The Discovery of Lactic Sugar

The discovery of lactic sugar, or, as it was called by the early writers, manna seu nitrum seri lactis, is generally ascribed to BARTOLETI (sometimes also written BARTOLETTI, BERTOLETTI, BARTHOLET, or BARTHOLDI), who is supposed to have mentioned it for the first time in his Encyclopaedia Hermetico-dogmatica... Bononiae, of which. there were three editions, namely, I615, I6I9, and i 6zi. The date of the discovery of lactic sugar is therefore sometimes given as . I 615 or I 6 I 9. As far as I have been able to ascertain, ETTMULLER (i) in 1736 was the first to mention BARTOLETI'S claim: "Serum lactis habet in se sal volatile nitrosum; vnde BARTHOLETUS praeparat ex sero lactis remedium, quod vocat mannam seu ritrum seri lactis, in Encvclop. p. 400." ETTMiULLER was followed by SPIELMANN (2), BERGMAN (3), FOURCROY (4), GMELIN (5), THOMSON (6), Kopp (7),