William Cullen 1710-1790

Portrait of William Cullen

William Cullen was an 18th century Scottish physician and chemist.

His chief works were First Lines of the Practice of PhysicInstitutions of Medicine (1710) and Synopsis Nosologiae Methodicae (1785). In the 1785 work he classified diseases into four major groups:

  • Pyrexiae, or febrile diseases, as typhus fever
  • Neuroses, or nervous diseases, as epilepsy
  • Cachexiae, or diseases resulting from bad habit of body such as scurvy
  • Locales, or local diseases, as cancer

Writings of William Cullen

Cullen William (1784). First Lines of the Practice of Physic Edinburgh: C. Elliot & T. Cadell.

Writings about William Cullen

Christie, JR (1994). Historiography of chemistry in the eighteenth century: Hermann Boerhaave and William Cullen. Ambix, 41 (1): 4–19. PMID 11616322.

Cramer, M. and De Morsier, G. (1976). Teachings of the physician William Cullen of Edinburgh (1712-1790) transcribed by his student physician Louis Odier of Geneva (1748-1817)]” (in French). Gesnerus 33 (3-4): 217–27. PMID 793940.

Crellin, JK (January 1971). “William Cullen: his calibre as a teacher, and an unpublished introduction to his A Treatise of the Materia Medica, London, 1773”. Medical History 15 (1): 79–87. PMID 4929623.

Doig, A, et al, eds, (1993). William Cullen and the Eighteenth Century Medical World , Edinburgh, Scotland: Edinburgh University Press, 1993)

Dubois, J.C. (June 1985). Neuroses and practical medicine in the works of William Cullen (in French). Annales Médico-psychologiques 143 (6): 572–7. PMID 3909876.

Johnstone, R.W. (January 1959). “William Cullen”. Medical History 3 (1): 33–46. PMID 13632206.

McGirr E.M. (February 1991). William Cullen MD (1710-1790). Scottish Medical Journal 36, 1, 6. PMID 2031172.

McGirr E. and Stoddart W. (February 1991). Changing theories in 18th-century medicine. The inheritance and legacy of William Cullen. Scottish Medical Journal 36, 1, 23–6. PMID 2031170.

Risse G. B. (March 1973). William Cullen and child care. A 1788 letter. Clio Medica 8, 1, 65–7. PMID 4129567.

· Risse GB (1974). Doctor William Cullen, physician, Edinburgh: A consultation practice in the Eighteenth Century. Bulletin of the History of Medicine 48, 3, 338–51. PMID 4618142.

Stott, R. (June 1986). William Cullen and Edinburgh medicine: A reappraisal. The Society for the Social History of Medicine Bulletin 38: 7–9. PMID 11612030.

Stott, R. (April 1987). “Health and virtue: or, how to keep out of harm’s way. Lectures on pathology and therapeutics by William Cullen c. 1770”. Medical History 31 (2): 123–42. PMID 3550326.

Wightman, William (1990). Cullen, William. In C Gillespie (ed,) Dictionary of Scientific Biography, NY: Scribner’s.

William Cullen (1710-1790). JAMA 188: 388–9. April 1964. PMID 14114029.