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“Contagium Vivum)(From Marcus Terentius Varro's (116-54 BC) “Animalia Minuta” And American Journal of Urology Research Research Article A Brief Historical Survey of the “Contagium Vivum) (From Marcus Terentius Varro’s (116-54 B.C.) “Animalia Minuta” And Titus Lucretius Carus’ (C.94-C.54 B.C.) “Semina” To Louis Pasteur’s (1822-1895) and Robert Koch’s (1843-1910) “Germs” and “Bacteria” - Prof. Sergio M1* and Prof. Bertozzi MA2 120080 ZIBIDO SAN GIACOMO (Mi) - Italy 2Head of the Complex Operative Department at the Azienda Ospedaliera Universitaria of Pisa - Italy *Address for Correspondence: Prof. Sergio Musitelli, 20080 ZIBIDO SAN GIACOMO (Mi) - Italy, Tel: +39- 029-053-748; E-mail: Submitted: 27 November 2017; Approved: 02 January 2018; Published: 03 January 2018 Cite this article: Sergio M, Bertozzi MA. A Brief Historical Survey of the “Contagium Vivum) (From Marcus Terentius Varro’s (116-54 B.C.) “Animalia Minuta” And Titus Lucretius Carus’ (C.94-C.54 B.C.) “Semina” To Louis Pasteur’s (1822-1895) and Robert Koch’s (1843-1910) “Germs” and “Bacteria”. Am J Urol Res. 2018;3(1): 001-009. Copyright: © 2018 Sergio M, et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. American Journal of Urology Research Th e insects were considered wonderfully perfect creatures since adorning a precious nail with the fi gure of “Phaeton and the quadriga Aristotle (384 - 322 B.C.). Galen (c.129- 199 A.D.) deals with them of the Sun” He states that an anonymous artist had realized the fi gure with a greatest admiration. However nobody did ever either imagine, so perfectly that an observer could see “the bits, the mouths, the front or suppose the existence of micro-organisms before Antony van - tooth that - to tell the truth - I did not succeed in seeing owing to the Leeuwenhoek (1632 - 1723), perhaps only a brief passage of Marcus smallness unless I put that wonderful beauty in full light” and adds: “It Terentius Varro’s “De re rustica” (On agriculture) excepted. Even was diffi cult for me to distinguish the sixteen legs of the horses clearly, Lucretius’ “semina morbi” and Gerolamo Fracastoro’s (1478 - 1533) but those, who succeeded in seeing them clearly could realize that “seminaria morbi” cannot at all be interpreted as if they were “living the articulations of each leg appeared to be perfect. However none creatures”, although invisible to the naked eye. First the “insects” of these legs represented a workmanship more perfect than that of a then the so called “infusoria”1 became the protagonists during the leg of a fl y! Moreover the art, which realized the leg of the fl y, fi lls the 17th century thanks to the accession of the “microscope”, so that entire insect, because the fl y lives, eats and grows”. Th is miracle that their observation brought to the demolition of Aristotle’s theory of the Divine Craft sman performs in a lowermost animal like a y,fl how “spontaneous generation” fi rst by Francesco Redi (1626 - 1698) at more astonishing and wonderful will appear in the higher animals? macroscopical level, then by Lazzaro Spallanzani (1729 - 1841) at 3 - Galen’s observation is really wonderful! All the more so microscopical level, thank to whose experiments and discoveries we because he never performed observations of insects3 and states: can affi rm that modern microbiology started. “I never dissected and would never try to perform dissections of 1 - Although there cannot be any doubt that the History of modern fl eas, worms, bees and ants. Indeed as I fi nd a lot of mistakes made Biology starts from the discoveries made thanks to the invention and by the anatomists in the description of the parts of bigger animals, the use of the instruments of optical magnifi cation, nonetheless it is the legitimate and reasonable suspicion arises that they made even no less true that the insects were the protagonists of the fi rst stage. greater mistakes in observing the littlest ones”. In these few lines one Aft er all the fi rst statement of an observation performed with the aid may surmise a criticism to Aristotle, although he respectfully doesn’t of a real magnifying instrument - if we exclude those performed by quote his name! Giovanni Rucellai (1475 - 1525) surely having recourse to a concave 4 - However Galen is quite wrong. Indeed one can fi nd just mirror and described by him in his little poem “Le api” (On the bees), in his works the fi rst attempts at a systematic research on these published by Gian Giorgio Trissino ( 1478- 1550) in 1539 - goes back “littlest animals”, which represented to him -and will represent to to the year 1610, when Galileo Galilei (1564 -1642) not only published all the biologist of the subsequent centuries till the 17th century -the his brief and fundamental treatise “Sidereus