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VESALIUS AT 500
an exhibition commemorating the five-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Andreas Vesalius
Exhibition and catalogue by Philip Oldfield
ThomAS FIShEr rArE book LIbrAry, UnIVErSITy oF ToronTo
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Catalogue by Philip Oldfield Edited by Pearce Carefoote, Anne Dondertman, Barry Walfish Exhibition curated by Philip Oldfield Mounted by Linda Joy Digital photography by Paul Armstrong Printed by Coach House Press, Toronto Typset in Goodchild, designed by Nick Shinn
Front cover: Portrait of Vesalius engraved by Jan Wan- delaar for Vesalius’s Opera omnia anatomica & chirur- gica. Leiden, 75. Back cover: the first skeletal figure from De humani corporis fabrica. Basel. 543
Title page: the ornamental initial V was specially cut for the 555 edition of De Humani corporis fabrica. It depicts Apollo flaying Marsyas, loser in a music con- test between the two, presided over by the Muses.
LIbrAry And ArchIVES cAnAdA cATALogUIng In PUbLIcATIon
Oldfield, Philip, author Vesalius at 500 : an exhibition commemorating the five hundredth anniversary of the birth of Andreas Vesalius / by Philip Oldfield.
A catalogue of an exhibition of rare books held at the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, May 3 - August 9, 04, commemorating the 500th anniversary of the birth of Andreas Vesalius. The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library owns most of the books in this exhibition, others are borrowed from private collectors. Includes bibliographical references.
ISbn 978-0-777-6-5 (pbk.)
. Vesalius, Andreas, 54-564–Exhibitions. . Human anatomy–Early works to 800–Bibliography–Exhibitions. 3. Medicine–Early works to 800–Bibliography–Exhibitions. 4. Rare books–Bibliography–Exhibitions. 5. Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library–Exhibitions.
I. Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, issuing body, host institution II. Title.
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Pozeg throughout the process of planning the PrEFAcE exhibition. We are sincerely grateful to all those whose generosity has made it possible for us to When we were first approached by Dr put together what we hope is a fitting tribute Vogrincic in 2011 about whether the Fisher to the life and work of ‘the prince of Library had an interest in being the repository anatomists’. for a special copy of the second edition of Fab- rica, we little realized how momentous an The influence of Vesalius continues to be felt opportunity was presenting itself. The confir- today not only by those with an interest in the mation by Dr Vivian Nutton that the annota- history of medicine, but also by anyone who tions in that 1555 copy were genuinely by admires the beauty of image and text as com- Vesalius, and the resulting scholarly interest in bined on the handsome folio pages of his most that copy dovetailed with the plans we already famous work. Generations of medical illustra- had to commemorate the five-hundredth tors, including each year’s new cohort from the anniversary of Vesalius’s birth with a special University of Toronto’s Biomedical Communi- exhibition in 2014. The exhibition has been ably cations Department, marvel anew at the curated by Philip Oldfield, History of Science expressive portrayal of the human body, and and Medicine librarian at the Fisher Library, Vesalius’s passionate commitment to making who has also written the accompanying cata- that portrayal both accurate and beautiful. logue.
The Fisher Library’s medical holdings are Anne Dondertman impressive, but we have been able to supple- Director, Fisher Library ment our own resources in a most remarkable way for this exhibition. In addition to the extraordinarily important annotated copy of the second edition, made available to us on deposit, we have been fortunate to collaborate with other private collectors, as well as Christopher Lyons of the Osler Library at McGill University. Our own collections together with the works on loan have enabled us to situate Vesalius within the long tradition of anatomical knowledge and teaching up to his time, as well as to present an almost com- plete set of Vesalius’s own work. For example, from the Fisher’s own collections the first edi- tion of Fabrica and the German edition of the Epitome of the same year are being displayed alongside the Latin edition of the Epitome on loan from Dr Eugene Flamm, who has con- tributed a number of other important works to our exhibition. Stuart Rose has kindly lent the only other book known to have been anno- tated by Vesalius, Guenther’s Institutiones anatomicae. Dr Brian Morrison has lent an example of one of the plates from a contempo- rary plagiarized edition of Tabulae anatomicae sex. In addition to the 1555 annotated copy of Fabrica, Dr Vogrincic has contributed other items from his collection including many of the portraits and the medals. When I saw the extremely scarce first edition of Mondino’s Anatomia on sale by distinguished bookseller Jonathan A. Hill in New York earlier this year I knew that it would be a fabulous addition to our exhibition. Jonathan has very generously allowed us to put it on display, along with a six- teenth-century edition on loan from the Osler Library. I would also like to acknowledge the support and encouragement of Dr Zlatko FIS Vesalius 17_Layout 1 14-05-24 10:30 AM Page 6 FIS Vesalius 17_Layout 1 14-05-24 10:30 AM Page 7
