1. Objectives -- 2. Surgical and technological background -- 3. Historical sources -- 4. Origins of the armamentarium -- 5. Materials of instrument composition -- 6. Organic materials -- 7. Nonferrous metals -- 8. Ferrous metals -- 9. Gum, rubber, and plastics -- 10. Overview of materials -- 11. A Structural classification of instruments related to basic manufacture with an analysis of handles and handling -- 12. Probes and their allies -- 13. Needles and their penetrating derivatives -- 14. The Surgical blade from fingernail to ultrasound -- 15. Spring forceps (tweezers), hooks, and simple retractors -- 16. Catheters, hollow needles, and other tubular instruments -- 17. Scissors and related pivot-controlled cutting instruments -- 18. Clamps, hemostats, and related pivot-controlled forceps -- 19. Retractors, dilators, and related inset-pivoting instruments -- 20. Mixed and miscellaneous instruments -- 21. The Mechanical arrest of hemorrhage -- 22. Wound closure -- 23. Extraction of thorns, arrows, bullets, and other embedded foreign materials -- 24. Limb amputation -- 25. Counterirritation, scarification, and venesection -- 26. Variolation and vaccination -- Appendix 1. Sources of "collections" computed in chapter 5 -- Appendix 2. Copper alloys of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries -- Appendix 3. Museums and collections exhibiting surgical instruments -- Bibliography.