The first dissertation printed in Sweden illustrated with engravings is De cerebro humano printed in 1646. It is a small dissertation in quarto format of only sixteen pages illustrated with four engravings depicting the human brain. The first plate is signed in Latin `Magnus N. Helsing fecit´ giving us a clue to the artist´s identity, Magnus Nicolaus Celsius. He was a skilled engraver who later would illustrate three more dissertations and one treatise. Since a full discussion of all his engravings in these works would require a rather long...

The year of 1793: Napoleon is doing well, sending his troops far and wide in Europe and beyond. Still, enormous numbers of casualties, of wounded soldiers. What to do? How to help them? One solution was to develop better means of transport, to try and get them medical care as soon as the battle ended. Stretchers, litters, and horse-driven carts and wagons (ambulances volantes) came in handy. In Egypt, Napoleon’s chief army surgeon, Baron Dominique Larrey, even included camel litters in the truss. Warfare has, sadly enough one might say, been...