Pharmacopoeia Londinensis: or The London dispensatory further adorned by the studies and collections of the fellows now living, of the said colledg. In this sixt edition you may find, 1. Three hundred useful additions. 2. All the notes that were in the margent are brought into the book between two such crotchets at these [ ] 3. On the top of the pages of this impression is printed, the sixt edition, much enlarged. 4. The vertues, qualities, and properties of every simple. 5. The vertues and use of the compounds. 6. Cautions in giving al medicines that are dangerous. 7. All the medicines that were in the old Latin dispensatory, and are left out in the new Latin one, are printed in this sixt impression in English, with their vertues. 8. A key to Galen and Hippocrates their Method of physick, containing thirty three chapters. 9. In every page two columns. 10. In this impression, the Latin name of every one of the compounds is printed, and in what page of the new folio latin book they are to be found. By Nich. Culpeper, Gent. student in physick and astrology.
London: printed by Peter Cole, printer and book-seller, at the sign of the Printing-press in Cornhil, near the Royal Exchange, 1659.
Collation:
8vo: 3*4 (–3*1) A8 B2 \[chi]C8
C–G8 I6 2A–2I8 2K6 2M–2P8
2Q2, 179 of 180 leaves, pp. [26] 107 [1] 191–431 [5] 343–377
[33], LACKING THE LONGDITUDINAL HALF-TITLE 3*1. Title within a double
border of fleurons. 2K5, titlepage ‘A key to Galen’s method of physick’
dated 1658.
Condition:
163 x 105mm. Title leaf and last leaf frayed and repaired in the margins,
affecting the title border; a small copy with shaved headlines and
catchwords and loss of text on one or two pages; light browning and
soiling.
Binding:
Recent quarter calf. Engraved portrait of Culpeper mounted as a
frontispiece and a woodcut portrait mounted on the pastedown with a
manuscript verse below.
Provenance:
Contemporary signature ‘Geo: Dickins’ on title; Edwin Clarke (1919–1996).
References:
Wing C7530; ESTC R15780;
Wellcome II, p. 414; Krivatsy 2984; Sanderson D4.
Price:
£600
‘Sixth edition’, but the fourth substantive edition, setting with a double fleuron border to the title and the imprint in 3 lines (in another setting the border is made up of a single row of fleurons, the imprint is in two lines and item 8 of the title begins ‘A key to Galen and Hippocrates’. A translation of Pharmacopeoia Londinensis (1650), first published in folio in 1653 and in 8vo in 1654 (with a 12mo piracy in the same year) 1655 and 1656; all these editions are called the ‘sixth edition’ on the titlepage.
¶ As with Culpeper’s Herbal, Peter Cole evidently found it commercially advantageous to publish the first edition in folio, to establish the work’s authority, and later editions in smaller format for a wider market. This is analogous to modern publishers issuing books in hardback editions before paperbacks are available.
Literature: Poynter 10.
