A Treatise on Sugar
With Miscellaneous Medical Observations

An English doctor's 1799 history of the origins, development, cultivation and uses of sugar, based on his experiences in Jamaica.

Benjamin Moseley (Author)

9781108050500, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 9 August 2012

286 pages
21.6 x 14 x 1.6 cm, 0.37 kg

Benjamin Moseley (1742–1819) was an English doctor who left England and spent eighteen years working in Kingston, Jamaica. His time there coincided with the massive expansion of sugar production on the island. Drawing on his own experience as well as an extensive range of classical and contemporary published sources, Moseley presents a lively history of the cultivation and use of sugar cane. The work, first published in 1799 and expanded in this second edition in 1800, discusses the origins of the plant and its later cultivation and development in the Americas, as well as the popularity of refined sugar. Special attention is devoted to the plant's medicinal uses. Moseley also became known for his outspoken opposition to the growing practice of vaccination, and he uses a medical essay in the appendix of this book to launch an attack on the effectiveness of cowpox in inoculations.

Preface to the second edition
A treatise on sugar
Appendix
Miscellaneous medical observations.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ]