Inaugural Medical Dissertation on Blind and Open Hemorrhoids

Page 5 is misnumbered 5 in the original, though text flow suggests it follows page 6.

ῥοϊς flow or αἱμόρροος blood-flowing denotes a certain kind of Serpent, which by its bite makes blood drip from all parts of the body of the one struck, concerning which see Galen l. c., Dioscorides l. 6. c. 50., Pliny l. 20. c. 21., Solinus, polyhist. cap. 40., Lucan. 9. on the civil war, Paræus, surgery l. 2. c. 17., Sennertus l. 6. medical practice, and others. But leaving these different meanings aside, we only accept here that by which Hemorrhoids denote a flow of blood from the opening of the veins or arteries of the anus, and a tumor arisen in them: and so we shall institute a treatment concerning two as it were species of them, while they are commonly divided into Blind and Open.

III. We do not find this affection to be rich in a various crowd of synonyms. The Greeks, as was said before, indicated it by the word αἰμορροΐδων hemorrhoids. The Latins bestowed citizenship upon this word, being destitute of a more convenient one. It is also heard as Hemorrhoidal flux, tumor, or pain, as witnessed by Celsus and Pliny. Many authors are accustomed to confuse Mariscas skin tags or external hemorrhoids with Hemorrhoids, which Theod. Gaza and others interpret as hemorrhoids; but Massarias, prax. lib. 3. cap. 24. and Forest. l. 23. observ. rebuke them. More on these will occur below among the distinctive Signs.

IV. OPEN apertæ hemorrhoids are sometimes called Apparent by some, both because they are visible to the sight, and because they pour out blood at certain periods. BLIND cæcæ ones, however, or occluded, Greek τυφλαὶ blind, are both those which lie hidden inside, and those which appear outside, but are closed: Plater thinks they are more correctly called closed or painful; indeed, Fabricius ab Aquapendente l. c. thinks one is improperly said to have blind hemorrhoids who has never suffered their flux.

V. Our Germans, by a gilded title of honor, call it the golden Vein, di güldne Ader / den güldnen Aderfluß the golden vein / the golden vein-flux, perhaps from the efficacy, from the golden and significant advantage which their timely and moderate flux provides, as Solenander, Horstius, and others suspect; for some think that the health of the whole Body results from it in those who are accustomed to it, see Hippocrates, book on humors. Others rather wish these golden veins to be called such κατ' ἀντίφρασιν by irony, because of their troublesome and immense foulness.

It is also called by some di Rückader the back vein, perhaps from that significant bifurcation