The Public Health in G.B. Morgagni. New historical perspectives

The article sheds light on an almost unknown aspect of the activity of G.B. Morgagni. Historians have almost entirely forgotten his work as legal medical expert for the Health Magistrate of the Republic of Venice. His numerous hand-written works well testify his evolution from the Neo-Hippocratic theories to an ante-litteram Hygiene. He surmounts the classical theory of miasma and offers a sort of microbial theory of contagion, long before the microbiological revolution of the end of the 19th century. Morgagni also provides new solutions for the control of air quality and of environmental risks, conceived as measures of Public Health, according to the neo-Hippocratic theories as well as to the Enlightment social medicine ideals.