John Floyer

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Sir John Floyer (March 3, 1649 - February 1, 1734), English physician and author, was the third child and second son of Elizabeth Babington and Richard Floyer, of Hints Hall. Hints is a quiet village lying a short distance from Lichfield in Staffordshire^[1]. He was educated at Oxford.

He practised in Lichfield, and it was by his advice that Dr Johnson, when a child, was taken by his mother to be touched by Queen Anne for the king's evil on March 30, 1714. As a physician, Floyer was best known for introducing the practice of pulse rate measurement, and creating a special watch for this purpose. He was an advocate of cold bathing, and gave an early account of the pathological changes in the lungs associated with emphysema.

[edit] Bibliography

Pharmako-Basauos: or the Touchstone of Medicines, discovering the virtues of Vegetables, Minerals and Animals,by their Tastes and Smells (2 vols, 1687)
The praeternatural State of animal Hurnours described by their sensible Qualities (1696)
An Enquiry into the right Use and Abuses of the hot, cold and temperate Baths in England (1697)
A Treatise of the Asthma (1st ed., 1698)
The ancient ~vxpoXoinyia revived, or an Essay to prove cold Bathing both safe and useful (London, 1702; several editions 8vo; abridged, Manchester, 1844, 12mo)
The Physician's Pulse-watch (1707-1710)
The Sibylline Oracles, translated from the best Greek copies, and compared with the sacred Prophecies (1st ed., 1713)
Two Essays:
- the first Essay concerning the Creation, Aetherial Bodies, and Offices of good and bad Angels
- the second Essay concerning the Mosaic System of the World (Nottingham, 1717)
An Exposition of the Revelations (1719)
An Essay to restore the Dipping of Infants in their Baptism (1722)
Medicina Gerocomica, or the Galenic Art of preserving old Men's Healths (1st ed., 1724)
A Comment on forty-two Histories described by Hippocrates (1726).