A la découverte du Brésil avec l’Historia naturalis Brasiliae

Au 17e siècle, le Brésil est une terre portugaise depuis sa découverte en 1500 par le navigateur Pedro Álvares Cabral. Toutefois, une enclave hollandaise existe entre 1624 et 1654 au nord-est du Brésil. C’est dans ce contexte que deux hollandais, le médecin Willem Piso et l’astronome Georg Marggrav, accompagnent en 1638 le prince de Nassau dans son voyage au Brésil. C’est l’occasion pour les deux savants d’explorer le territoire et d’en répertorier la faune et la flore.

Titre-frontispice

Leurs découvertes sont rassemblées en 1648 par le géographe Johannes De Laet dans un livre intitulé Historia naturalis Brasiliae. Cet ouvrage est considéré comme le premier traité scientifique sur le Brésil. La bibliothèque Osler possède un exemplaire de l’édition originale (Osler room – folio P678h 1648), imprimée à Leyde, par la célèbre maison Elzevier. Le titre-frontispice est particulièrement travaillé : il s’agit d’une gravure colorée à la main, qui semble évoquer le Brésil comme un nouveau Paradis. On y voit deux indigènes, dans une végétation luxuriante, entourés de nombreux animaux (perroquets, singes, fourmiliers, serpents, poissons, crabes, tortues, paresseux…).

Le livre se compose de deux parties : le De medicina Brasiliensi écrit par Willem Piso, et l’Historia rerum naturalium Brasiliae de Georg Marggrav. L’ensemble, organisé et complété par Johannes De Laet,  est richement illustré par plus de quatre cents gravures sur bois.

Un moulin à sucre

Dans son De medicina Brasiliensi, Willem Piso recense les maladies et les venins qui existent au Brésil, ainsi que leurs remèdes locaux. Il y décrit également les vertus thérapeutiques des plantes (De facultatibus simplicium). On trouve d’ailleurs une explication très intéressante de la fabrication du sucre de canne (De saccharo).

Homme en habit traditionnel

La seconde partie, l’Historia rerum naturalium Brasiliae, rédigée par Georg Marggrav, recense les plantes, les poissons, les animaux et les insectes du Brésil. Une rapide description du pays et de ses habitants est également incluse : Marggrav y évoque les coutumes des indigènes du Brésil (vêtements, religion, nourriture… et même la langue avec un bref lexique incorporé dans le texte).

Une espèce de fruit de la passion

Un fourmilier

L’Historia naturalis Brasiliae a fait connaître en Europe de nouvelles plantes médicinales (comme l’ipecacuanha, utilisée notamment pour traiter la dysenterie). Il est devenu un ouvrage de référence pour les naturalistes européens tout au long des 17e et 18e siècles: son influence est notamment perceptible dans les travaux de Buffon et de Linné. C’est un riche témoignage des tentatives de description et de compréhension de la nature au 17e siècle.

 

Bibliographie:

Brienen R. P., Visions of Savage Paradise: Albert Eckhout, Court Painter in Colonial Dutch Brazil, Amsterdam, Amsterdam University Press, 2006.

Charlot C, Guibert M.-S., “Petite histoire de la Racine Brésilienne en France au 17ème siècle”, 38e Congrès international d’histoire de la Pharmacie, Séville, 19-22 septembre 2007, disponible en ligne.

Galloway J. H., “Tradition and innovation in the American sugar Industry, c. 1500- 1800: an explanation”, Annals of the Association of American geographers, 75, 3, 1985.

Medeiros M. F. T., Albuquerque U. P., “Abstract food flora in 17th century northeast region of Brazil in Historia Naturalis Brasiliae”, Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine, 10, 50, 2014.

Safier N., “Beyond Brazilian nature: the editorial itineraries of Marcgraf and Piso’s Historia Naturalis Brasiliae”, dans Van Groesen M. (ed.), The Legacy of Dutch Brazil, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2014.

Walker T. D., “The medicines trade in the Portuguese Atlantic world: acquisition and dissemination of healing knowledge from Brazil (c. 1580–1800)”, Social history of medicine, 26, 3, 2013.

Whitehead P. J. P., Boeseman M., A portrait of Dutch 17th century Brazil : animals, plants, and people by the artists of Johan Maurits of Nassau, Amsterdam – Oxford – New-York, North-Holland Publishing Company, 1989.

 

 

Resurrecting the History of Body-Snatching at McGill

Guest post by Annelise Dowd. Annelise is a McGill University Master of Information Studies student with research interests in the digital humanities, library accessibility, and special collections outreach.

 

“He told us there were two subjects, and that as you were nervous he’d set you and Jim to work first; that our turn would come. He pointed to a grave; said that’s where would have to work; told us not to begin until he returned, as we might be caught; and that when we heard the whistle we were to run to the gate.”

