5 La stampa medico-scientifica nell’Europa del XV secolo
Con cenni sulla fruizione dei libri di materia medica e ricettari
abstract
The 15cBOOKTRADE has assigned a subject and multiple keywords to each edition printed before 1501. We are now able to provide a comprehensive assessment of the entire production of medical material in print. This essay first does that, by looking at overall numbers, topics, areas of publication, Latin versus vernacular editions, and so on. It then focuses on the production and distribution of Materia Medica, and concludes with the evidence of use of this material, gathered from the copy-specific data pertaining to the surviving copies described in MEI, to sketch out the socio-cultural profile and the reading practices of the many anonymous and of the few known actual readers.
Keywords: Materia medica • Reading practices • Printing medicine • Incunabula • Medical texts