William Woodville | Medical Botany, London, 1790-94, 4 vols, contemporary brown calf-backed boards

William Woodville

Medical Botany, containing Systematic and General Descriptions, with Plates, of all the Medicinal Plants, Indigenous and Exotic, Comprehended in the Catalogues of the Materia Medica, as Published by the Royal Colleges of Physicians of London and Edinburgh. London: printed and sold for the author, by James Phillips, 1790-1794

FIRST EDITION, first issue, 4 volumes (including supplementary volume), small 4to (228 x 178mm.), 274 hand-coloured engraved plates, contemporary brown calf-backed boards, 2 morocco lettering pieces detached, spines worn with joints splitting

Containing 274 hand-coloured plates by James Sowerby, of medicinal plants, by William Woodville (1752-1805), the prominent botanist and physician. He was a member of the Royal College of Physicians, and was notable for his contributions to the prevention of smallpox, through promotion of inoculation, and later vaccination. His interest in botany existed alongside his medical career: he became a member of the Linnaean Society in 1791. Medical Botany is his most prominent work, an investigation of materia medica based on research by his fellow members of the Royal Society of Physicians, examining the plants' botanical characteristics alongside their medicinal uses. He was recorded as having died, in 1805, of smallpox; his library was sold at Sotheby's later that year.    

LITERATURE:

Dunthorne 334; Great Flower Books, p. 81; Nissen BBI 2183; Stafleu TL2 18.272