Vesalius was born into a family with a long VESALIUS AT 500 medical pedigree. His great-great-grandfather, Peter Witing, had assembled a large medical InTrodUcTIon library, and had written a commentary on the This year we are commemorating the five- fourth fen of the encyclopaedic Latin version of hundredth anniversary of the birth of one of the Canon of the Persian physician Avicenna. In the great figures in the history of medicine. The his professional capacity Witing had attended fame and significance of Andreas Vesalius rest Emperor Friedrich III (45-493). Vesalius’s almost entirely on one book, his monumental great-grandfather, Johannes (d. 476), had also De humani corporis fabrica, first published in been in royal service as physician to Mary of 543. The Fabrica (as it is commonly referred to) Burgundy (457-48), wife of the future Holy is justifiably celebrated for its splendid wood- Roman Emperor Maximilian I (459-59). cuts that introduced art into the sphere of Johannes is recorded under the Latinized form anatomy, and set the standard for all future of his name, Johannes de Wesalia, in the reg- anatomical illustration. The enduring signifi- ister of the University of Leuven [Louvain] cance of the illustrations is attested to by the where he taught medicine, before being fact that they were still being copied and imi- appointed city physician of Brussels around tated two hundred years after their first 447. It was during Johannes’s lifetime that the appearance. In addition to its illustrations, the family surname was changed from Witing to Fabrica also conveys a vitally important text, Van Wesele. universally regarded as the cornerstone for the study and teaching of human anatomy. The Johannes’s eldest son, Everard, followed in his new approach Vesalius introduced to the father’s footsteps by becoming physician to formal instruction of anatomy, and the Mary of Burgundy, and to her husband the methodology he developed for presenting regent of the Netherlands, Archduke (from anatomical information based on direct and 508 Emperor) Maximilian I, and their children. accurate observation, were revolutionary in Everard also wrote a commentary on the med- their consequences. In addition to its other ical writings of Rhazes, (Ab¯u Bakr Muh.ammad merits, the Fabrica was also an excellent prac- ibn Zakariya¯ Ra¯zı¯ (854-95)) and on the first tical manual on dissection. The beautifully ren- four parts of the Aphorisms of Hippocrates. dered woodcuts blend elegantly with the printed text, resulting in a masterpiece of the Andreas, the father of Vesalius, was the illegiti- printer’s art - the perfect marriage of text and mate son of Everard. He was trained as an illustration. The Fabrica is without doubt one apothecary and entered the imperial service of of the splendours of Renaissance scientific book the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (500- making. 558) in that capacity. At an unknown date Andreas married Isabel, daughter of Jacob Yet despite the book’s universal appeal, sur- Crabbe, a tax-collector of Brussels, and prisingly little is known about its creator. The Catherine Sweerts. As part of his daughter’s biography of Vesalius is somewhat sketchy, and dowry, Jacob Crabbe provided a house on Helle there are large gaps in the narrative, particu- Straetken in the Haute Rue quarter, located in larly during his formative years, and in the final the southern part of Brussels. It was here that years of his life. What little we do know about Vesalius was born in 54. In the same house him, especially regarding his medical education his elder brother Nicolas, his younger brother and career, is gleaned from his own remarks Franciscus, and sister Anne were also born. The and observations found in his published writ- house was demolished in 6. On its site now ings. The testimony of his contemporaries stands L’église Saints-Jean-et-Étienne-aux-Min- helps to fill some of the gaps. imes. If we are to believe the testimony of the brilliant mathematician, astrologer, and physi- Andreas Vesalius was born André Van Wesele cian, Girolamo Cardano (50-576), who cast at the end of 54, the second son of Andreas Vesalius’s horoscope in 547, the anatomist was and Isabel Van Wesele. The family’s original born at 05:45 on the morning of 30 December. surname, Wijtinck or Witing, was subsequently At the time of Vesalius’s birth Brussels was one changed to Wesele – a reflection of the geo- of the principal cities of the renamed Duchy of graphical origin of their predecessors. The com- Brabant, which on the death of Mary of Bur- mercial centre of Wesel is located at the gundy in 48 became known as the Habsburg confluence of the Rhine and Lippe rivers in the Netherlands. Duchy of Clèves, a state within the Holy Roman Empire (modern North Rhine-West- phalia in Germany).
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Cardano’s horoscope of Vesalius
EArLy EdUcATIon reading Aristotle’s De anima, and Gregor On the details of Vesalius’s early life there is Reisch’s encyclopaedic compendium, the Mar- practically no information. The family home in garita philosophica. In particular he recalls the Brussels was close to a place known as Gallows diagram of the human brain indicating the five Hill (Galgenberg), where executed criminals senses. were exposed to the elements; the site is now occupied by the Palais de Justice. From UnIVErSITy oF PArIS 533-537 Vesalius’s own testimony we know that as a Vesalius’s decision to pursue a medical career boy he dissected small animals such as rats, was taken on the advice of a family friend, mice, moles, and an occasional cat or dog. It is Nicolas Flourens, who had also studied at likely that the young Andreas attended the ele- Leuven, before becoming physician to the mentary school run by the Brethren of the Emperor Charles V. In his first published work, Common Life (Fratres Vitae Communis), but Paraphrasis in nonum librum Rhazae medici there is no documentary evidence to support arabis clariss. ad Regum Almansorem (537), this assumption. On completion of his elemen- Vesalius acknowledges his indebtedness to tary schooling, Vesalius moved to Leuven in Flourens by dedicating the Paraphrasis, as well February 530 to prepare himself for university. as a later work, known as the Venesection Letter The University of Leuven at that time consisted of 539, to the “patron of my early studies.” It is of a group of colleges, known as pedagogia. also likely that Flourens urged the young Vesalius entered the college known as the Vesalius to pursue his medical studies at the Castle School (Pedagogium Castrense), where prestigious University of Paris, considered at the curriculum was designed for students that time to be the leading medical school out- taking the degree of Master of Arts, a prerequi- side of Italy. site for entry into a professional school. Latin