 

My Last Experience of Resurrectionning,”

McGill University Gazette,vol. 1, no. 4: January 1, 1874

 

The Origins of McGill Student Body-Snatching

Anatomy study, McGill medical students, Montreal, QC, 1884. McCord Museum.

In the 1830s, the nascent McGill Medical Faculty was incorporating the practice of dissection as the central method for anatomical instruction. However, even with the introduction of the Anatomy Act in 1843, an act intended to legally require institutions to supply bodies to medical faculties, the city of Montréal failed to donate an adequate number of cadavers. With limited options and little institutionally provided dissection material, McGill medical students quite literally took the issue into their own hands.

Portrait of the McGill “Resurrectionists”

Graduating Class in Medicine, c.1905. McGill Archives.

The McGill University Gazette, McGill’s first newspaper, illustrates the figure of the student body-snatcher, or a more popular term at the time, “resurrectionist.” Medical students resurrected corpses for one of two purposes: for their own anatomical exams, or to supply bodies to their professors, with a reward of $30-$50 per body. For a number of medical students, body-snatching was an efficient, albeit morbid, means to cover one’s tuition.

Body-snatching was often a winter activity, due to the frozen ground preventing the burial of bodies. Until the ground thawed, corpses were stored above ground in cemetery “dead houses,” an easy target for students to forcibly enter and steal bodies. A winter body-snatching trip would typically include hiking to Côte-des-Neiges or Mount Royal cemetery in the dead of night, removing the corpses from their caskets, and tobogganing down the snow-covered slope with their “subjects” in tow.

“The Good Old Days at McGill,” The McGill Daily Vol. 39 No. 001: September 27, 1949

The legal ramifications for body snatching were minor, and the general attitude towards body-snatching amongst the medical student body was openly positive. In fact, students fined in court for body snatching in 1875 were hoisted on the shoulders of a sea of medical students, chanting and singing in encouragement of their classmates’ deeds!

The Continued Legacy of Body-Snatching

In 1883, a strengthened Anatomy Act put greater pressure on institutions to provide bodies to Montréal’s medical schools. In effect, by the twentieth century, any mention of body-snatching had all but disappeared. Yet, as noted in the early issues of The McGill Daily, the legacy of these “brave resurrectionists” lived on in the medical faculty for decades. Annually, students would celebrate “King Cook”, the medical building custodian who assisted students in sneaking unofficially obtained corpses on campus. These celebrations consisted of a parade down Saint Catherine Street and humorous theatrical productions, in which the famed Stephen Leacock was known to partake in.

Medical Building janitor King Cook dressed as John Bull, the patriotic symbol of Great Britain, with medical students, 1918. McGill Archives.

The notoriously rowdy “King Cook Celebration” was documented as last occurring in 1926, and since then the history of the medical student body-snatching has been largely forgotten. Although largely absent from official documents, the remaining first-person accounts reveal this morbid and fascinating period in McGill Faculty of Medicine history.

 

 

 

Sources:

Hanaway, Joseph, and Richard Cruess. “The Faculty of Medicine: 1874–85: The Osler Years.” McGill Medicine: The First Half Century, 1829-1885, McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1996, pp. 65–99, www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt814n7.11.

Lawrence, D.G. “Resurrection and Legislation or Body-Snatching in Relation to the Anatomy Act in the Province of Quebec.” Bulletin of the History of Medicine. 32.5 (1958). Print.

Shepherd, Francis J. Reminiscences of Student Days and Dissecting Room. Montreal: publisher not identified, 1919. Print.

The McGill Student Publications Collection

Worthington, E D. Reminiscences of Student Life and Practice. Sherbrooke [Quebec: Printed for Sherbrooke Protestant Hospital by Walton, 1981.

 

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.

Vernissage for new exhibition, Vaccination: Fear, Fame and Controversy, 1798-1998

Since its earliest days, vaccination has been attended by hesitation, resistance and controversy. Why did an innovation that promised to rid the world of the terrible scourge of smallpox inspire such enduring fear? When Jenner spearheaded the promotion of vaccination at the turn of the nineteenth century, he predicted the end of a disease that had taken 60 million lives in the eighteenth century alone. He was right, but it took until 1980 before the World Health Organization could proclaim “smallpox zero”. This exhibition explores the tension between the promised public-health benefits of vaccination and the reasons why resistance checked its acceptance. It seeks to understand the origins of vaccine hesitancy through various cases, both local and global, and demonstrates the legacy of those cases in contemporary vaccination debates. vffcredhighres

Please join us for a vernissage with wine and cheese for this exhibition, Wednesday, February 1st, 2017, at the Osler Library, 4:30-6:30PM.

