Thomas Platter the Younger (; ; c. 24 July 1574 in

Basel , french: link=no, Bâlois(e), it, Basilese , neighboring_municipalities= Allschwil (BL), Hégenheim (FR-68), Binningen (BL), Birsfelden (BL), Bottmingen (BL), Huningue (FR-68), Münchenstein (BL), Muttenz (BL), Reinach (BL), Riehen (BS ...

– 4 December 1628 in Basel) was a Swiss-born physician, traveller and diarist, the son of the humanist

Thomas Platter Thomas Platter the Elder (; ; 10 February 1499, in Grächen, Valais – 26 January 1582, in Basel) was a Swiss humanist scholar and writer. Biography Thomas Platter (the Elder) was a master of several languages, knowing Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, ...

the Elder. The foremost record of Platter's life is the manuscript journal he kept, written in German, between around 1595 and 1600. It details his life as a medical student in

Montpellier Montpellier (, , ; oc, Montpelhièr ) is a city in southern France near the Mediterranean Sea. One of the largest urban centres in the region of Occitania (administrative region), Occitania, Montpellier is the prefecture of the Departments of ...

and his later travels in France, Spain, Flanders, and England. The diary supplies detail on many aspects of late sixteenth-century European culture: medical education (including

dissection Dissection (from Latin ' "to cut to pieces"; also called anatomization) is the dismembering of the body of a deceased animal or plant to study its anatomical structure. Autopsy is used in pathology and forensic medicine to determine the cause o ...

s), street and carnival life in Barcelona,

European theatre The European theatre of World War II was one of the two main theatres of combat during World War II. It saw heavy fighting across Europe for almost six years, starting with Germany's invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 and ending with the ...

, and the practicalities of the

slave trade Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

Jennifer Speake Jennifer Speake, ''née'' Drake-Brockman (born 1944, Toronto) is a Canadian-British freelance writer and editor of reference books. Life Jennifer Anne Speake was born in Toronto in 1944. She was the daughter of Lieutenant-Colonel Guy Percy Lumsde ...

, ed., ''Literature of Travel and Exploration'', Taylor and Francis, 2003, pp. 967–8. Perhaps the most studied section of Platter's diary is his account of a 1599 trip to London with his older half-brother,

Felix Platter Felix Platter (also Plater ; ; Onomastic Latinisation, Latinized: Platerus; 28 October 1536 – 28 July 1614) was a Swiss people, Swiss physician, well known for his classification of psychiatric diseases, and was also the first to describe an in ...

, including a visit on 21 September, "at about two o'clock", to the

Globe Theatre The Globe Theatre was a theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare. It was built in 1599 by Shakespeare's playing company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, on land owned by Thomas Brend and inherited by his son, Nicholas Brend, and gra ...

, where Platter saw an early production of ''

Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and ...

''. His account provides

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...

scholars with evidence for the dating of that play.Marvin Spevack, Introduction to ''Julius Caesar'' by William Shakespeare, New Cambridge Shakespeare (Cambridge University Press, 1988), pp. 3–4.)

Editions

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Platter, Thomas The Younger 1536 births 1628 deaths Swiss diarists 16th-century Swiss physicians 17th-century Swiss physicians 16th-century diarists 17th-century diarists