and Greek, rhetoric, and philosophy were By September 533 Vesalius had arrived in obligatory subjects. Among Vesalius’s fellow Paris, where he took up lodgings with an old students was Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle friend from Leuven, Jean Sturm. Vesalius was (57-586), the future statesman and Primate nineteen years of age – too young to be of the Netherlands, who also became chan- awarded the Masters of Arts, although he had cellor to the Emperor Charles V, and to King completed all the degree requirements. Under Philip II of Spain. While pursuing his studies at such circumstances the university administra- the Castle School, Vesalius also attended tion usually admitted the candidate, deferring courses at the College of Three Languages [Ped- award of the degree until a later date. Vesalius agogium Trilingue], established in 57 by the duly registered as a candidate (philiater) for humanist Jeroen van Busleyden (470-57), a the baccalaureate in medicine. close friend of Erasmus (466-536). At the Col- lege, Vesalius developed his competence in The statutes of the medical faculty at the Uni- scholastic Latin, and mastered classical Greek, versity of Paris, established in 350, had as well as acquiring a rudimentary knowledge changed little over the next two centuries. of Hebrew. From his schooldays Vesalius recalls Members of the Faculty of Medicine who
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taught regular courses were known as regent cine in all its branches were dominated by the doctors; they also presided over academic dis- writings of Galen (9-ca. 6 CE), the spiritual putations and theses. Students were expected successor of Hippocrates (circa 470-360 bcE). to follow a demanding curriculum. Courses ran every day from early morning, except on The extremely prolific Galen wrote on all Thursdays and certain feast days, from the aspects of medicine. Throughout the medieval second week of November until 8 June, for period, it was mainly Galen’s works on physical thirty-six months spread over four years. The medicine and therapeutics that were copied, curriculum consisted of lectures in Latin cov- circulated, and closely studied by Arab and ering the main medical disciplines of pharmacy, Byzantine scholars, resulting in a large number physiology, surgery, pathology, botany (materia of commentaries and translations into Syriac, medica), anatomy, hygiene, and therapeutics, as Arabic, Hebrew, and Latin. At a time when expounded in the writings of Hippocrates, little importance was attached to the study of Galen, Avicenna, Averroes, Avenzoar, Rhazes, the body’s structure (despite Galen’s frequent and the scholars of the Schola Medica Salerni- exhortations about the crucial role of anatomy tana. In addition two specially elected regent in the study of medicine), his anatomical writ- doctors, known as professors-in-ordinary, sup- ings were of no practical interest to physicians, plemented the so-called ordinary lectures with and were largely neglected and even forgotten. more detailed daily lectures. Candidates for the The resulting decline in anatomical investiga- baccalaureate in medicine were also employed tion was to persist throughout the medieval as instructors, who were required to give lec- period. From the third century cE until the tures or papers (cursus) on a variety of medical dawn of the Renaissance, dissection was little themes. practiced in Byzantium or the Islamic lands, and had all but disappeared. Most physicians AnATomy AT PArIS were satisfied with a modicum of anatomical Although the study of anatomy became a knowledge in order to treat wounds, and to requirement for medical candidates at Paris perform simple surgical procedures, disloca- from the late fifteenth century, prior to 478 tions, and fractures. very little dissection had actually taken place. Surviving records report a dissection being car- As Vesalius reminded readers of the Fabrica, ried out in 407, but there are no further refer- anatomy had been an important subject of ences until 478. Anatomy did not yet enjoy the study in ancient Alexandria in the third century status of an independent discipline, and was bcE, and human dissection had been widely regarded as a mere adjunct to surgery. As such, practiced. Herophilus (circa 335-circa 80 bcE), it came under the purview of the surgeon or a member of the Alexandrine school, was barber, rather than the physician, who reputed to have been an expert dissector, and regarded dissection with some distaste. Mem- the author of a number of medical works, bers of the Guild of Surgeons of Paris and bar- including a treatise on anatomy, long since lost. bers, being excluded from the Faculty of Both he and Erasistratus of Ceos (active circa Medicine, had established their own schools, 80 bcE) were believed to have performed dis- though they did attend and even participated section and even vivisection on condemned in dissections carried out at the University. But criminals. they were always considered subservient, and did not enjoy the same status or privileges as There is no evidence that Galen ever performed the physicians, and had no say in the teaching human dissections during his time in Alexan- of anatomy at the University. dria. In his writings he urged practitioners to undertake dissections as frequently as they As a result, anatomical instruction in Paris could, even though this opportunity was lagged behind the teaching of the subject in denied to Galen himself, for in Asia Minor Italy, where surgeons were admitted into the where he spent his early professional life, dis- universities. In general French medical practi- section was forbidden by law. Elsewhere the tioners were uninformed about Italian medi- practice of human dissection was hampered by cine, and there was a distinct lack of contact religious scruples, legal restrictions, social between the conservative French universities taboos, and the general unavailability of and their progressive Italian counterparts. But cadavers. the tide was beginning to turn, as the spirit of a new classical scholarship took root. Contrary to common belief, the attitude of the Church to dissection was one of tacit tolerance gALEn And AnATomy rather than outright condemnation. Provided From the third century right up to the seven- the corpse was treated with dignity, and was teenth century the study and practice of medi- given a Christian burial (if appropriate), the
