Antiquarian Medical Books

Received the following notice today. My wife and I viewed this book in the fall when we were in Iowa City and were amazed at the level of detail and of course the fact that "flap books" were this old and not only for children.


The Hardin Library for the Health Sciences is pleased to announce the completion of its latest digitizing undertaking: Johann Remmelin’s Catoptrum Microcosmicum, the most extensive anatomical "flap book" of the 17th century. Published in 1619, the work consists of three large plates, each of which contains several multi-layered illustration of the human body. The digitizing project includes high-resolution photographs of the layered flaps of the illustrations and uses "Zoomify" technology (requiring a small plug-in) to allow varying levels of magnification. Catoptrum Microcosmicum is the third book in the John Martin Rare Book Room to be digitized, the others being Anatomia Universa (Mascagni) and Tabulae anatomicase by Da Cortona.

You can view Catoptrum Microcosmicum at: http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/hardin/rbr/imaging/remmelin/

All three works may be viewed by going to the John Martin Rare Book Room site