Lung

Use in the book

The Timaeus excerpt describes drink as passing through the lung toward the kidneys and bladder within its account of the reproductive outlet. The claim is part of the dialogue’s physiological narrative. A faithful translation preserves this unusual route rather than silently replacing it with the digestive tract.

Places to read

1. I.47.1.3The lung appears in the described course of drink through the body.

Translation in this edition

“Lung” is the lexical meaning even where the assigned function is unfamiliar.

Use in the book

Burton makes the lungs both an instrument of voice and an instrument of respiration. The organ’s dependence on the heart is represented politically: lungs are a town clerk or crier, or an orator attached to a king, expressing the heart’s thoughts. The marginal Latin attributed to Melanchthon repeats this relationship: the lung as instrument of voice is joined to the heart. Burton’s claim that no creature lacking lungs can utter a voice is the generalization offered as evidence within this historical account, rather than a present-day classification of animal sound.

Breathing is explained as the cooling of the heart. The neighbouring account of the heart describes blood sent to nourish the lungs, air drawn from them and vital spirits distributed through the body. The lung paragraph calls the connecting vessel the Venosal Artery, while also calling it a vein; aspera arteria names the windpipe. The later account of movement calls that windpipe the vocall Artery and compares the lungs to bellows. The diaphragm mediates their action; fresh air is brought in, sent to cool the heart and carried back when heated. The terminology and the cooling account must be read together rather than silently converted into modern circulatory physiology.

The lungs also connect passing disturbance with lasting disease. Following Seneca, Burton compares repeated and neglected melancholy provocations to a discharge that first produces a cough and, when persistent, a “consumption of the lungs,” a wasting illness. Elsewhere heated lungs are one possible explanation of facial redness, among alternatives that prevent blushing from proving a moral offence. The organ has two further material roles: lungs appear among foods judged hard to digest, while particular plants are assigned powers over the lungs as an organ to be treated. These reported uses differ from the external application of an animal’s lungs described below.

The lung family also appears outside formal anatomy. In the address to the reader, a marginal quotation presents Democritus shaking his lungs through continual laughter. This bodily image supports the portrait of the laughing observer, whereas the political orator image explains an organ’s function. In treatment, Piso is reported to recommend a ram’s lungs applied hot to the head. These are an animal substance used externally, not the patient’s own lungs; the surrounding passage places the remedy within an argument for moistening. In love melancholy, Burton reports through Hoffmann a supposed dissection at which Empedocles found a burned heart, smoke-blackened liver and dried lungs. The account moves directly into an emblem of Cupid heating a pot. It is evidence for the language of consuming passion, not independent verification that such a dissection occurred or that Plato recorded it.

Related entries

Organical parts; Anatomical arteries; Heart and cordolium; Spirits; Humoral qualities

Places to read

1. Democritus Junior to the Readercontinual laughter shakes Democritus’s lungs; the printed Juvenal locator and the edition’s correction are distinguished in the note
2. First Partition, disposition and habitlung consumption as an analogy for repeated and neglected disturbance becoming established disease
3. First Partition, anatomylungs, voice, the heart’s government and cooling; lights, pulmo, Venosal Artery and aspera arteria
4. First Partition, moving facultythe windpipe as vocall Artery and the lungs as bellows
5. First Partition, dietanimal lungs among internal organs judged difficult to digest
6. First Partition, causes of symptomsheated lungs among alternative explanations of redness without wrongdoing
7. Second Partition, medicinal simpleslungs as the target of particular plants’ reported powers
8. Second Partition, treatment of head melancholya ram’s lungs as an externally applied remedy, within the moistening argument
9. Third Partition, symptoms of love melancholythe reported dried lung and the transition from alleged dissection to love’s fire

In this edition

“Which wanteth these lights” becomes “lacking lungs.” The modern term removes the obsolete noun while retaining Burton’s claim about voice. “Aspera arteria” and “vocall Artery” both become “windpipe” in their respective passages. The venosal artery remains historically named; the edition identifies it as the old term for the pulmonary vein, while preserving the source’s arrangement of air, blood and spirits.

The margin’s “pulmo vocis instrumentum” is rendered “the lung, the instrument of voice.” This is an editorial translation of Burton’s Latin quotation, not a separate English sentence by Burton. Likewise “pulmo arefactus” is “the lung dried up” in the love passage’s margin, while Burton’s own prose has “his lungs dried up.” The margin subsequently speaks of the soul as twice boiled or burned; the body does not contain that “twice.” The anatomical family remains the same even where the two formulations differ.

aspera arteria

Printed “aspera arteria” (Latin). Attestation: phrase.

The windpipe, the cartilaginous air passage connecting external breathing with the lungs.

Argument: Its literal rough-artery wording does not make it a modern blood artery.

Context: Latin anatomical name embedded in Burton’s English.

Source: original body

Source wording, Original wording: by that aspera arteria

Modern rendering: by way of the windpipe

Alignment convention

Qualification: Original and modern units are exact substrings of the paired source.

consumption of the lungs

Printed “consumption of the lungs” (English; phrase).

Wasting illness affecting the lungs, used as an analogy for repeated disturbances becoming established disease.

