Theophile Bonet (1620-1689) Physician of Geneva

Theophile Bonet, son and grandson of physicians, was born in Geneva, at that time a refuge for Protestants fleeing from religious persecution. Bonet visited several centers of learning before receiving the MD degree from Bologna in 1643 and returning to cosmopolitan Geneva.¹ He achieved immediate success in practice and, as physician to the Duc de Longueville at Neu-Chatel, gained financial and political security, enabling him to review in depth published postmortem protocols and to develop other scholarly pursuits. Meanwhile, he gained clinical experience at the bedside and recorded in minutia his observations of the sick. The inveterate practice of notetaking compiemented his critical appraisal of ancient and contemporary works and led to an encyclopedic body of clinical and pathological material.

Bonet's interest in anatomy and his approach to the understanding of disease was a major break from tradition. Although Vesalius had challenged authority in anatomical dissection, Harvey had demonstrated