Willem ten Rhijne (1647,

Deventer Deventer (; Sallands: ) is a city and municipality in the Salland historical region of the province of Overijssel, Netherlands. In 2020, Deventer had a population of 100,913. The city is largely situated on the east bank of the river IJssel, ...

– 1 June 1700, Batavia) was a Dutch doctor and

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

who was employed by the

Dutch East India Company The United East India Company ( nl, Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, the VOC) was a chartered company established on the 20th March 1602 by the States General of the Netherlands amalgamating existing companies into the first joint-stock ...

in 1673. In summer 1674 he was dispatched to the trading post

Dejima , in the 17th century also called Tsukishima ( 築島, "built island"), was an artificial island off Nagasaki, Japan that served as a trading post for the Portuguese (1570–1639) and subsequently the Dutch (1641–1854). For 220 years, i ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...

. While giving medical instructions and taking care of high-ranking Japanese patients, ten Rhijne collected materials on Japanese medicine, especially on

acupuncture Acupuncture is a form of alternative medicine and a component of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) in which thin needles are inserted into the body. Acupuncture is a pseudoscience; the theories and practices of TCM are not based on scientif ...

and

moxibustion Moxibustion () is a traditional Chinese medicine therapy which consists of burning dried mugwort ('' wikt:moxa'') on particular points on the body. It plays an important role in the traditional medical systems of China, Japan, Korea, Vietna ...

. In autumn 1676 he returned to Batavia where he continued to serve as a physician. In 1683 he published a book entitled "Dissertatio de Arthritide: Mantissa Schematica: De Acupunctura: Et Orationes Tres". His treatise on the art of needling which he called ''acupunctura'' was the first Western detailed study on that matter. He also wrote ''An Account of the Cape of Good Hope and the Hottentotes'', which describes the lives of the

Khoikhoi Khoekhoen (singular Khoekhoe) (or Khoikhoi in the former orthography; formerly also '' Hottentots''"Hottentot, n. and adj." ''OED Online'', Oxford University Press, March 2018, www.oed.com/view/Entry/88829. Accessed 13 May 2018. Citing G. S. ...

(then ''Hottentots'') during the early days of Dutch settlement in the Cape as well as a pioneering book on Leprosy in Asia (Dutch: Asiatise Melaatsheid) and a treatise on tea that was published by Jakob Breyne.

Works

* Disputatio medica de dolore intestinorum a flatu ��publicae medicorum disquisitioni subjicit Wilhelmus ten Rhyne ��Præs. F. de le Boe Sylvio. Lugduni Batavorum: apud viduam & haeredes Joannis Elsevirii, 1668 * Exercitatio physiologica in celebrem Hippocratis textum de vet. med. Quam ��sub praesidio ��Francisci de le Boe Sylvii ��publico medicorum examini submittit Wilhelmus ten Rhyne ��ad diem Iunii, loco horisque solitis, ante mer. Lugduni Batavorum: apud viduam & haeredes Johannis Elsevirii, 1669. * Meditationes in magni Hippocratis textum XXIV de veteri medicina quibus traduntur brevis pneumatologia, succincta phytologia, intercalaris chymología &c.; cum additamento & variis hinc inde laciniis de salvium &c. Lugduni Batavorum: apud Johannem à Schuylenburgh, 1672. * Wilhelmi ten Rhyne Medici, Botanici & Chymici quondam Magni Imperatoris Japonicæ, nunc verò Medicinæ & Anatomiæ Professoris in Batavia Emporio Indiæ Orientalis celeberrimo Excerpta ex observationibus suis Japonicis Physicis &c. de Fructice Thee. Cui accedit Fasciculus Rariorum Plantarum ab eodem D.D. ten Rhyne In Promontorio Bonæ Speï et Saldanhâ Sinu Anno MDCLXXIII. collectarum, atque demum ex Indiâ Anno MDCLXXVII. in Europam ad Jacobus Breynium, Gedanensem transmissarum. In: Jacobi Breynii Gedanensis Icones Exoticarum aliarumque Minus Cognitarum Plantarum in Centuria Prima descriptarum Plantae Exoticae. Gedani: Rhetius, 1678 (pp. II– XXV) * Wilhelmi ten Rhyne M.D. &c. Transisalano-Daventriensis Dissertatio de Arthritide: Mantissa Schematica: De Acupunctura: Et Orationes Tres. I. De Chymiae ac Botaniae antiquitate & dignitage: II. De Psysiognomia: III. De Monstris. Singula ipsius Authoris notis illustrata. Londini: imp. R. Chiswell ad insigne Rosae Corona, 1683. * Schediasma de promontorio bonae spei eiusque tractus incolis Hottentottis Wilhelmi ten Rhyne Schediasma de promontorio bonae spei eiusque ejusqve tractus incolis Hottentottis accurante, brevesque notas addente Henr. Screta S. a Zavorziz. Scafusii: Meister, 1686. (English trans.: ''An Account of the Cape of Good Hope and the Hottentotes, the Natives of that Country'', 1704) * Verhandelinge van de Asiatise Melaatsheid na een naaukeuriger ondersoek ten dienste van het gemeen. Amsterdam 1687

* Harold J. Cook: ''Matters of Exchange. Commerce, Medicine, and Science in the Dutch Golden Age''. Yale University Press, New Haven CT u. a. 2007, . * J. M. R. van Dorsson: ''Willem ten Rhijne''. In: ''Geneeskundig Tijdschrift Voor Nederlandsch-Indie''. Nr. 51, 1911, , S. 134–228. * Seiichi Iwao: ''A Dutch Doctor in Old Japan''. In: ''Japan Quarterly''. Vol. 8, No. 2, 1961, , S. 170-178. * Guizhen Lu,

Joseph Needham Noel Joseph Terence Montgomery Needham (; 9 December 1900 – 24 March 1995) was a British biochemist, historian of science and sinologist known for his scientific research and writing on the history of Chinese science and technology, i ...

: ''Celestial Lancets. A History and Rationale of Acupuncture and Moxa''. Routledge Curzon, London u. a. 2002, . * Wolfgang Michel: ''Medicine and Allied Sciences in the Cultural Exchange between Japan and Europe in the Seventeenth Century''. In: Hans Dieter Ölschleger (Hrsg.): ''Theories and Methods in Japanese Studies. Current State & Future Developments''. Papers in Honor of Josef Kreiner. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Unipress, Göttingen 2007, , S. 285–30
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* I. Schapera (ed.): ''The early Cape Hottentots. Described in the writings of Olfert Dapper (1668), Willem ten Rhyne (1686) and Johannes Gulielmus de Grevenbrock (1695)''. The Van Riebeeck Society, Cape Town 1933, (''Van Riebeeck Society Publications'' 14), (Reprint: Negro Universities Press, Westport CT 1970, ).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rhijne, Willem ten 1647 births 1700 deaths 17th-century Dutch physicians 17th-century Dutch botanists People from Deventer University of Franeker alumni Dutch East India Company people

Works

Further reading

References