ZACCHIA, PAOLO. – Physician, born in Rome in 1584, died there in 1659.
He completed his elementary and secondary studies under the Piarist Fathers and the Jesuits; he obtained his medical degree in Rome. In 1644, when Pope Innocent X was pope, the latter appointed him protomedicus and pontifical architect, also on account of the high reputation he had by then attained through his Quaestiones medico-morales, which he had begun publishing as early as 1621. He was a versatile man of talent, devoting himself to painting and to composing music and poetry, but he remains famous for his medical learning and practical skill; above all, he is regarded as the founder and, for his time, an outstanding student of forensic and pastoral medicine (v. MEDICINA PASTORALE). He was buried in the church of S. Maria in Vallicella, in Rome.
In his works he wrote on the most diverse subjects and was among the first to uphold the contagiousness of tuberculosis. His Quaestiones, in 10 books, intended for physicians and students of law, the publication of which cost him approximately thirty years, deal in particular with the most varied medico-legal subjects, from pregnancy to childbirth; with dietetics and teratology; offspring and the establishment of paternity; toxicology; simulation; the contagiousness of diseases; professional errors; medical deontology; pulmonary docimasia; and the possessed and demoniacs. He also wrote a treatise on depressive neuropsychoses.
(courtesy of d. l. Vitosic)
ZAGABRIA, ARCIDIOCESI di – Our Lady of the Stone Gate. Panel painting from the 17th century – Zagreb, arch of the Stone Gate.