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Archipathologia. In qua internarum capitis affectionum essentia, causae, signa, praesagia, [et] curatio accuratissima indagine edisserunter (In Which the Essence, Causes, Signs, Prognoses, and Treatment of the Internal Affections of the Head Are Set Forth with the Most Accurate Investigation) ["PERHAPS THE EARLIEST ATTEMPT AT DEALING WITH MENTAL DISTURBANCES IN A SYSTEMATIC MANNER"]

Montalto, Philotheus Elianus (Elijah)

Paris: François Jacquin for the Société Caldorienne, 1614. First edition. Hardcover. Quarto (22.5 by 16.6 cm). Collation: a4 e4 i2 A-5L4 (= blank i2; T3 mis-signed S3; 2N3 as 2L3); [18], [2, blank], 817 [i.e., 807; p.280 numbered 290 and so on thoroughout], [1, blank], [15, index], [1, blank] pp. Woodcut printer's device, lettrines, head- and tailpieces; printed marginalia. Contemporary vellum with manuscript title in ink at spine head. Occasional faint touches of dampstain (mostly marginal; early ink blot in conjunction with underlining at pp. 348-49, obscuring two words; oxidation spot (burn?) at 4H with 3mm hole obscuring a letter; sigs. R and 3V held by single cord (sitting well and undamaged). Apart from occasional oxidation spots, text clean and fresh throughout. A very good copy.

First edition of "perhaps the earliest attempt at dealing with mental disturbances in a systematic manner" (Friedenwald). A popular work that was "often referred to by later medical writers" (EJ), the Archipathologia was re-published at Saint-Gervais-les-Bains by J. de la Pierre in 1628 under the title Tractatus accuratissimus de morbis capitis; Samuel Schelerier published the work at Paris (under the original title) in 1632. Among the most notable of its early readers was Robert Burton, whose frequent references to the present work are found throughout his Anatomy of Melancholy. It should be noted that in his discussion of melancholy, Montalto makes a nuanced but quite notable effort to distance himself from the commonly held views of its origins in diabolical possession. The many works on nervous and mental diseases which appeared prior to Montalto's Archipathologia fall into three catagories: commentaries on ancient Greek works; consilia -- reports and discussions of specific cases; monographs on special subjects. Despite the fact that Neuburger and Pagel suggest that Felix Platter (1536-1614) "made the first effort to classify mental diseases" in his three-volume Praxeos (Basel: Konrad Waldkirch, 1602-1608), the pioneering nature of Montalto's systematic work on mental disturbances is undeniable. (Friedenwald, incidentally, judges Platter's system to be "more primative" than Montalto's.) In any event, the eighteen treatises of the Archipathologia clearly indicate the author's desire for a comprehensive understanding of mental afflictions: pain; headaches; brain fever with delirium; melancholy; the insanity of lovers; mania; hydrophobia; amentia (idiocy); memory loss; coma; insomnia; lethergy; caros (states of semi-unconsciousness); catalepsy; vertigo; nightmare; epilepsy; apoplexy.

Philotheus Elianus Montalto (1567-1616), was a descendant of those Jews in Spain and Portugal who accepted baptism, but who secretly preserved loyalty to their ancient faith. He was born in Castel-Branco in Portugal, where he was christened Felipe Rodriguez. His Jewish name was Elaiu (Elijah) and his family name, de Luna Montalto. Apart from studying medicine at Salamanca, almost nothing is known about early life. He fled the Inquisition to the Netherlands and arrived in Livorno in 1599. Accepted by the Jewish community in Italy, he abandoned his baptismal name and styled himself Philotheus (the lover of God) Elianus. The Grand Duke Ferdinand I (1549-1609), who was kindly disposed to the Jewish settlers in Livorno, summoned Montalto to Florence to serve as his personal physician. At Florence, Montalto's first work, Optica intra Philosophiae, et Medicinae Aream, de Visu, de Visus Organo, et Obiecto Theoriam Accuratè Complectens (Optics within the Field of Philosophy and Medicine, Accurately Comprising the Theory, Organ, and Object of Sight) was published by Cosimo Giunta in 1606. In the introduction to the Optica we learn that Montalto met Marie de Medici, the queen of France, during a brief sojourn in Paris prior to his arrival in Florence. In 1611, Marie summoned Montalto to Paris to serve as her personal physician, which required that she obtain a papal dispensation from Paul V so that she might be treated by a Jew. Montalto agreed on condition that he should have full liberty to practice his religious observances. On 12 September 1612, Marie bestowed upon Montalto the position of Consilarius et Medicus Ordinarius (Councellor and Fully-Credentialed Medical Doctor). Such extraordinary favor shown by the queen of France to a man who publicly avowed Judasim is acknowledged in the dedication of the present volume: "You have summoned me from Italy most generously, to assume a very high office, the care of your health and of your life..." (trans. Friedenwald). At his death in 1616, Marie ordered that Montalto's body be embalmed and conveyed to Amsterdam for a proper burial, there being no Jewish cemetery in France. Among the many learned contemporaries and friends whose glowing encomia of Montalto are preserved in their writings are the well-known philosopher and Jewish physician, Joseph Solomon Delmedigo (1591-1655); Rabbi Judah Leon of Modena (1571-1648); Benedict de Castro of Hamburg (b. 1597), court physician to Queen Christina of Sweden; and Abraham Zacutus Lusitanus (1575-1642), a notably erudite physician of converso heritage.

Among the reasons Friedewald devotes an entire chapter to Montalto in The Jews in Medicine (1944) is that no mention of the Jewish physician and his remarkable career were to be found in any of the standard modern encyclopedias of medical biography, including Hirsch's Lexikon. Friedenwald also makes special mention of the rarity of the 1614 edition of Archipathologia, not being able to find a copy in the United States. We have been able to locate a total of 19 copies, world-wide, but none in North America.

Annotations: Occasional early underlinings and a handful of marginal annotations in black ink; at p. 788 "epilepsiae" has been corrected to "apoplexiae" at the chapter heading and first line of text. Very good. Item #54462

References: M. Altbauer-Rudnik, "Prescribing Love: Italian Jewish Physicians Writing on Lovesickness: [in:] Korot, the Israel Journal of the History of Medicine and Science 20 (2009/10): pp. 99-116; Enc. Jud. (1st ed.) 11: 1194; H. Friedenwald, The Jews and Medicine (1967): pp. 468-96; p. 492 (title-page image); Neuburger and Pagel, Handbuch der Geschichte der Medizin 3: 605; SBN ITICCUTO0E122582; USTC 6016462. Not in Hirsch's Lexikon (first ed.); not in Krivatsy.

Full title and imprint: Philothei Eliani Montalto Lusitani, Christianissmi Galliarum, et Navarrae regis Ludovici XII, et Chr[istianissi]mae reginae regentis consiliarii, [et] medici ordinarii. Archipathologia. In qua internarum capitis affectionum essentia, causae, signa, praesagia, [et] curatio accuratissima indagine edisserunter. Lutetiae: apud Franciscum Iacquin, sumptibus Caldorianae Societatis. M. DC. XIII. [1614].

Price: $10,000.00