The lesser writings of John Arderne / by D'Arcy Power.

  • D'Arcy Power
Date:
1913
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The lesser writings of John Arderne / by D'Arcy Power. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    copious hemorrhage is distinguished from blood coming out with corrupt matter. ‘The more that the blood cometh from the ferther partys, the more it is medlyd with waterynesse. And the more that it cometh from the nygh partes with the lesse water it is medlyd.’ Gonorrhea. ‘ The yerd of mane or the wykket i.e. vulva, of wommane yi they be brent with hete & grete swellynge withinne & with huge sorowe & prikkynge’ are cured by injections, for ‘of mannys yerde, & of wommars membre thorough the vice of the matrice, spryngen out many infirmytees.’ The inflammation can also be taken down by the application of an ointment spread upon ‘ a small lynnen cloth of the brede of vi ynchys,’ kept in place in the case of a man by ‘a lytyll bagge leste that the heed of the yerd hange doune and so to take the more swellynge. Euery day onys this werke schalbe renywed & namly ayenst evensonge.’ Ulceration of the penis. The whole treatise on ulceration of the penis is interesting. Cancer is distinguished from other forms of ulceration ; phagedzena, too, was known, for directions are given ‘to clean away dead flesch in the sore of a mannys yerd’. Chaudepisse was not un- common, and there were botches which may have been soft sores, for _ they were clearly multiple, or they may have been the results of herpes where the vesicles had suppurated. In this chapter he quotes with approval the methods of ‘ Magister (Williame) de Hokkesworth cirurgion nobillissimum ’, who ‘curyd the Schereve of Wiltschyre when many good lechys hadde fayled’. I have tried in yain to find any other trace of Magister William de Hochesworth or Hokkesworth. Arderne had a high regard for him, and he may have been the master under whom he served his apprenticeship. There is no evidence of syphilis nor description of any sore which might reasonably be taken for it. Scabies. The itch is treated with litharge and quicksilver as an oint- ment mixed with orpiment and stavesacre, the mercury being mortified with the spittle of a fasting man. Diseases of the male organs of generation. Following upon this short digression on scabies is a treatise on injuries and diseases of the scrotum and testicles. The injuries to these parts had arisen from a variety of causes as John Arderne saw them. ‘ I have knowe some that have geldyd heme-selff & taken awey the stonys of the testyculys for evere. I have knowen also some men that thorough the bytynge of ane hounde the purse of the testicles hath ben almost al-to rentte ... and that happed other whyle of hurtynge as a mane that lepyth uppone hys hors unwarly.’ He also recognizes solid and fluid swellings, those that are painful and others that are painless. The whole essay is practical, original, and full of suggestions, showing that Arderne had seen several cases, and that such injuries and diseases were no less common then than they are at the present time. Diseases of the eye. A treatise on diseases of the eye is introduced with a prefatory note on the value of Tutty, which is ‘ founden at the potekaryes
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