Norimbergæ: sumptibus Johannis Ziegeri, typis Christophori Gerhardi, 1679

This frontispiece to Mercklin’s work on blood transfusion shows both animal to human and human to human blood transfusion. Following Harvey’s discovey of the circulation of the blood, various experiments in blood transfusion took place in the 1660s. The first transfusions were animal to animal; some successful animal to human transfusions followed, but the death of Antoine Mauroy in 1667, after a third transfusion of calf’s blood performed by Jean-Baptiste Denys, led to the practice being abandoned. It was not revived until the 19th century, when the first human to human transfusions were performed.

Keynes.D.2.14

References: Sir Geoffrey Keynes, ‘Tercentenary of blood transfusion’, British Medical Journal, 4(5576) (18 Nov. 1967), 410–11.