Context: Senecan analogy adapted by Burton; a persistent discharge contrasted with one episode; no specific modern diagnosis assigned.

Source: original body

Source wording, Original wording: a consumption of the lungs

Modern rendering: a wasting disease of the lungs

Alignment convention

Alignment convention

lights

Printed “lights” (English). Attestation: word form.

Lungs: the respiratory organ invoked as a prerequisite of vocal utterance.

Argument: Defines the obsolete English name through its explicit antecedent Lungs.

Context: Burton’s asserted anatomical generalization.

Source: original body

Source wording: which wanteth these lights

Lungs

Printed “Lungs” (English). Attestation: word form.

Meaning and use, Argument: The lungs understood as a bodily organ of voice and respiration.

Context: Burton, with the following shape comparison attributed to Fernel.

Source: original body

Source wording: The Lungs is a thin spungy part

lungs · local use 1

Printed “lungs” (English). Attestation: word form.

Animal lungs used as an external medicinal application.

Argument: Moistening is the surrounding historical treatment rationale.

Context: Piso’s recommendation as reported by Burton.

Source: original body

Source wording: a Rams lungs applied hot to the forepart of the head

lungs · local use 2

Printed “lungs” (English; lemma). Attestation: word form.

Citation key, Printed form, Original wording, Modern rendering: lungs

Animal breathing organs, regarded here as food among the internal parts.

Context: The medical authorities cited reject this difficult-to-digest food within humoral dietetics; distinct from external medicinal use.

Source: original body

Source wording: heart, lungs, liver, spleen

Alignment convention

Alignment convention

lungs · local use 3

Printed “lungs” (English; lemma). Attestation: word form.

The breathing organs, assigned particular plant remedies in historical materia medica.

Context: Burton marvels at the reported special powers of plants; lungs are the target of treatment, not its animal ingredient.

Source: original body

Source wording: For the lungs Calamint, Liquorice

Original wording, Modern rendering: For the lungs

Alignment convention

Alignment convention

lungs heated

Printed “lungs heated” (English; phrase).

Heated breathing organs, among proposed bodily causes of facial redness.

Context: One alternative among fear, force, inexperience, other heated organs and drink; Burton disputes that all redness proves wrongdoing.

Source: original body

Source wording: from wind, the lungs heated

Original wording: the lungs heated

Modern rendering: heated lungs

Alignment convention

Alignment convention

pulmo · pulmonem

Printed “pulmonem” (Latin). Attestation: word form.

Accusative singular of the Latin lung noun; the lung is what continual laughter shakes.

Argument: Physical image of the laughing philosopher.

Context: Marginal quotation attributed to Juvenal; Democritus is the laughing subject.

Source: original marginal quotation with editorial translation

Source wording, Original wording: Perpetuo risu pulmonem agitare solebat Democritus.

Modern rendering: Democritus used to shake his lungs with continual laughter.

Alignment convention

Qualification: The whole Latin sentence aligns with the whole editorial sentence; plural English lungs renders the singular collective organ.

pulmo · local use 1

Printed “pulmo” (Latin). Attestation: word form.

The lung, considered as the bodily instrument through which voice is produced.

Argument: Lungs are attached to the heart as orator to king.

Context: Melanchthon is named as the source of the marginal political analogy.

Source: original marginal quotation with editorial translation

Source wording, Original wording: pulmo vocis instrumentum

Modern rendering: the lung, the instrument of voice

Alignment convention

Qualification: Modern unit is the supplied editorial translation of the original marginal quotation, not Burton’s English.

pulmo · local use 2

Printed “pulmo” (Latin). Attestation: word form.

Lung taken from a ram, named as an ingredient applied externally.

Argument: The animal is the organ’s source, not the patient.

Context: Marginal medical recommendation corresponding to the body’s attribution to Piso.

Source: original marginal quotation with editorial translation

Source wording, Original wording: pulmo arietis

Modern rendering: A ram’s lung

Alignment convention

Qualification: English supplies the indefinite article; Latin genitive arietis specifies a ram.

pulmo arefactus

Printed “pulmo arefactus” (Latin). Attestation: phrase.

Citation key, Printed form, Source wording, Original wording: pulmo arefactus

A dried lung in the reported bodily devastation caused by love’s fire.

Argument: Supports the image of consuming passion, with body/margin differences preserved.

Context: Marginal quotation accompanying Burton’s report through Hoffmann; not independently verified as Plato.

Source: original marginal quotation with editorial translation

Modern rendering: the lung dried up

Alignment convention

Qualification: Modern unit is the supplied editorial translation of the original marginal quotation, not Burton’s English.

Venosal Artery

Printed “Venosal Artery” (English). Attestation: phrase.

Historical vessel named in the alleged passage of air from lungs to heart; the edition identifies the pulmonary vein.

Argument: Keep historical nomenclature and function together.

Context: Burton’s cooling physiology; the following clause calls the vessel a vein.

Source: original body

Source wording: by the Venosal Artery

vocall Artery

Printed “vocall Artery” (English). Attestation: phrase.

Windpipe, here the passage by which outside air is drawn in.

Argument: Connects anatomy to the moving faculty.

Context: Burton’s account; diaphragm mediates movement and lungs act like bellows.

Source: original body

Source wording: by the vocall Artery