LOWE, Peter (c.1550-1610)

Lot 170
10.12.2025 12:00UTC +00:00
Classic
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Lieu de l'événementRoyaume-Uni, London
Commissionsee on Website%
ID 1514475
Lot 170 | LOWE, Peter (c.1550-1610)
Valeur estimée
£ 8 000 – 12 000
LOWE, Peter (c.1550-1610)
The whole course of chirurgerie, wherein is briefey [sic] set downe the cause, signes, prognostications & curations of all sorts of tumors, wounds, vlcers, fractures, dislocations & all other diseases, vsually practiced by chirurgions […] Whereunto is annexed the presages of diuine Hippocrates. London: Thomas Purfoot, 1597.
Very rare first edition, early (first?) issue with ‘briefey’ rather than ‘briefly’ in the title, of an important work by the founder the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow. Bound with the complete prefatory chapter from A.T.’s A rich store-house or treasury for the diseased (London: Thomas Purfoot, 1596) titled ‘Divers & Sundrye Good Instructions & Rules for all such as are the true Practisers of Phisick and Chirurgerie’ (Roman and Black letter, 15pp., gatherings B-C; ESTC S118082).

Lowe ‘left Scotland around 1566 for France, where he spent about thirty years serving in the Spanish and French armies and the French royal household. During this time, he reportedly survived the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre by hiding in the king’s wardrobe. His medical training is uncertain, though he likely studied at the University of Orléans and became a master surgeon of the College of St Côme in Paris […] Educated and well regarded in French high society, he served as surgeon to Henri IV for six years before leaving France around 1596. By then in London, he published An Easie, Certain and Perfect Method to Cure and Prevent the Spanish Sickness, dedicating it to Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex. Unusually Lowe wrote in the vernacular, a move which could have attracted much criticism from contemporaries, who favoured Latin as the legitimate medium for academic discourse. It was constructed partly in the form of a catechism, or conversation between the author and a student, and partly a description of surgical techniques, medical treatments, and examples from his practice in France’ (ODNB). ESTC S109645 (11 copies; the title variant of the word ‘briefey’ or ‘briefly’ not noted; the copy at the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow has the same title variant ‘briefey’); not in Wellcome, Garrison-Morton, Norman or Durling/NLM.

Two parts in one volume, plus 8 leaves from A rich store-house, small quarto (177 x 118mm). Two titles within decorative woodcut borders, woodcut initials, head- and tail-pieces, book and chapter headings added in manuscript to the first part and 5-page manuscript index at end in ink in a 17th-century hand, possibly by the early owner Robert Leigh (head of title slightly frayed, light browning and scattered spotting and stains, a few manuscript chapter headings cropped by the binder, a few minor chips or tears without loss of text). Early 20th-century brown morocco, spine in compartments with raised bands gilt (covers detached, spine slightly rubbed). Provenance: Robert Leigh (17th-century signature on title) — John Done (signature on R1v) — John Bostock (signature at head of dedication leaf) — Royal Society of Medicine (circular ink stamp [Medical & Chirurgical Society] to title and A3; and gilt crest to lower left corner of upper cover).
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