Drugs on trial: experimental pharmacology and therapeutic innovation in the eighteenth century

Sir Henry Savile, and Harvey) as the result of Venetian attitudes towards the Inquisition. This is an opportunity missed, for it is clear that the reputation of the university was not by itself always sufficient to attract students all the way from England. Nor was a Paduan degree in medicine always as attractive as most medical historians have assumed, for several years might elapse without the presence of an English medical student. Such wider considerations rarely surface in this carefully written and wellresearched book, which sets out in great detail what is known about the English in Tudor Padua. If more is sometimes claimed for some of its teachers, e.g. Leonico Tomeo, or its humanistically inclined graduates than is warranted by the meagre evidence, that is a small price to pay for this extremely valuable book, which makes clear why Shakespeare had his Lucentio arrive at "Fair Padua, nursery of the arts" for "a course of learning and ingenious studies".