Were Acknowledgements Used in Yester Years to Prevent the Accusation of Plagiarism in Cancer Cases?

It is an admitted practice to pay homage to the source of any information being used for a new work. Elsewhere [1], I delineated the principles as I found them in the literature. Here, on proposing to trace the patterns used by the medical masters of yester years, it materialized that they probably sought to prevent the accusation of plagiarism. This word, as the Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary [2] has it, is “to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one’s own: use (another’s production) without crediting the source).” Also exemplified as “commit literary theft,” it was stated to have been first used in 1716. Therefore, the present paper deals with sources dating thereafter.