in promotion of the Osler Library’s current exhibition, Vaccination: Fame, Fear and Controversy, 1798-1998, to explore some of the historical and contemporary cases of resistance to vaccination. Vaccination and Its Discontents: Historical and Contemporary Reflections on Vaccination and Vaccine Hesitancy will aim at analysing the character of the fears and doubts of anti-vaccinists, and the successes and failures of vaccination’s proponents in addressing the concerns of their opponents. The contemporary rhetoric surrounding vaccination is implicitly connected to, and draws upon, two centuries of rehearsal. Recognising the essential structure of anti-vaccinist arguments in particular may provide new ways to address them. The panel works towards novel approaches to vaccination controversies, opening up new possibilities for contending with vaccine hesitancy in our own times.

 

Please join us in this discussion, followed by a wine & cheese reception.

 

Relevant reading: 
Andrea Kitta and Daniel Goldberg, “The Significance of Folklore for Vaccine Policy: Discarding the Deficit Model,” Critical Public Health (2016).
Rob Boddice, “Vaccination, Fear and Historical Relevance,” History Compass (2016).
Mark Wainberg, PhD OC OQ FRSC (McGill University) Director of the McGill University AIDS Centre

The exhibit, Vaccination: Fame, Fear and Controversy, 1798-1998, is open to the public during library hours, Monday-Friday, 9:00-5:00 and runs through the end of April 2017.

Both the exhibit and the speaker panel are co-sponsored by the McGill Faculty of Medicine and the Freie Universität Berlin.

Illustrated Talk: The Maude Abbott Medical Museum 1822-2017

You’re invited! Please join us next Tuesday February 14th, 4pm for an illustrated talk by Dr. Richard Fraser, Professor of Pathology at McGill Faculty of Medicine, Senior Pathologist at MUHC, Director of the Maude Abbott Medical Museum.

Learn about the repository’s treasured history at McGill and observe a carefully curated selection of specimens and preserved curiosities from this unique collection!

Dissection Room Records 1883-1908

Inscription on first page of Dissection Room Record 1883-1891 written by Dr. Richard Lea MacDonnell, Demonstrator of Anatomy, McGill University in April 1883.

We are pleased to have these historical records back at the Osler Library after receiving recent conservation treatment. These books contain records of all McGill Faculty of Medicine dissection cadavers in the Department of Anatomy from 1883-1891, and 1896-1908.

When the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada’s Anatomy Act of 1843 was amended in April 1883, Senior Demonstrator of Anatomy Dr. Richard Lea MacDonnell began keeping these detailed records at McGill. Prior to the Anatomy Act, body-snatching was a nefarious problem often associated with the study of anatomy. The 1843 and 1883 Acts allowed for more corpses to be made available to medical schools for the purpose of teaching and learning. The records preserved within these books provide details and evidence of the Department of Anatomy’s legally acquired cadavers at the time. Each entry includes details such as name, sex, age, cause of death, religion, date received, which hospital the cadaver was received from, and the date and location of burial.

Richard Lea MacDonnell (1856-1891) was the son of Dublin surgeon Dr. Robert Lea MacDonnell. A graduate of McGill in 1876, McDonnell went on to become a prominent figure within the Faculty of Medicine before his untimely death at the age of 35. William Osler paid tribute to his friend and colleague in the New York Medical Journal, writing: “Although only thirty-five years old, he [MacDonnell] had reached a position which gave scope to abilities of first-class order and afforded opportunities of impressing upon a large class of students those qualities of mind so essential in the teacher, so priceless to the taught – honesty, system, and painstaking care” (NYMJ, 54: 162, 1891).

Below is a composite portrait of McGill Faculty of Medicine in 1882 from our William Osler Photo Collection. William Osler is standing fourth from left, and Richard Lea MacDonnell stands on the far right. A new Richard L. MacDonnell Collection (P133) has been created in the Osler Library Archives, and these dissection books along with several fascinating scrapbooks put together by MacDonnell are now available to view upon request.

“McGill University Faculty of Medicine at its Semicentennial, 1882”, William Osler Photo Collection, Osler Library of the History of Medicine, CUS_033-011_P. Standing, from left to right, are Thomas G. Roddick, George Ross, William E. Scott, William Osler, Francis J. Shepherd, William Gardner, George W. Campbell, Gilbert Prout Girdwood, Frank Buller, and Richard L. MacDonell. Sitting, from left to right, are Robert Palmer Howard, William Wright, John William Dawson, Duncan C. MacCallum, Robert Craik, and George E. Fenwick.