GREW, Nehemiah.

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Musaeum Regalis Societatis, First edition of the earliest catalogue of the collections of the Royal Society. It is published with Grew's study of guts, "which is the first zoological book to have the term 'comparative anatomy' on the title page, and also the first attempt to deal with one system of organs only by the comparative method" (Garrison-Morton, p. 61). The work also contains a description of Newton's reflecting telescope (p. 360). A botanist and physician, Nehemiah Grew (c.1641-1712) was appointed joint secretary of the Royal Society with Robert Hooke in 1677. He had published at least four botanical works before this book, including his successful Anatomy of Plants (1682), but Musaeum Regalis Societatis marked the climax of his career. "Erudite and in places innovative in its classification and interpretation of objects" (ODNB), its lavish engravings were funded by subscription, making it one of the first scientific books to be published in England in this way.

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