Cordus, Valerius, 1515-1544. Valerii Cordi Dispensatorium, sive Pharmacorum conficiendorum ratio / Cum Petri Coudenbergii, & Matthiae Lobelii scholiis, emendationibus, & auctariis. Accessit hac editione, praeter Guilielmi Rondeletii De theriaca tractatum, emendatiorem; & Formulas selectiorum pharmacorum, quorum post Val. Cordum usus passim receptus est, auctiores: alius Fr. Dissaldei ejusdem argumenti libellus; & novissime alia nonnulla hactenus nondum edita calci libri adjecta sunt. Lugduni Batavorum : Ex officinâ Joannis Maire., 1651. Flyleaf and first title page missing, as well as back flyleaf. Upper corner of text block has some light waterstaining throughout, mildew spots pp 379-419. Pp 185 and 343 have very small ink spot not affecting text. Original vellum binding, however sewn through spine to attach loose signature. Vellum discolored. Needs a bookbinder's tender mercies.. Vellum binding. Small octavo  749 pp plus 15 page Index. 2 small illus in text pp 385,195. 

Contents include : Dispensatorium, De Venenis Eorumdemque Antidotis Seu Alexipharmacorum, Francisci Joelis - De Curatione Morborum in Genere, Tabula Referens Capulas pp 489-503 Rondelet’s De Theriaca Tractatus, Formulae electorium Pharmacorum, quorum usus post Valierium Cordum, Ex ultima Matthiae Lobelii recognitione and Dissalde’s Pharmaconetes, sive pharmacitis biblos, Tabella pp 715-721, De Simplicibus medicamentis in Omnibus 722-728. 

"First published apothecary by authority by the senate of Nuremburg in 1546, posthumously. It includes some chemical remedies as well as recipe for ether. In the middle 1500's attempts were made to standardize early pharmacological literature by authorities in charge of public health. In Latin. 

 "Valerius Cordus (18 February 1515 – 25 September 1544) was a German physician and botanist who authored one of the greatest pharmacopoeias and one of the most celebrated herbals in history. He is also widely credited with having pioneered a method for synthesizing ether (which he called oleum dulce vitrioli, or "sweet oil of vitriol"). Cordus wrote prolifically, and also identified and described several new plant species. The plant genus Cordia is named in honor of him. Among the research outlined in the lectures were the results of his own systematic observations of many of the same plants described by Pedanius Dioscorides in the 1st century CE. Direct observation of live specimens was one of Cordus' strengths.  In 1540 Cordus discovered and described a revolutionary technique for synthesizing ether, which involved adding sulfuric acid to ethyl alcohol.  In 1542 he began travelling back and forth between Germany and Italy for his research and studies, and also presented his great pharmacopoeia, Dispensatorium, to the Nuremberg city council. The council presented him with 100 gold guilders following the presentation, and published the work posthumously as a book in 1546.  The University of Wittenberg awarded him a medical degree in 1544, the same year that his great herbal in five volumes, Historia Plantarum, was published — a work unique at the time for its balanced analysis of interest not only to botanists, but to pharmacists and herbalists as well.  Later that same year, at the age of 29, Cordus died of malaria while in Rome. "Summa Gallicana.