Catalogus librorum rei medicae, herbariae, & chymiae bibliothecae Joannis Riolani medicorum Parisensium primarii.

The earliest sale catalogue of a private scientific or medical library may be that of Jean Riolan the Younger. John F. Fulton (1899-1960) owned a possibly unique copy of an inventory sale catalogue of Riolan’s library issued by the Parisian booksellers Simeon Piget and Federicus Leonard in 1654. The library must have been purchased outright by John Martyn and James Allestrye, booksellers for the Royal Society, as they issued the above inventory sale catalogue of the complete library in 1665. Fulton observed that neither of the Riolan catalogues include prices and tentatively concluded that the books were disposed of to the highest offer through private negotiation. See Fulton, The great medical bibliographers (1951) 27-28.