A mirror for medicine, II : some resources of the Wellcome Institute Library : an exhibition, Monday 12 June - Friday 29 September 1989.

  • Wellcome Historical Medical Library
Date:
1989
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: A mirror for medicine, II : some resources of the Wellcome Institute Library : an exhibition, Monday 12 June - Friday 29 September 1989. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    A note on the title of the exhibition There is a long tradition of literary and pictorial 'mirrors'. Our title might therefore be regarded as an inheritor of the short title of the Spiegl der Artzny by Laurent Friesz of Colmar [Strassburg: J. Griininger, 1519]. But before this there were many other such 'mirrors', notably the Speculum ma- jus of Vincent of Beauvais [13th century], consisting of the 'Speculum historiale' (history of mankind to 1254), 'Speculum naturale' (encylopaedia of nature), and 'Speculum doctrinale' comprising all the learned, liberal, practical and mechani- cal arts, including medicine. The first illustrated book to be published in England was Caxton's Myrrour of the worlde, 1481, an encyclopaedia translated from the French, which explained, inter alia, 'how moche the erth hath of heyght, how moche in circuyte, and how thycke in the myddle'. WELLCOME COLLECTION ©Trustees of the Wellcome Trust 1989