Cardano, Girolamo.

De malo recentiorum medicorum medendi usu libellus. GM 5370.

      Venice: Octavio Scotto, 1536. First Description of Typhus & a Rickettsial Infection Cardano, Girolamo (1501-76). De malo recentiorum medicorum medendi usu libellus . . . Eiusdem libellus de simplicium medicinarum noxa. 8vo. 105, [7]pp. (last leaf blank). 146 x 97 mm. Modern limp vellum, 16th century style. Faint staining on first & last leaves, slight browning, some printed glosses minutely cropped, but still fine. Small old armorial stamp on title & colophon. A few 16th century annotations. Venice: Ottaviano Scoto, 1536. First Edition. G-M 5370. The first description of typhus, and of a Rickettsial infection. Cardano called it "morbus pulicaris" or "flea-like disease" because the spots in typhus resemble flea-bites. The description is found in De malo recentiorum medicorum medendi usu, which translates as "On the bad practices of modern physicians." Not distinguishing typhus from measles is the thirty-sixth "fatal error" of the physicians. De malo was Cardano's first book; it sold very well, except among the physicians whose colleague Cardano wanted to become. Cardano's criticisms, however, put sufficient pressure on the Milan physicians that they offered him some concessions, and this in turn opened the way to triumph for Cardano, who rose to the second most prominent physician in Europe after Vesalius. The book is extremely rare; the great medical collectors had later editions (Waller and Cushing) or none (Osler). Ore, Cardano (1965)12-13. Major 161-64. Durling 841. Wellcome I 1277. 13193