Examines the life and work of sixteenth-century physician Leonardo Fioravanti, and describes the medical community and practices of Renaissance Italy.

In the tradition of Galileo's Daughter and Brunelleschi's Dome, this exciting story illuminates the captivating world of the late Renaissance—in this case its plagues, remedies, and alchemy—through the life of Leonardo Fioravanti, a brilliant, remarkably forward-thinking, and utterly unconventional doctor. Fioravanti's marvelous cures and talent for self-aggrandizement earned him the adoration of the people, the scorn of the medical establishment, and a reputation as one of the age's most colorful, combative figures. Written by Pulitzer-prize nominated historian William Eamon, The Professor of Secrets entices readers into a dangerous scientific underworld of sorcerers and surgeons. Meticulously researched and engagingly written, this gripping narrative will appeal to those interested in Renaissance history, the development of science, and the historical thrillers so popular today.

He was called 'that glorious man of new miracles'...'an angel of paradise, sent by God to earth for the health and preservation of human life'. He also was accused of being a charlatan and a dangerous quack, and he served time in prison for poisoning his patients. It was from his cell that this Renaissance surgeon issued an audacious challenge: 'that there be consigned to me alone twenty - five sick people...and an equal number with similar infirmities to all the physicians of Milan. If I don't cure my patients more quickly and better than they do theirs, I'm willing to be banished forever from the city'. Leading historian and Pulitzer - nominated author William Eamon, in his thoroughly researched narrative history, ''''The Professor of Secrets'''', evokes the world of Renaissance medicine to tell the stranger - than - fiction tale of surgeon Leonardo Fioravanti. The doctor's fascinating story opens a window onto the scientific and medical world of the late Renaissance - a time when the next devastating plague was just a flea bite away. When barber surgeons frequently bled their patients along with giving them a shave. When one could buy a ticket to view a public dissection of a human body. And when doctors, according to Eamon, practiced a 'chemistry - kit - in - the - basement' style of science. As Dava Sobel's bestselling ''''Galileo's Daughter'''' intimately brings to life, through letters, the world of an astronomer and his troubles with the Church, so The Professor of Secrets reconstructs a life lost to history and tells an alternative story of the Scientific Revolution - speaking through the experiences of a man who lived on the margins of great events and witnessed them with a penetrating vision. From charlatans selling their wares in the streets, to horrifying cures and treatments, to Fioravanti's 'miraculous' contributions to medicine at the time, Eamon points up the un - romanticised realities of life during the Renaissance. And he shows us that this first 'celebrity' physician is still relevant today, as our own modern charlatans - TV doctors and fad - diet hawkers - push upon us the next latest and greatest medicines and cures.

By explaining how to sire multicolored horses, produce nuts without shells, and create an egg the size of a human head, Giambattista Della Porta's Natural Magic (1559) conveys a fascination with tricks and illusions that makes it a work difficult for historians of science to take seriously. Yet, according to William Eamon, it is in the "how-to" books written by medieval alchemists, magicians, and artisans that modern science has its roots. These compilations of recipes on everything from parlor tricks through medical remedies to wool-dyeing fascinated medieval intellectuals because they promised access to esoteric "secrets of nature." In closely examining this rich but little-known source of literature, Eamon reveals that printing technology and popular culture had as great, if not stronger, an impact on early modern science as did the traditional academic disciplines.

"Wolfe Lowenthal's quiet little memoir will with window-opening wisdom reinforce, I think, my view of how Cheng stood on Tai Chi. It tells how a young writer reacted to this strange Chinese man when he appeared in New York City in the mid-1960s and stayed there for a decade before returning to Taiwan to die in 1975. In a nickel town where neurosis is a cardinal virtue, the Tai Chi center established by Cheng soon became an oasis of learning. In my visits there I was invariably approached by a quiet fellow with a ready smile and loads of questions. His form and sensing hands improved but he never lost his kindly ways. This led me once to tell the three seniors that the one person in the club who best exemplified Tai Chi was this junior. That man who has since become a teacher of the art is the author if this book." -Robert W. Smith, from the Preface

He was called 'that glorious man of new miracles'...'an angel of paradise, sent by God to earth for the health and preservation of human life'. He also was accused of being a charlatan and a dangerous quack, and he served time in prison for poisoning his patients. It was from his cell that this Renaissance surgeon issued an audacious challenge: 'that there be consigned to me alone twenty - five sick people...and an equal number with similar infirmities to all the physicians of Milan. If I don't cure my patients more quickly and better than they do theirs, I'm willing to be banished forever from the city'. Leading historian and Pulitzer - nominated author William Eamon, in his thoroughly researched narrative history, ''''The Professor of Secrets'''', evokes the world of Renaissance medicine to tell the stranger - than - fiction tale of surgeon Leonardo Fioravanti. The doctor's fascinating story opens a window onto the scientific and medical world of the late Renaissance - a time when the next devastating plague was just a flea bite away. When barber surgeons frequently bled their patients along with giving them a shave. When one could buy a ticket to view a public dissection of a human body. And when doctors, according to Eamon, practiced a 'chemistry - kit - in - the - basement' style of science. As Dava Sobel's bestselling ''''Galileo's Daughter'''' intimately brings to life, through letters, the world of an astronomer and his troubles with the Church, so The Professor of Secrets reconstructs a life lost to history and tells an alternative story of the Scientific Revolution - speaking through the experiences of a man who lived on the margins of great events and witnessed them with a penetrating vision. From charlatans selling their wares in the streets, to horrifying cures and treatments, to Fioravanti's 'miraculous' contributions to medicine at the time, Eamon points up the un - romanticised realities of life during the Renaissance. And he shows us that this first 'celebrity' physician is still relevant today, as our own modern charlatans - TV doctors and fad - diet hawkers - push upon us the next latest and greatest medicines and cures.