NANSICH, ABRAHAM. Aleh Teruphah ["Leaf of Healing": Halachic responsum permitting the use of innoculation to combat smallpox and other novellae]

(MEDICINE).

Alexander ben Judah & Son

London

1785

FIRST EDITION

Vinograd, London 111; Roth, London 52

The author records a conversation with the late Moroccan Kabbalist Shalom Buzaglo who reported that women in his native Morocco had anticipated the use of innoculation to ward off smallpox via their unique use of folk medicine. Innoculation against smallpox gained currency in English society, due to the social-relief efforts of Lady Montagu, and the British Royal Family, who adopted the practice during the smallpox epidemic that hit London in 1721. Later in 1796, Edward Jenner refined the ages-old technique with his discovery that injection of cowpox into humans could spare them the blain of smallpox, a potentially fatal disease