Icones Anatomico-Physiologicae Partium,

£7,500 · Offered by Shapero Rare Books

early colour microscopy First edition of one of the earliest works on the anatomy of tissues rather than organs or organ systems, and one of the earliest microscopical works printed in colour. A never bound, unopened copy complete with all thirty plates and the original blue paper covers. Rare; only three copies have appeared at auction since 1992, one of which was incomplete, and WorldCat locates no institutional copies. Jan Bleuland (1756-1838) attended the University of Leiden, where he learned the art of preserving anatomical specimens by injection under Eduard Sandifort. After graduating in 1780 he practised medicine in Gouda and taught anatomy, physiology, surgery, and obstetrics at the universities in Hardewijk and Utrecht. 'During his career Bleuland published a number of illustrated anatomical works printed in colour, showing a special interest in the fine structure of healthy and diseased states of the organs and tunics of the digestive tract. Bleuland made a collection of over two and a half thousand anatomical preparations' which he used to prepare his publications, and which were later purchased by the government for the Utrecht anatomical museum (Meli, 'The Rise of Pathological Illustrations: Baillie, Bleuland, and Their Collections', Bulletin of the History of Medicine, volume 89, number 2, pp. 234-235). 'As in previous works he published, Bleuland was especially interested in the vascular structure of tunics and membranes and focused on what he called anatomia

• Binding: Hardcover

Found via Rare Books Intel, a search across rare-book dealers, auction houses and marketplaces worldwide.