First printing of the sixteenth-century statues of the London hospitals. Tradition has it that it was published at the instigation of Samuel Pepys. Hospitals in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were of more general use than they are today. They were charitable houses erected to provide a range of benefits the poor: schools, places of apprenticeship for poor children, workhouses, prisons, places of resort for the old and disabled as well as lying-inn hospitals and places for the sick and diseased.  

 D'Arcy Power in "Notes on the bibliography of three sixteenth-century English books connected with London Hospitals" (The Library, 4th series) also Foundations of Medical History, 1931, p.124-8, observed of this book: "a casual examination of the book shows no reason to doubt the statement of the year 1557 made on the title page". The clue to the real date of publication is the name "Goodfellow" at the end of the minutes of the 5th printed page. John Goodfellow was town clerk from 1690-1700 and his name is printed here verifying the correct transcription of the sixteenth-century ordinance. In 1681 the court of Alderman, the governing body of the City of London, made a concerted attempt to regain control of the management of the four London hospitals which were becoming more independent. The 1557 ordinances confirmed the Corporation's authority but existed only in manuscript. Copies were therefore printed and distributed to the governors of the hospitals and every member of the Corporation of the City of London. Pepys was governor of the Mathematical School of Christ's Hospital, recently established at his instigation, and it is said that he was responsible for the edition. The statutes contain sections on the number and duties of the governors, the courts governing the hospitals, the rules governing the admission of children and pensioners, of putting the children into service, the examination of single women found to be with child, the officers of President, Treasurer, Surveyor and all the lesser officers of the hospital including the Matron, The Nurses and Keepers of Wards, Butler, Porter, Shoemaker, Schoolmaster, Barber and Beadles. One of the chief officers was the Matron who was responsible for the condition of the women and children in the House and her duties mainly comprised keeping the nurses in order and seeing to the cleanliness and hygiene of the place.