Rare books, manuscripts, music, ephemera…
Posted on 2nd August 2012 by simonbeattie
Who’d have thought it…? This extraordinary (and rare) poem, from 1751, was written in honour of an amputation performed by Jean-Nicolas Moreau, for over 40 years chief surgeon at the Hôtel-Dieu. Le Roy, a lawyer, praises Moreau for removing his lower arm, which was shattered in a hunting accident, recounting the process in some (rather gory) detail. The end of the poem describes a new gun Le Roy has commissioned from the Royal Gunsmith and the first time he used it, on a wild boar. He duly presents the fillet and the right trotter to Moreau.
How delightfully bizarre! And I love the idea of presenting him with the boar he then killed. Presumably it was not his “primary” arm that was amputated.
Presumably not, no. Unless he learned to use his other arm.