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Church raised no objections to the practice of the eleventh century, public dissections were dissection. After all, viewed from a theological gradually introduced into the curricula. The standpoint, dissection revealed the wondrous first public dissection took place at the Univer- design and wisdom of the Creator. The ecclesi- sity of Bologna in 307. Public dissections con- astical authorities, on the other hand, were tinued at Bologna throughout the fourteenth quick to condemn as sacrilegious the robbing of century, and became a standard part of the graves to procure anatomical specimens. medical curriculum thereafter, and were incor- Human vivisection was also vigorously con- porated into the university’s statutes in 405. demned. The Islamic attitude to human dissec- The earliest recorded dissection to have taken tion was slightly more complex and place at the University of Padua is 34. The inconclusive. Nowhere in the Qur’an is dissec- statutes of 465 made provision for a public dis- tion explicitly proscribed, though mutilation section to take place annually before an audi- and the breaking of bones are forbidden, as is ence of teachers and a limited number of the desecration of graves. Without specific students. At Venice public dissections began in interdictions against dissection, the legal 368, at Florence in 388, and later in several Islamic authorities acted indecisively. If the other Italian university cities. Outside of Italy cadaver to be dissected was that of a non- officially approved dissections were granted Muslim, there was no opposition. But if the every other year to Montpellier in 340, and corpse was that of a Muslim, the situation was annually to Vienna in 404, Prague in 460, quite different, and the authorities could inter- Paris in 478, and Tübingen in 485. vene, though there is no evidence that they actually did. In Bologna, as in other institutions of medical education, public anatomical demonstrations Even though the religious authorities did not followed a standard format that had been in explicitly condemn dissection, there was a gen- effect since the early fourteenth century. In a eral sense that opening a cadaver was a sacrile- temporarily erected theatre, proceedings were gious and barbaric act. The sight of blood and presided over by an instructor or lector, who sat gore, and the stench of putrefaction impeded in his chair (cathedra) reading aloud the pre- the development of anatomical research. And if scribed Latin text, and making the occasional considerations of morality and squeamishness additional comment. The specimen to be dis- were not major concerns, there was still the sected, usually an executed criminal, was laid imagined threat of contagion. out supine on the dissecting table, while those in attendance crowded around. The dissection Several alternative means for gathering itself was often spread over three or four days, anatomical knowledge were available. Much and was performed by a surgeon or barber, information could be gleaned from the living while an ostensor pointed out the parts being body, such as the eruption of the wisdom teeth, discussed. The whole ritualized procedure was the pulse, nerve sensations, and anatomical designed to demonstrate anatomy in accor- anomalies such as double joints. Vital anatom- dance with the writings of Galen; its purpose ical information might also be acquired was not to verify the text against the evidence through the examination of deep wounds in of the body, or to discover new anatomical dead and living bodies. As physician to the structures. The model made no allowance for Gladiator School in Pergamum, Galen had debate or close individual investigation by the ample opportunity to examine wounds, but he students, and was more of a rigid academic cer- regarded this as inadequate for the real study emony with little didactic benefit. The sheer of the human body, as it only provided details size of the audience, which could number sev- of surface anatomy. The dissection of animals, eral hundred, disallowed any close intimate particularly the Barbary ape (Macaca sylvanus), study. This format for dissection was main- whose anatomy, Galen claimed, closely resem- tained right up to the time of Vesalius, and bled that of humans, provided the greatest even beyond. It is hardly surprising, therefore, source of anatomical information. Other ani- that the teaching of anatomy stagnated. mals exploited for dissection were dogs and pigs. A much rarer source of anatomical speci- For almost two thousand years anatomical pro- mens was the unburied corpses of outlaws who cedures were based on the doctrine of the three had been exposed on mountainsides, to be venters, derived from the teachings of Plato devoured by birds or wild animals. The (circa 48-circa 347 bcE). In the Timaeus Plato cadavers of stillborn or aborted fetuses pro- attempted to explain the nature and purpose of vided yet another source of specimens. the physical world, and the creation of the uni- verse. He had neither interest nor experience in AnATomy And dISSEcTIon physical anatomy, and was concerned only in With the founding of universities in Europe in the philosophical significance of the body,
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PrE-VESALIAn AnATomIcAL WorkS: mondIno dEI LUzzI Anatomical treatises were not unknown before the fourteenth century, but they merely formed part of larger works of surgery. Anatomia, the textbook prepared by Mondino de Luzzi (circa 70–36) in 36 for use by his students, is regarded as the first book devoted entirely to anatomy, and became the standard manual of anatomical dissection for the next two hun- dred years. The practical method of dissection, advocated by Galen, was followed by Mondino, who in 306 became the inaugural Professor of Practical Anatomy at the Univer- sity of Bologna.
