Key Collections

Radiology

In 1971 Scotland’s first radiological collection was begun at Surgeons’ Hall by Dr Bill Copland. A bequest from the estate of Mr Bruce M Dick covered the cost of adapting the old museum workshop and staff room into a dedicated space for the new X-ray collection with viewing equipment, donated by Kodak.

Histopathology

The 1840s had seen the establishment of the use of the microscope in medicine and the study of tissue at a minute level, what is now called, histology. In 1846 the museum began forming a series of microscopic preparations on glass slides, the early foundation of the museum’s histology collection.

Casts and Models

The Barclay Collection

John Barclay (1758-1826), a leading anatomy teacher in Scotland, had a particular interest and expertise in comparative anatomy and had amassed an impressive teaching collection of over 2,500 specimens. He bequeathed his collection to the College on the condition that a new hall was built to accommodate it; this was completed in 1832. Much of Barclay's collection was transferred to other musuems in the 1950s, but a few specimens are still kept at Surgeons' Hall.

The Medina Portraits

Between 1697 and c1708 John Baptiste de Medina (later to become Sir John - he was the last man to be knighted in Scotland before the Act of Union in 1707) was commissioned to produce over thirty oval shaped, gilt framed portraits of the surgeons. As a group they create a unique historical record of a medical community of the period.