Observationes Medicae (Tulp)
Tulp is primarily famous today for his central role in the 1632 group portrait by Rembrandt of the Amsterdam Guild of Surgeons, which commemorates his appointment as praelector in 1628.
"Observationes Medicae" is also the title commonly used by early Dutch doctors in the 16th and 17th centuries who wrote up their cases from private practise in Latin to share with contemporary colleagues.
He soon no longer needed to advertise his services, however, and his many duties as Praelector, and later, mayor of the city of Amsterdam, prevented him from spending so much time on his practise.
He published the book 5 years after the Amsterdam Pharmacopoeia was completed, which was his own personal initiative, and that helped to set intercity medical standards in the region known as the United Provinces.
Tulp had a reputation for a moral upstanding character, and Joost van den Vondel wrote poetry extolling his virtue.
Most notably, Tulp's work and that of Jacob de Bondt (alias Jacobus Bontius) was copied and republished by Linnaeus to show a link between apes and man.
However, the book was prefaced by a long lykoratie, or ode to his memory, in which Ludovicus Wolzogen explains what a wonderful man Tulp was, and everything that he did for the city of Amsterdam and medicine in general.
Title page from Prof. Tulp's 1641 book, published by Lodewijk Elzevir .
Page from Prof. Tulp's book with possibly the first published illustration of a chimpanzee.
Same page from 1740 Wolzogen edition.
Story from Prof. Tulp's book with illustration of the knife and kidney stone (publication 1740)