The Medical-Surgical Lexicon in the Middle English Version of Lanfranc’s Chirurgia Magna| Biomed Grid

Hugh Lanfranc of Milan (1245 about – 1315 about), native from a family of Pisa, accomplished his studies at the medical school of Bologna. In this school other famous medieval physicians, as Guy de Chauliac an Henry of Mandeville attended their studies). We have almost no information about his life; however, we can infer this news from his works. In fact, we know that he was a pupil of William of Saliceto (who died between 1276 and 1285), during the period William taught in Bologna. In this town Hugh Lanfranc accomplished his scientific l training and began to exercise his profession as a physician. Later he carried on his profession in Milan, where he became also a surgeon, as he informs us in his Chirurgia Magna. His patients were members belonging to ecclesiastical and secular nobility and, among them, Matteo Visconti, who exiled Lanfranc from Milan in 1290, because he became the chief of the Torriani party. For this reason, Lanfranc left Milan and moved to France and lived in a few cities, as Lyon and Paris (about 1295). Lanfranc considered Paris as a heaven on the earth, particularly adapt for studying and a city respectful of its citizens. In Paris he was received by Jean Passavant, the deacon of Medicine Faculty who encouraged him to write the Chirurgia Magna.