Over The Horizon

Early Medicine in Manuscripts

A recent exhibition at the University of Otago medical library provided a rare glimpse into the workings of the golden age of Scottish medicine via a collection of books and manuscripts dating back to the 1500s. The collection was once owned and used by three generations of Edinburgh University professors of anatomy, all named Alexander Monro and distinguished by the titles Primus, Secundus and Tertius.

The 400 or so manuscripts include copies of Vesalius's De humani corporis fabrica (1555) and William Hunter's spectacular Anatomia uteri humani... (1774) with its life-size, anatomically precise drawings. These were used by the Monros as part of their teaching resource from 1720 to 1846, when Edinburgh University was seen as one of the great European medical schools.

Manuscripts written by the Monros primus and secundus have survived, as have student notes taken during the lectures they gave. This material shows how medicine developed in these early days from the early microscopist work through to greater understanding of the nervous system and the theory of disease.

Many of the founders of the Otago School were from Edinburgh or trained there, but the Monro collection took a more roundabout route before it reached the library of the Otago Medical School. Monro tertius had a son, David, who, although medically qualified, became a politician in New Zealand. He became Speaker of the House and was knighted in 1866, and inherited his father's medical collection which arrived in the country in 1871. Ownership disputes were eventually resolved, and the collection has been housed in Otago since 1929.