"Lexicon nosologicum polyglotton" de Ph. A. Nemnich (1801) : observações sobre o material português

This paper presents the Lexicon nosologicum polyglotton omnium morborum, symptomatum vitiorumque naturae et affectionum propria nomina decem diversis linguis explicata continens (‘Nosological polyglot vocabulary of all diseases, symptoms and natural defects, containing the proper names of affections explained in ten different languages’) as well as the figure of its author Philipp Andreas Nemnich (1764–1822), German encyclopaedist and journalist. It is a little-known multilingual lexicographic work, published in 1801 in Hamburg, which furnishes a collection of names of various kinds of diseases, ailments, natural defects and health problems, and is designed for the practical use of doctors of multiple specialities from different countries. The main purpose of the paper is to point out the characteristics of the Portuguese material included in the dictionary. It also provides evidence of the Lexicon nosologicum polyglotton’s importance in supplying general knowledge about the European scientific and folk medicine at the beginning of the 19th century.