Although Galen’s doctrines were well estab- lished in European universities by the start of the fourteenth century, the Galenic anatomical texts available to Mondino in preparing his textbook, were few and far between, and were mostly incomplete or corrupt. He had to rely on depiction of the three venters from Gregor Reisch’s Mar- abridged versions of De usu partium [On the garita philosophica, 508 Use of Parts] and of De locis affectis [On Affected Parts], and a few other fragmentary which for him was the vehicle of the soul, the texts. result of intentional design by a superior Being. By the end of the fifteenth century the few According to Plato, the body consists of three anatomical illustrations that existed were of cavities, or venters, separated by the natural little significance. They were not intended to be demarcations of neck and diaphragm. The realistic depictions of what was seen, but were lower venter, extending downwards from the rather mnemonic representations of what tra- diaphragm to the pubic bone, contains the dition demanded. Moreover, illustrations were abdominal viscera. The middle venter, between used haphazardly, with no direct relationship the neck and the diaphragm, is home to the to the text. heart and lungs. The higher region, above the neck, houses the brain. This arrangement of FAScIcULUS mEdIcInAE abdomen, chest, and brain corresponds to the This kind of illustration is evident in the Fasci- three bodily functions – nutritive, vital, and culus medicinae, sometimes attributed to sensitive - and was an integral part of the Johannes de Ketham. First published at Venice humoral theory of medicine. The veins carried in 49, it was reprinted several times during nutriment from the liver to the rest of the body; the final years of the fifteenth century and the the arteries distributed blood and spirit from early decades of the sixteenth century. The Fas- the heart, while the nerves carried senses to the ciculus is the earliest printed book to include brain and motion from the brain to the mus- anatomical illustrations of any significance. The cles. full-page woodcuts reveal the state of medicine at the end of the medieval period. They are Although originally a philosophical doctrine, schematic, and contributed little to the the three venter division also provided a prac- advancement of anatomical knowledge. The tical means for organizing anatomical proce- illustration in the Fasciculus of a dissection in dures. In the context of dissection, it was progress is of considerable interest, as it depicts expedient to open the lower venter first, as the the format of anatomical demonstration viscera were the most susceptible to rapid employed throughout the fourteenth and fif- decomposition. Once the viscera had been teenth centuries. dealt with, the organs of the middle venter were examined, and finally the brain in the By the second decade of the sixteenth century upper venter. other illustrated anatomical texts that dis- played a more sophisticated approach to the subject were printed. The most important works were those by Jacopo Berengario da Carpi, and Johann Dryander.
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Woodcut of a dissection from the early sixteenth century, from the Fasciculus medicinae of 5. In the centre is the instructor seated in an elevated chair, reading the prescribed anatomical textbook. In the lower centre the dissection is performed by a barber or surgeon while the figure on the right, the ostensor, points to the various anatomical parts being discussed.
the ancient authority of Galen. He produced a JAcoPo bErEngArIo dA cArPI useful manual of dissection that superseded Jacopo Berengario (460-530) completed his Mondino’s, and was the best work of its kind monumental Commentaria cum amplissimis before the Fabrica. He was also a strong advo- additionibus super Anatomia Mundini in 5. cate of private dissection, and was one of the This commentary on Mondino’s textbook pro- first anatomists to understand that verbal vided a complete guide to earlier anatomical descriptions were sometimes insufficient to writings, and was Berengario’s most significant clarify complex anatomical structures, which contribution to anatomical knowledge. A much were best served through illustration. Some of condensed version of the Commentaria, enti- the woodcuts are crudely rendered, but they tled Isagogae breves, was issued in 5 in a were adequate for Berengario’s purposes in the small quarto of eighty leaves, richly illustrated 50s. As anatomical knowledge grew, the need with woodcuts. It was republished, with for more accurately drawn and minutely changes and revisions, in 53, 530, and 535. detailed illustrations was acutely felt, and was In several respects Berengario anticipated eventually realized in the magnificent wood- Vesalius. He was one of the first to challenge cuts of Vesalius’s artist.
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JohAnn dryAndEr Galen’s hitherto unknown or forgotten writ- Johann Dryander (500-560) had planned a ings on anatomy. comprehensive treatise on the anatomy of the In 54 Leoniceno’s Latin translation of a small whole human body, but only the first part, collection of Galen’s writings was printed by devoted to the head, was issued. It appeared in Henri Estienne in Paris, and in 58, Estienne’s September 536 with the title: Anatomia capitis son-in-law Simon de Colines, printed Leoni- humani. A second edition followed in June 537 ceno’s Latin version of De motu musculorum with the revised title Anatomiae, hoc est, cor- [On the Movement of the Muscles]. poris humani dissectionis pars prior. Twenty- three woodcut illustrations present a Of the twenty-six surviving Galenic works sequential dissection of the head, along with dealing with anatomy and physiology, the most the tools necessary for the task. Dissection of important were De usu partium corporis humani the neck, the base of the skull, the jaw and the and De anatomicis administrationibus [On teeth are also depicted. anatomical procedures]. The former was avail- able throughout the Middle Ages in a variety of chArLES ESTIEnnE abridged or corrupt copies. In the early four- Another precursor of Vesalius was Charles Esti- teenth century it became better known thanks enne (circa 505-56), whose richly illustrated to the Latin translation by Niccolò da Reggio anatomical volume, De dissectione partium cor- (b. 80) that was later printed at Paris by poris humani libri tres, eventually appeared in Simon de Colines in 58. De anatomicis 545, following a six-year delay over a legal dis- administrationibus was rediscovered only in pute between Estienne and his surgical assis- 58. tant Etienne de la Riviere. The curious woodcuts of this beautifully printed book are gALEn And PArIS not as anatomically sophisticated as those in The leading Galenists at the University of Paris the Fabrica, yet do display a certain artistry and in the 530s were Johann Guenther of Ander- originality. nach (505-574), and Jacobus Sylvius (478- 555), two of the most influential teachers of ThE gALEnIc rEVIVAL anatomy during Vesalius’s student years at When Vesalius arrived in Paris, the recovery of Paris. Following Leoniceno’s lead, both men Galen’s texts, a trend that had begun in Italy immersed themselves in translating Galen into towards the end of the fifteenth century, was in Latin. Guenther alone translated more than full swing. One of the leaders of the Galenic forty Galenic texts, including De anatomicis revival in Italy was Niccolò Leoniceno (48- administrationibus. 