Czechoslovak Medical Students at Oxford

Abstract

IN connexion with the historic ceremony at Oxford on February 27 when Czechoslovak medical degrees were conferred on twenty-three Czechoslovak medical students, it is of interest to recall that on February 25, 1586/7, Wencelaus (Václav) Lavinius (that is, Lavický), a Moravian who had studied medicine for twenty years in France, Germany and Italy, and had been licensed to “incept in medicine” at Wittenberg “sub Pensero”, was admitted as M.D. of Oxford on condition that he gave three “solennes lectiones” before his departure¹. He had presented letters of introduction from Sir Francis Walsingham, and from Massionius Fontanus and J. Castolus, “pasteurs” of the French church in London. Castolus's letter stated that Lavinius had spent a year in London, had brought a letter of introduction from Beza of Geneva, and that he was “rector peregrinationum et familiæ præfectus” of Baron di Zerotini (that is, z Žerotin), a Moravian.