nuncius” (Th e sidereal lowermost class of the animals and were a kind of link between the nuncio), but also modifi ed his “occhiale” (spyglass), transferred his animal and the vegetal world. instrument from the observation of the infi nitely big, to that of what 5 - It is really impossible to analyse here all the pages that - in that time - was considered to be infi nitely little and described Aristotle dedicates to the study of these even littlest living creatures. the characteristics he had observed “in the eye of a certain insect” However we think that it is important to emphasize at least few of through the particular instrument, which he later called “occhialino” them, which we judge to be exceptionally interesting and such as (little glass) in the letter, with which he accompanied the gift of just to give the literally roaring measure of Aristotle’s genius. First of all an “occhialino” he sent to Federico Cesi (1585 - 1630) on September he succeeded in distinguishing male and female insects: “As for the 23/1624 insects -he writes4 -the males are littler than the females; they service *Expert of the History offi ce of the E.A.U: (European Association them at the back and it is diffi cult to separate them (during the sexual of Urology). I dedicate also this work to the memory of my adored intercourse)”. He did not succeed in seeing the eggs lied by the insects son Giulio, who was killed on May 14, 2012 by a criminal driver, who -this is true - however, aft er having correctly observed that “all the did not observe a STOP sign. insects that copulate bear larvae”5, he maintains that a particular kind of butterfl ies6 “lay a hard body that looks like a seed of bastard saff ron, **Head of the Complex Operative Department of Andrology at but is full of humour”, and it is worth observing that the average the Azienda Ospedaliera Universitaria Pisana. diameter of a bastard saff ron seed is less than 0,002 inch! 2 - Galileo’s “occhialino” was changed into “microscope” by 6 - As for the larvae, Aristotle’s statement is really exceptional: the members of the glorious “Academia dei lincei” (1603 -1630) “the animal -he affi rms - doesn’t develop from a particular part and the insects became the exceptionally fertile ground, in which of the larva, as it occurs in the hen eggs, but is the result of the the microscope fought its fi rst and exceptional battles and let the growth and diff erentiation of the entire larva”. Unfortunately he scientists discover the marvellous organization of these littlest bodies. did not succeed in observing the insect’s eggs and, by consequence, “Marvellous”, this is true, but not “unsuspected”! Indeed Galen inherited from his predecessors the theory of “spontaneous” and himself speaks of it2 on the occasion of the description of a cameo “equivocal generation”7, which survived till the 18th century, when 1. Micro - organisms that seemed to come into being “spontaneously” after “infusion” of herbs in water 4 Cf. De placitis Hippocratis et Platonis (On Hippocrates’ and Plato’s theories), V, 5, K. V, 540 2. Cf. De usu partium corporis humani (On the usefulness of the parts 5. Cf. Historia animalium (Description of animals), V, 19, 550b of the human body), XVII, 1, K. IV, 361- 362. 6. On the other hand we nowadays know that are not so few the ovovi- K. means “Claudii Galeni Opera Omnia, edited by Carl Gottlob Kühn, viparous and even viviparous insects Lipsiae, 1921 ff. The Roman numbers correspond to the volume; 7. Most probably he is alluding to the Bombyx he deals with a little the Arab ones to the chapter or the page later, but which cannot be identifi ed with the silkworm 3. It is worth observing that the term “insects” was referred to all the lower animals, from the real “insects” to the worms, which, on their 8. It was supposed to occur when the offspring of a kind of spontane- turn, also included the larvae. ously born insects derived from copulation SCIRES Literature - Volume 3 Issue 1 - www.scireslit.com Page - 002 American Journal of Urology Research it was fi nally demolished by Lazzaro Spallanzani (1729 - 1799). Yet page14, in which Aristotle describes what we call “acarus scabiei” (itch he had performed even more astonishing observations. Indeed few - mite), i.e. the Sarcoptes scabiei. “When the lice - he writes -are on lines below8 he states that “the female locusts lay their off spring into the point of forming15 little blisters appear, but without pus. Should the earth where they insert in advance the tube their tail is provided one incise them the lice come out” and adds that “in some men this with whilst the males are lacking in it” and proves to have correctly phenomenon causes a disease, should his body suff er from abundant observed the so-called “ovipositor”.
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