54), professor of medicine, mathematics, and philosophy at the University of Ferrara, whose As the influence of the newly recovered Galenic personal library was renowned for its rare and texts began to spread, Galen’s anatomical writ- extensive collection of Greek medical and sci- ings formed the basis for the study of anatomy entific manuscripts. Finding the Latin transla- at several European universities, including the tions of Galen to be riddled with errors and University of Paris. But the enthusiasm for inaccuracies, Leoniceno strongly advocated a Galen demonstrated in Paris soon developed return to original Greek sources. into a new conservatism. Members of the Fac- ulty, particularly Guenther and Sylvius, dis- As more of the writings of Galen were discov- played a blind enslavement to Galenic ered in Greek manuscripts, and in Latin trans- doctrines, which put paid to any free academic lations of the numerous Arabic versions that enquiry in the sphere of anatomy. For these circulated in manuscript, the restoration of the zealots Galen was infallible, and his writings Galenic canon reached a highpoint in 55, sacrosanct. when the first Greek edition of his known writ- ings was published by the heirs of Aldo Significant changes in dissecting procedures Manuzio in Venice. Other editions in Greek were soon introduced at Paris. Much more soon followed, including the important edition attention was devoted to the bones and mus- in seven volumes, printed by Andreas cles in contrast to previous anatomical practice, Cratander at Basel in 538. New Latin transla- which concentrated on the viscera of the three tions of Galen also began to proliferate. Initially venters. In De anatomicis administrationibus publication focused on Galen’s writings on Galen again stressed the importance of the practical medicine, therapeutics, and hygiene, skeleton as the foundation of the structure of which had been preserved in large numbers in the body and the muscles as its moving agents. Arabic and Latin translations. But in the years immediately prior to Vesalius’s arrival in the One of Guenther’s most influential works was French capital, attention began to shift to Institutionum anatomicarum secundum Galeni
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survived in Arabic translations. Ignorance of this fact demonstrates the unfamiliarity in Paris with Italian anatomical writings. Also telling is the fact that Vesalius did not correct the erroneous attribution in his revised edition of the Institutiones anatomicae.
Sylvius, too, worked diligently on arranging, organizing, and abstracting the vast and growing corpus of the writings of Galen. He produced a series of synoptic tables and other aids designed to help students navigate their way through the newly published ancient texts. His endeavours were much appreciated by his students, including Vesalius. Despite a relatively late start in medicine, Sylvius became an academic instructor at the age of fifty-three, and enjoyed both success and popularity. Two of his works, Ordo, et ordinis ratio in legendis Hippocratis et Galeni libris (54) and In Hip- pocrates et Galeni physiologiae partem anatomicam isagoge (54), although published after Vesalius had left Paris, represent Sylvius’s teaching from 53. Both Guenther and Sylvius also played a major role in developing and pop- sententiam ad candidatos medicinae libri ularizing “new” Latin anatomical terminology. quatuor, a succinct survey of Galen’s writings for medical students that at the same time pro- Vesalius later criticized the conservative nature vided a manual for dissection. First published of anatomical instruction in Paris, but at first he at Paris in 536, and again at Basel the same enjoyed a cordial relationship with his year, Guenther’s textbook was used by Vesalius teachers. On several occasions Vesalius claims as a guide in preparing his 538 publication, to have learned practically nothing from Tabulae anatomicae sex. Vesalius found certain Sylvius on human anatomy, but he does discrepancies between what Galen had acknowledge his teacher’s superior knowledge allegedly written, and the observable facts. of the Galenic canon, and recognized the value Believing the errors to be Guenther’s and not of his lectures on dissection. Vesalius was also Galen’s, Vesalius set about amending Guen- grateful to Guenther for teaching him the rudi- ther’s text, and correcting the large number of ments of dissection, even if Guenther did none typographical errors. The revised edition, with of the dissecting himself. Instead, he allowed Vesalius’s name on the title page, was pub- his students to carry out the work – an oppor- lished in Venice in 538. Although Vesalius’s tunity seized upon by Vesalius, ever eager to name does not appear on the title page of improve his dissecting skills, so admired by Guenther’s original edition of 536, in a passage Guenther. At this point there were no obvious concerning the seminal vessels, the author signs of Vesalius’s later animosity towards his refers to his student by name in glowing terms: teachers or to Galen’s methods. He belonged very much in the Galenic camp, and remained It [the seminal vessel] was only recently so for several years after his departure from the found with the help of Andreas Vesalius, son French capital. of the Emperor’s pharmacist, a young man, by Jove, of great promise, possessing a sin- gular knowledge of medicine, erudite in both The formal dissections performed by Vesalius languages [Latin and Greek] and most under supervision were supplemented by noc- skilled in dissecting bodies … turnal excursions to the cemeteries of Paris, where he often had to fend off vicious dogs to But contrary to Guenther’s generous acknowl- recover human bones for private study. His edgement, the discovery was not in fact new, osteological knowledge became so proficient, and had been known to Italian medicine for that he claimed even when blindfolded, to be several hundred years. The vessels were able to identify a bone by touch. Another familiar to Mondino, Berengario, and Massa, source for anatomical specimens were executed and had, moreover, been described by Galen in criminals whose corpses were left to rot on the De anatomicis administrationibus, which, gallows– a sight familiar to Vesalius since his although lost until the sixteenth century, had childhood at Gallows Hill. Vesalius conducted
