Now Gilbert by the incorporation of many chapters on surgery in his Compendium inculcates practically the same idea more than fifty years before Lanfranchi, and may claim to be the earliest representative of surgical teaching in England. Malgaigne, indeed, does not include his name in the admirable sketch of medieval surgery with which he introduces his edition of the works of Ambroise Pare, and says Gilbert was no more a surgeon than Bernard Gordon. This is in a certain sense true. Gilbert was certainly not an operative surgeon. But it needs only a very superficial comparison of the Compendium of Gilbert with the Lilium Medicinae of Gordon to establish the fact that the books are entirely unlike. Indeed, it may be truthfully said that Gordon's work does not contain a single chapter on surgery proper. His cases involving surgical assistance are turned over at once, and with little or no discussion, to those whom he calls "restauratores" or "chirurgi," and his own responsibility thereupon ends.
We have no historical facts which demonstrate that Gilbert's Compendium exercised any considerable influence upon the development of surgery in England, but when we consider the depressed condition of both medicine and surgery in his day, we should certainly emphasize the clearness of vision which led our author to indicate the natural association of these two departments of the healing art, and the assistance which each lends to the other.
Footnote 1: [(return) ]
In Leslie Stephen's "Dictionary of Biography."
Footnote 2: [(return) ]
British Medical Journal, Nov. 12, 1904, p. 1282.
Footnote 3: [(return) ]
Janus, 1903, p. 20.
Footnote 4: [(return) ]
Cap. XXXVI, p. 116, edition of Brewer.
Footnote 5: [(return) ]
Haeser says that this MS. of Roger's "Chirurgia," made by Guido Arenitensium, was discovered by Puccinoti in the Magliabechian library, and that an old Italian translation of the same work is also found there. The latter was the work of a certain Bartollomeo.
The text used to represent Roger in the present paper is that published by De Renzi (Collectio Salernitana, tom. II, pp. 426-493) and entitled "Rogerii, Medici Celeberrimi Chirurgia." It is really the text published originally in the "Collectio Chirurgica Veneta" of 1546, of which the preface says:
"His acceserunt Rogerii ac Guil. Saliceti chirurgiae, quarum prior quibusdam decorata adnotationibus nunc primum in lucem exit, etc.," and adds further on:
"Addidimus etiam quasdam in Rogerium veluti explanationes, in antiquissimo codice inventas, et ab ipso fortasse Rolando factas." While I may recognize gratefully the surgical enthusiasm which led the editor to the publication of these "veluti explanationes," for my present purpose he would have earned more grateful recognition if he had left them unprinted. As the text now stands it is merely a garbled edition of the Rolandina. However, it is the best representative of the "Chirurgia" of Roger at present available. See De Renzi, op. cit., p. 425.
Footnote 6: [(return) ]
This apparent anachronism carries us back to the history of the mythical Island of Brazil, which appeared upon our charts as late as the middle of the 19th century.
Footnote 7: [(return) ]
In his chapter on embryology (f. 304c) Gilbert describes the lrili vein as follows: "The embryo is nourished by means of the lrili or lrineli vein, which does not exist in man. This vein has its origin in the liver and divides into two branches. Of these the superior branch bifurcates, and one of its branches goes to the right breast, the other to the left, conveying blood from the liver. This blood in the breast is bleached white (dealbatur) like milk, and forms the nourishment of the infant. The inferior branch of the lrili vein also bifurcates, sending one of its branches to the right cornu of the uterus, the other to the left. These vessels carry blood into the cotyledons, whence it is transmitted to the fetus and digested by its digestive faculty."
Footnote 8: [(return) ]
Cf. the French bosse de la gorge.