Contributing Institution: UCLA Library Special Collections

Title: Josef Bärtl medical notebook

Source: Palinurus Antiquarian Books

Identifier/Call Number: Biomed.0365

Physical Description: 1 unknown (1 volume)

Date (inclusive): 1820-1868

Language of Material: Materials are in German.

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Purchased from Palinurus Antiquarian Books, 2015.

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UCLA Catalog Record ID: 7696693 

"A [more than] 600-page manuscript medical notebook that includes diagnostic information, care, theoretical considerations, recipes and cures. The notebook is in German (Roman and Gothic script) in a clear hand throughout. It is in alphabetical order (designated with letter tabs). Baertl [Bärtl] (1790-1868) was a military physician and an early convert to homoeopathy. He graduated from the Josephs Akademie in 1828 and served in the army of Austria in Treviso, Venice, Palermo, and finally Mailand. He was fluent in German, French, Italian, and Bohemian. He was the author of several books and numerous articles that were translated or appeared in the British Journal of Homoeopathy. [This] manuscript ... was his personal reference notebook. The entries are in the form of compositions or diary-like entries on ailments, or notes. It is packed with his thoughts on the various illnesses and medical issues he encountered in his practice; e.g., his encounter with an eye ailment in Palermo that led to his article on clinical observations of 'granular ophthalmalia' in 1863, his book on epilepsy, or his entries in the manuscript on cholera and his book on intermittant fevers. One can also see where he modified or supplemented entries with notes or comments and some references to the contemporary medical literature. What the manuscript offers is an immediate view of a physician at work confronted with the manifold issues of large military encampments and hundreds if not thousands of individuals. It is also a record of the evolution of his thoughts on treatment and adaptation of homoeopathic theory."--Antiquarian bookseller's description.