Grisaunt, William

, a. physician, astronomer, and mathematician, and like his countryman, friar Bacon, | violently suspected of magic, lived in the fourteenth century, He studied at Merton college, Oxford; and, probably to escape the disagreeable consequences of such suspicions, went into France, where he devoted himself entirely to the study of medicine, first at Montpelier, and then at Marseilles. In this eity he fixed his residence, and lived by the practice of his profession, in which he acquired much skill and eminence. There is no greater proof of his genius, besides the imputations he laboured under in his youth, than his assiduously pursuing the method instituted by the Greek physicians, of investigating the nature and cause of the disease and the constitution of the patient. The time of his death is not known; but we are told that he was an old man in 1350, and that he had a son, who was first an abbot of canons regular at Marseilles, and at length arrived at the pontificate under the name of Urban V. Bale and Pits both give lists of his works, none of which are known to be extant. 1

1

Bale. Pits. Aikia’s Bioj. Memoirs of Medicine.