CASSERIUS, JULIUS PLACENTIUS.

DE VOCIS AUDITUSQUE ORGANIS HISTORIA ANATOMICA SINGULARI FIDE METHODO AC INDUSTRIA CONCINNATA TRACTATIBUS DUOBUS EXPLICATA. FERRARA, VICTORIUS BALDINUS, 1600-1601.

      2 parts in 1 vol. Folio. Contemporary vellum with spine lettered in ink. Engraved frontispiece of an anatomical theatre, portrait of Blankaart by Gouwe after D. van Plas with a Latin poem by Lud. Smitds and 51 very detailed and beautifully engraved anatomical full-page plates. 30 lvs. (incl. title and 2 portaits), 192, 126 pp. and 1 leaf. Beautiful work on the anatomy of the vocal and auditory organs written by the well-known anatomist and surgeon Julius Casserius (1561-1616) who studied at the famous University at Padus with the renowned Girolamo Fabrizzio, public lecturer in Padus from 1565. In later years Casseri achieved such fame as an anatomist that the universities of Parma and Turinnoffered him the chairs of anatomy. He, however, always refused because he was convinced he would succeed Fabrizio, the chair once helt by Vesalius. This work, here in its original edition, was his first publication and it is composed of 2 separate books that were issued together, although the second one, on the subject 'hearing' and the anatomy of the ear, is dated a year earlier than the first one, which is on the anatomy of the larynx. Casserius made some attributions of considerable importance to the science of anatomy of the sense organs, particularly the vocal and auditory organs. Most of the results of his studies, are based on zooetomic research and many of the 34 large and beautifully designed and engraved plates show zooetomic representations, among which are the vocals of a grasshopper, a dog, a rat and a frog. The research is extended to the superficial and deep muscles. For the first time a precise description of the two cdricoid-thyroid muscles is given. The description of the superior and inferior laryngeal nerves is accurate, as are his assumptions that they originate from cranial nerves and his statements of the function of the laryngeal nerves. He also deals with phonation: the nature of sound and the concepts regarding the nature of the human voice, and the importance of the larynx in general and the reasons for its shape, position and structure. The last 12 plates, in the second treatise, are dealing with the ear. In this second treatise Casserius describes the anatomy of the ear and deals with vascularization and the innervation of the middle and inner ear and the physiology of hearing. This work was the first accurate publication on the larynx ever by the 'Felix chirurgus, insignis anatomicus', as Haller calls him.The engraved plates are of superior quality and very detailed and exact. In his work, Casserius mentions the German artist Joseph Maurer who lived for a while in his house, with the specific purpose of making the anatomic drawings. Recent research indicates that the baroque and allegorical title, which depicts all kinds of anatomical figures like the skeletons of frogs, birds and dogs together with human skeletons, of which some have wings, and almost certainly the 2 portraits as well, are most likely the work of Jacopo Ligozzi. Good copy with the bookplate of Dr. T. Broeksmit and an early ownership's entry of Gerrit Backer on the second fly-leaf. Wellcome 1333; Krivatsky 2199; Morton 286; LeFanu, Notable medical books (Indianapolis, 1976), p. 57; DSB 3, p. 98-9; see also Roberts & Tomlinson, The fabric of the human body (Oxford 1992), pp. 259-263; Hook & Norman, The Norman Library of Science & Medicine (San Francisco 1991), 410.