288 Banister and Pulmonary Circulation 



cian to Henry VIII and Elizabeth, in his 'Treatise of the Anatomy of a Man's 

 Body' (1548, 1577, etc.) made no reference to European medical science or to 

 his own experience. The reason for the omissions was an excellent one. Vicary 

 had copied, without acknowledgment, a fourteenth-century manuscript. No 

 changes seemed necessary and none were made." However, neither of them 

 mentions the Vesalian compendium published by Thomas Geminus in 1545, 

 two years after Vesalius' book, or the English translation in 1559.^ This work 

 of Geminus and that of Banister were largely responsible for the spread of 

 Renaissance anatomy in England. Both Jones and Smith refer to Banister, but 

 neither gives a true account of his sources or of the purpose of his book. Jones 

 cites him as example of the "extreme worship of authority," giving as evidence 

 "the innumerable references to Galen" in Banister's Treatise of Chimrgerie, 

 1575. There is no mention of Banister's sources from Vesalius and Columbus 

 in his anatomical book. Smith speaks slightingly of the work of Banister as typi- 

 cal of Tudor medical literature and says: "Banister delighted in compilations. 

 One of these embraced nine volumes and bore the title 'The History of Man 

 Sucked from the Sap of the Most Approved Anatomists' (1578)." The signifi- 

 cant point is that neither of these authors has mentioned the fact that Banister 

 drew upon the most modern writers available to him and brought their ideas 

 to the yoimg English stvidents of anatomy and surgery. 



It is our purpose to treat in detail only one phase of this newer anatomical 

 learning, the pulmonary circulation, and to show how, in regard to this. Banis- 

 ter dealt with his sources. The idea of the passage of blood through the lungs 

 is certainly one of the most important developments prior to Harvey, and 

 Banister's treatment of it should give a clue to his general attitude toward 

 the modern ideas of his time. We know that he used the De Re Anatomica of 

 Colimibus in his lectures on anatomy, for Sir D'Arcy Power has shown'' that 

 in the picture of Banister giving the "visceral" lectme at the Barber Surgeons' 

 Hall in 1581 the book on the lectern is that of Columbus, and he has identified 

 the passage to which it is opened. 



The best descriptions of the life of Banister are given in these articles by 

 Sir D'Arcy Power and in the Dictionary of National Biography. According 

 to the DNB, John Banister, or Banester, was born in 1540. However, Sir D'Arcy 

 Power shows that the picture mentioned above gives his age as 48 in 1581, 

 making his date of birth therefore 1533. He died in 1610. He had a long career 

 as a surgeon, and on two occasions served with the military forces, with the 

 Earl of Warwick in 1563 and with the Earl of Leicester's expedition to the Low- 

 lands in 1588. He was admitted to the Barber Surgeons' Company in 1572, was 

 granted a license to practice physic by the University of Oxford in 1573, and 

 ^" 1593' upon royal recommendation, he was granted a license by the College 

 of Physicians. He was on close terms with the leading surgeons of the time, 

 particularly William Clowes, and John Read, who married his daughter. 

 Stephen Bradwell says in one of his works that he is the grandson of Banister, 

 while Richard Banister, the oculist, was a near kinsman and was educated 