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private anatomical sessions in his own rooms “barbaric” words that Arab authors had intro- with privileged colleagues. Sometimes bodies duced into their medical treatises. Although were kept in his bedroom for several weeks. Vesalius was later to view Arab medicine more favourably, for the time being he was prepared bETWEEn PArIS And PAdUA to acknowledge the contributions to medicine Vesalius was not destined to complete his by Arab physicians, but only insofar as they studies at the University of Paris. In July 536, were in keeping with the writings of Galen. shortly after he had fulfilled the third year of the curriculum, French forces under King PAdUA Francis I (494-547) invaded the Duchy of Rather than complete his degree of Doctor of Savoy, provoking a strong military response Medicine in Leuven, Vesalius chose to transfer from the forces of the Holy Roman Emperor, his studies to the University of Padua, at that Charles V who sent two armies, one into time renowned as the primary medical school Provence, the other into northern France, to in Italy. In December 537 he successfully dislodge the French. As an alien Fleming, passed his entry examinations, and within days Vesalius, fearing reprisals, decided to leave was appointed demonstrator (ostensor) and Paris, and return to the relative academic back- lecturer in surgery and anatomy (explicator water of Leuven, where he was dismayed to chirurgiae) by the Senate of the Republic of find that medical studies had stagnated. Mem- Venice, under whose rule Padua had been since bers of the Faculty of Medicine, ignorant of 406. ancient Greek medicine, were still entrenched in the medieval doctrines of the Arabs. Only Although dissections at the University of one teacher met with Vesalius’s approval – Padua had been performed since 34, they Johannes Heems of Armentières (d. 560) to were carried out infrequently, usually once a whom he later dedicated his revised edition of year, and the number of students allowed to Guenther’s Institutiones anatomicae. Although attend was strictly limited. Dissections, which no dissection had been undertaken at the Uni- could last several weeks, were usually per- versity since 58, the reputation Vesalius had formed in December, when the rate of decom- earned while studying in Paris had reached position was slower. Public anatomical Leuven, where he was granted permission to demonstrations were performed in the manner conduct his own anatomical demonstrations, set out by Mondino at Bologna in the early including dissections. Vesalius also continued fourteenth century, but Vesalius was about to to carry out his own private dissections. He change all that. As lecturer in surgery and related how once he came across a skeleton, anatomy he was granted the freedom to revise stripped of its flesh by birds, in the ditch along the procedures for anatomical demonstration a country road. With the connivance of the as he deemed fit. The fundamental changes civic authorities, he succeeded in smuggling the that he introduced totally transformed the bones into his lodgings where he re-assembled presentation of anatomical demonstrations the skeleton. henceforth.
While at Leuven Vesalius completed the TAbULAE AnATomIcAE SEx, 538 requirements for the degree of bachelor of A significant innovation introduced by Vesalius medicine. In February 537 he published his was the use of illustrations to accompany his bachelor’s dissertation, Paraphrasis in nonum lectures, and to serve as aides-mémoire. The librum Rhazae medici arabis clariss. ad Regum large illustrations in the form of charts were so Almansorem, a revision and commentary of the successful among the students, that Vesalius Latin translations of the work written for King was encouraged to produce a set of charts that Almansur of Khurasan, by the Arab-Persion became known as the Tabulae anatomicae sex. physician, Rhazes. Vesalius undertook a revi- sion of the ninth book of the Ad Almansorem, Three of the figures were drawn by Jan Stefan making stylistic changes and improvements, van Calcar (circa 499-circa 546), a fellow and adding a commentary to the Latin transla- countryman of Vesalius, who had migrated to tion of Rhazes. Venice to study art in the school of Titian. The two Flemings probably met in Venice where During the first few decades of the sixteenth Vesalius had stayed during his journey to century, scholars attempted to purge medicine Padua. Stefan’s name appears in the colophon of what were considered to be barbaric Arab of the sixth Tabula – “sumptibus Ioannis influences, and to restore medicine to its “pure” Stephani Calcarensis,” suggesting that the artist ancient Greek roots. Part of Vesalius’s purpose had either financed the enterprise, or was being was to re-write Rhazes’s text in a more elegant recompensed for his labour with the proceeds Latin, that would replace the coarse style and from sales of the charts. Stefan’s skeletal draw-
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ings, though not free from error, were a consid- erable advance on previous depictions by other artists. Besides their directly practical purpose, the Tabulae anatomicae were essentially a prelimi- nary trial for “something more considerable” that was taking shape in Vesalius’s mind: the De humani corporis fabrica.
The innovative combination of text and illus- tration in the Tabulae anatomicae was a major milestone in anatomical teaching. The Tabulae anatomicae also represent a significant turning point in Vesalius’s career, as he begins to chal- lenge the authority of Galen for the first time. It was while he was checking Galen’s text against that of Guenther’s Institutiones anatomicae that Vesalius came to the realization that Galen had based his anatomical dissections on animals, usually apes, extending his conclusions by analogy to human beings. This uncomfortable discovery was not mentioned in the Tabulae anatomicae, but five years later, a more confi- dent Vesalius wrote in the Fabrica
… it is just now known to us from the The Venesection Letter signals further dissocia- reborn art of dissection, from the careful tion from traditional and authoritarian reading of Galen’s books, and from the wel- anatomy in favour of independent investigation come restoration of many portions thereof and judgment. For the second time Vesalius that he himself never dissected a human expresses disagreement with Galenic teaching. body, but in fact was deceived by his mon- As in the Tabulae anatomicae, he is guardedly keys … and often wrongly disputed ancient critical of Galen, by correcting or clarifying doctors who had trained themselves in what is erroneous or obscure in the Galenic human dissections texts. Vesalius meant no disrespect to Galen, whom he refers to as the “Prince of physi- Paradoxically, however, Vesalius himself had cians.” But he realized that a new exposition of relied on the anatomy of the ape in his depic- the human body was needed, still based on tion of the liver, kidneys, heart, and rete Galenic principles, but affirmed or repudiated mirabile in the Tabulae anatomicae. on the evidence of direct observation.
