Sir Hans Sloane was a leading physician and amassed a huge collection of manuscripts documenting the History of Medicine, Surgery and Anatomy. These cover seven major areas:

• Consilia and casebooks of physicians through the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, which tell us much about contemporary practices: Part 7 includes the extensive casebooks of Philip Moore, 1572-1610; Theodore Mayerne, 1607-1653; and Sir Edmund King, Physician to Charles II, 1660-96; and of physicians in Poitou and Venice.

• Papers of hospitals, asylums and institutions: There are records of Bart’s and St Thomas’s hospitals and papers of the Society of Apothecaries.

• Papers of leading physicians: There are the papers of Jean de la Riviere, premier physician to Henri IV of France; Thomas Gill’s holograph Tractatus de partu; Henry Power’s letters and account of the virtues of various herbs; and further manuscripts of William Harvey.

• Medical lectures: Featuring Herman Boerhaave’s Lectiones de viribus medica and lectures on wounds.

• Anatomical collections: Including David Coates’ observations on Tyburn dissections.

• Material on the Plague: A remarkable set of records of the Plague in Florence, Holland and England assembled by Richard Smith.

• Material for the History of Medicine: Part 7 includes writings of Aesculapius, Galen, Hippocrates and Ishak Ibn Sulaiman; a 10th century Antidotarium; and much on medieval medicine.