An Interactive Annotated World Bibliography of Printed and Digital Works in the History of Medicine and the Life Sciences from Circa 2000 BCE to 2022 by Fielding H. Garrison (1870-1935), Leslie T. Morton (1907-2004), and Jeremy M. Norman (1945- ) Traditionally Known as “Garrison-Morton”

15961 entries, 13944 authors and 1935 subjects. Updated: March 22, 2024

LAURENTI, Josephus Nicholaus

1 entries
  • 9517

Specimen medicum: Exhibens synopsin reptilium emendatam cum experimentis circa venena et antidota reptilium austriacorum.

Vienna: Joan. Thomae nob. de Trattnern, 1768.

"Laurenti is considered the auctor of the class Reptilia (reptiles) through his authorship of Specimen Medicum, Exhibens Synopsin Reptilium Emendatam cum Experimentis circa Venena (1768) on the poisonous function of reptiles and amphibians. This was an important book in herpetology, defining thirty genera of reptiles; Carl Linnaeus's 10th edition of Systema Naturae in 1758 defined only ten genera. Specimen Medicum contains a description of the blind salamander (amphibian): Proteus anguinus, purportedly collected from cave waters in Slovenia (or possibly western Croatia); this description represented one of the first published accounts of a cave animal in the western world, although the Proteus anguinus wasn't recognized as a cave animal at the time" (Wikipedia article on Josephus Nicolaus Laurenti, accessed 9-2017). Digital facsimile from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.



Subjects: TOXICOLOGY › Venoms, ZOOLOGY › Herpetology