Gaspare Tagliacozzi’s “De Curtorum Chirugia Per Insitionem (1597)”

Description: Two years before his death, Taglicgozzi introduced the first book devoted entirely to plastic surgery. While earlier writers such as Celsus had discussed various aspects of plastic and reconstructive operations, Tagliacozzi was the first to introduce many concepts that had for generations been closely guarded secrets. His publication paved the way for establishing the scientific validity of these concepts and for improving the design and methods of his now-famous forearm flap. The book beautifully illustrates and carefully details the technique of nasal, palatal, lip, and ear reconstruction. He shares his ideas for preventing gangrene, flap atrophy, hemorrhage, and scarring. The twenty-two illustrations throughout the treatise depict various flap designs and instrumentation in a strikingly similar format as our modern atlases and surgical manuals. The most renowned illustration in Tagliacozzi’s book is frequently depicted in our journal and society publications.

A translation from Latin of the complete text by Joan Thomas with an introduction by Robert M. Goldwyn, M.D. is published through Gryphon Editions; The Classics of Medicine Library, New York, 1996.

Provenance:

Vincenzo Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua Jacobus de Priolis, Doctor of Medicine

J.H. Hunt, M.D., Brooklyn, NY

Medical Society of Kings County, Brooklyn NY

The Haskell F. Norman Library of Science and Medicine, San Francisco, CA Paul and llana Rosenberg, Saddle River, NJ