LAENNEC, René Théophile Hyacinthe (1781-1826). De l'Ausculation Médiate ou Traité du diagnostic des maladies des poumons et du coeur, fondé principalement sur ce nouveau moyen d'exploration, Paris: J.-A. Brosson et J.-S. Chaudé, 1819, 2 volumes, 8°, FIRST EDITION, FIRST STATE with the original cancellandum leaf a*2, 4 folding engraved plates (half title to vol. I partly detached, first leaf in quire 10 of vol. I with paper fault and resultant clean tear affecting 3 lines of text, spotting in both vols., heaviest in final index leaves), contemporary yellow and grey marbled boards backed in calf, spines with simple gilt ornaments and contemporary red morocco lettering-pieces, later cloth box. [Dibner Heralds 129; GM 2673: "revolutionised the study of disease of the thoracic organs"; Grolier Medicine 57: "Invention of the stethoscope, the first tool for physical diagnosis, together with Laennec's masterful correlation of stethoscopic signs of chest disease with corresponding autopsy findings"; Lilly p. 173; Osler 1318; PMM 280; Waller 5491; Wellcome III, p. 429] Provenance: Louis H. Silver (morocco ownership label); Joseph Halle Schaffner (bookplate) (2)

細節

LAENNEC, René Théophile Hyacinthe (1781-1826). De l'Ausculation Médiate ou Traité du diagnostic des maladies des poumons et du coeur, fondé principalement sur ce nouveau moyen d'exploration, Paris: J.-A. Brosson et J.-S. Chaudé, 1819, 2 volumes, 8°, FIRST EDITION, FIRST STATE with the original cancellandum leaf a*2, 4 folding engraved plates (half title to vol. I partly detached, first leaf in quire 10 of vol. I with paper fault and resultant clean tear affecting 3 lines of text, spotting in both vols., heaviest in final index leaves), contemporary yellow and grey marbled boards backed in calf, spines with simple gilt ornaments and contemporary red morocco lettering-pieces, later cloth box. [Dibner Heralds 129; GM 2673: "revolutionised the study of disease of the thoracic organs"; Grolier Medicine 57: "Invention of the stethoscope, the first tool for physical diagnosis, together with Laennec's masterful correlation of stethoscopic signs of chest disease with corresponding autopsy findings"; Lilly p. 173; Osler 1318; PMM 280; Waller 5491; Wellcome III, p. 429] Provenance: Louis H. Silver (morocco ownership label); Joseph Halle Schaffner (bookplate) (2)

拍品專文

Although "ausculatory percussion" -- the evocation of sounds within the chest by finger-tapping -- had been introduced in the later 18th-century, it only became established once Corvisart had republished Auenbrugger's classic book in 1808. While Laennec was much indebted to Corvisart, his teacher, the stethoscope was his invention -- first in the form of a roll of paper, and then in the refined version, illustrated in his book, of a short wooden tube with a narrowing lumen for use at one ear. An instrument for "indirect ausculation" through amplification of the chest sounds, it has been called "the most important advance in physical diagnosis between Auenbrugger's introduction of percussion in 1761 and Roentgen's discovery of X-rays in 1895" [Heirs of Hippocrates]