Bernardino Genga. Manuscript Teaching Treatises (Parts III–IV): On Ulcers; On Bones and Ligaments. Rome, late 17th century.
Small Octavo
An important manuscript transmission of surgical teaching in late seventeenth-century Rome illustrating the pedagogical dissemination of the anatomical and clinical methods of Bernardino Genga. Genga served as Chief Surgeon and Professor of Anatomy and Surgery at the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Rome and was among the leading Roman anatomists and surgeons of the late seventeenth century.
Two contemporaneous manuscript volumes comprising Part III and likely Part IV of a larger instructional compilation associated with Genga’s teachings.
Part III, devoted to ulcers, opens with a formal title page attributing the text to Genga and identifying the copyist as Giuseppe Orsini. The manuscript appears to have been prepared as a teaching text by a student within Genga’s Roman circle.
Part IV concerns bones and ligaments and includes discussion of stranguria and related surgical conditions. Although this volume lacks a title page, it begins on page one with contemporary endpapers and appears complete based on the presence of its index.
Both volumes contain manuscript indexes listing the chapters of the respective treatises and appear to collate complete according to those indexes.
Following the index in the ulcer volume is an additional philosophical discourse titled “Allo scrittore” (“To the writer”), written in the same contemporary hand as the rest of the manuscript. In this section the author moves away from strictly surgical discussion and reflects on broader questions of natural philosophy, discussing generation, corruption, and the causes of natural phenomena within the traditional framework of Aristotle.
The ulcer volume also contains a hand-drawn heraldic device, possibly connected to a branch of the Orsini family, though this attribution remains unconfirmed. Another drawing depicts a stylized crucifix and dove, the emblem of the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Rome, the institution where Genga served as chief surgeon.
Teaching compilations of this type are known to have circulated in manuscript among medical students in Rome, and a small number of related manuscripts survive today in Italian institutional collections.
Condition: Contemporary leather bindings, heavily worn and dry, with surface abrasion and age-related deterioration to the boards. Partial marbled endpapers present on the pastedowns; both front and rear free marbled endpapers are lacking. Foxing and toning throughout consistent with age. Likely Part IV; the second volume lacks a title page, though it is unclear whether one was ever present. Last leaf of volume three loosely laid in. Overall a structurally sound manuscript with wear commensurate to period use.
Condition: Contemporary leather bindings, heavily worn and dry, with surface abrasion and age-related deterioration to the boards. Partial marbled endpapers present on the pastedowns; both front and rear free marbled endpapers are lacking. Foxing and toning throughout consistent with age. Likely Part IV; the second volume lacks a title page, though it is unclear whether one was ever present. Last leaf of volume three loosely laid in. Overall a structurally sound manuscript with wear commensurate to period use.