ROAAr: Rare Books, Osler, Art, and Archives

 

screen-shot-2016-12-13-at-3-05-51-pmMcGill’s new amalgam of Rare Books & Special Collections, Osler Library, Visual Art Collection, and the University Archives (collectively known as ROAAr) launched their first issue of a new newsletter series this December.

Published quarterly (Spring 2017 next), the ROAAr newsletter features four articles that showcase and discuss unique treasures of each rare unit.

Anyone who is interested in joining the ROAAr newsletter mailing list is encouraged to email info.library@mcgill.ca.

History is on every shelf at the Osler Library of the History of Medicine. Located on the third floor of McGill’s McIntyre Medical Building, the Osler houses Canada’s finest treasure trove of rare medical books, artifacts and archives. What began as a home for Sir William Osler’s personal library of 8,000 rare and historic works has grown to more than 100,000 titles that trace the beginnings of medicine in Canada and abroad to the present day.

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Snapshots of Osler at the bedside: Inspection, Palpation, Auscultation, Contemplation, c. 1895, Osler Library Photo Collection.

These rare collections have made the Osler a premier destination for students, researchers and bibliophiles from across Canada and around the world. This fall, the Osler played host to a visiting group from the Grolier Club – the oldest existing bibliophilic club in North America. Osler Librarian Chris Lyons led the distinguished guests on a tour through silent sanctuaries in the Wellcome Camera and the Osler Room, and gave them a hands-on look at many of the unique medical and historical gems within the Osler collection, such as a 1698 first edition of William Cowper’s Anatomy of Humane Bodies.

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The Grolier Club visits the Osler Library of the History of Medicine, 2016. Photo credit: Lauren Goldman

Capping off their trip, the eager Grolier Club members were treated to guided tours and presentations by the three other units under the McGill Library’s new ROAAr (Rare Books & Special Collections, Osler, Art, and Archives) umbrella.

To the delight of the guests, the Head of Rare Books Richard Virr showcased some of the Library’s oldest and most unique treasures, University Archivist Lori Podolsky helped them delve deep into McGill’s nearly 200-year history, and Coordinator Vanessa Di Francesco displayed many of the stunning works within the Visual Arts Collection. As they departed after their multi-day visit, the Grolier Club members were unanimous in their appreciation for their hosts, a testament to the treasures in the Osler collection and the combined and collaborative strength of ROAAr as a whole. The experience provided a fantastic model for hosting future visitors.

It was a busy autumn for Osler visits and curated exhibits – both within the library’s own gallery space and around Montreal. Our “pop-up” exhibitions this fall included 200 Years of the Stethoscope, celebrating two centuries of auscultation at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress (CCC), History of MS at the Montreal Neurological Institute’s annual MS Xchange, and in October, it was our pleasure to welcome two history classes from Marianopolis College (CEGEP) for a total of four visits – a powerful pedagogical experience for all.

For those discovering the Osler Library of the History of Medicine for the first time, we invite you to explore our online resources and website for more information. Contact or visit us anytime – there is much to be discovered!

Surgical Anatomy Exam, 1874

Ever wondered what a medical exam from 1874 would look like? Here’s an original copy of The Royal College of Surgeons 1874 final exam on “Surgical Anatomy and the Principles and Practice of Surgery”. Students were allocated three hours to answer 4 out of 6 questions. How do you think you would fare? Would you get top marks on this? Comments are welcome.

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Royal Colllege of Surgeons of England 1874 examination. Part of Osler Library’s Faculty of Medicine Scrapbook Collection.

Research Awards & Travel Grants 2017

Are you a historian, physician, graduate or post-doctoral student interested in conducting research at the Osler Library? Do you know that the Osler Library gives out awards and travel grants to local and international researchers each year? We are currently accepting applications for the following:

  • Dr. Edward H. Bensley Osler Library Research Travel Grant – Awarded to those whose project requires traveling to Montreal to consult material in the Osler Library. Each year up to $4000 in awards will be made available to one or more individuals who require a minimum of 2 weeks to carry out their research. This research must fall within the calendar year in which the grant is awarded. Applications for the 2017 grant must be received by December 31, 2016.
  • Mary Louise Nickerson Award in Neuro History – Awarded to one or more scholars who are interested in carrying out research utilizing the Neuro History Archival and Artifact Collections – the centre-piece of which is the Penfield Archive in the Osler Library – and other available resources at the Osler Library, the Montreal Neurological Institute, and the McGill University Archives. Applications for the 2017 award must be received by December 31, 2016.

picmonkey-collageAdditional information on terms, requirements, how to apply, previous winners, and general information about the library can be found here. We welcome all further enquiries at osler.library@mcgill.ca or 514-398-4475, ext. 09873.

Feel free to share this notice with your own networks, listservs, and social media outlets to help us spread the word about these fantastic opportunities!