ThE VEnESEcTIon LETTEr 539 Although Vesalius made his name in the field of Vesalius sent a copy of the Tabulae anatomicae anatomy, the Venesection Letter demonstrates to his mentor, Nicolas Flourens, the family that he was also interested in problems of clin- friend who had advised the young Vesalius to ical medicine. In the opinion of Vesalius the enroll at the University of Paris in 533. In his bloodletting controversy could be solved by written acknowledgement, Flourens asked using a new anatomical basis for the requisite Vesalius for his opinion about the proper pro- procedures of phlebotomy. cedures for venesection. The result was the so- called Venesection Letter. During his investigations, Vesalius had noticed the peculiar shape of certain veins, which he A dispute about the appropriate site of blood- interpreted as thickenings that reinforced the letting in the treatment of pleurisy had been veins. Charles Estienne, too, had seen them and raging for twenty years. Debate revolved had interpreted them as baffles preventing the around the method of bloodletting to be used. rapid flow of blood. In the 540s Giambattista Arab physicians had bled at a point furthest Canano (55-579) and Amatus Lusitanus away from the site of infection, whereas the (5-568) correctly identified them as venous Hippocratic and Galenic practice was to bleed valves, but misunderstood their function. The at a point as close as possible to the site. discovery of the valves would lead William Vesalius agreed with the ancient Greek Harvey (578-657) to a full understanding of method, but made certain modifications in their true function in the circulation of the cases of pleurisy. blood in 68.
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boLognA LEcTUrES 540 I have now almost completed two illustra- In January 540 Vesalius received an invitation tions of the nerves … I feel that these must from medical students of the University of be held back until I have produced illustra- Bologna to present a series of anatomical tions of the muscles and of all the internal demonstrations to accompany lectures read by parts … If bodies were available here as Matteo Corti (474 or 5-544). Vesalius had they sometimes are elsewhere, not for long spent a brief period in Bologna in 538, when he would the students lack such a useful work, had visited Corti. The two men argued over the especially since many distinguished men are question of fibres in the veins, which soured constantly urging me to it … besides others, the relationship. During the course of the 540 Marcantonio Genua, our distinguished pro- lecture series, Corti, a staunch Galenist, read fessor of philosophy … has strongly urged from Mondino’s Anatomia, confirming or cor- me to the task … if bodies become available recting Mondino’s text through reference to and Joannes Stephanus, the distinguished Galen. Corti believed that dissection was of contemporary artist, does not refuse his dubious value, as it merely confirmed what had services, I shall certainly undertake that task already been written by Galen. The two men were on a collision course, and the tension was gIUnTA EdITIon oF gALEn 54 palpable, according to one eyewitness present As he was embarking on his great project, at the occasion. When Corti interrupted Vesalius was invited to edit the manuscripts of Vesalius, challenging his assertions that contra- Galen’s anatomical treatises for an authorita- dicted Galen, Vesalius demonstrated that it tive Latin edition to be printed by the Giunta was Galen who was in error. Perhaps irritated Press in Venice in 54. by the patronizing attitude of the older man towards a lowly “dissector,” or feeling more The Giuntas had already published editions of audacious and outspoken in his opinions, Galen in 5 and 58. Encouraged by the Vesalius fiercely debated with Corti and sub- financial success of these editions, the firm’s jected him to public humiliation, much to the founder, Luca-Antonio Giunta (457-538), delight of the student audience. masterminded the project to produce a defini- tive edition of Galen’s writings that included The Bologna lectures proved to be a testing the recently recovered texts, as well as ground for the teaching techniques that improved versions of Latin translations collated Vesalius was developing. His usual course of against Greek manuscripts. Luca-Antonio did action was first to dissect a human, and then a not live to see the finished volumes, which dog, partly to provide a lesson in comparative appeared in 54-54 in eleven volumes under anatomy, and partly to show where Galen was the editorship of Agostino Gadaldini (55- in error in believing animal anatomy could be 575). A team of scholar-physicians was mar- applied to humans. At Bologna he performed a shalled to edit and translate individual works. complete dissection of an ape and mounted the In the introduction Gadaldini mentions several skeleton alongside that of a human to demon- of the contributors by name, including Vesalius, strate that Galen had based his description of “the celebrated and distinguished contempo- human vertebrae on those of the ape, which rary professor of dissection.” From Gadaldini were quite different. we discover that Vesalius was responsible for the editing of De nervorum dissectione, Anto- The lectures also mark an important stage in nius Fortulus’s translation of De venarum arte- Vesalius’s intellectual development as an riarumque dissectione, and Guenther’s Latin anatomist. He was now at an intermediate version of De anatomicis administrationibus. stage between the confident adherence to Galenism professed during his first public lec- It is evident from Gadaldini’s further remarks ture at Padua in 537, the hesitant skepticism that Vesalius was reluctant to revise Guenther’s expressed in Tabulae anatomicae, and the confi- translation of De anatomicis administrationibus, dent, sometimes overstated criticism of Galen for fear of offending his former teacher, perhaps voiced in the Fabrica. With his boldness and for a second time, so soon after his reworking of self-assuredness growing, Vesalius now turned Guenther’s Institutiones anatomicae. his thoughts to the great project about which he had hinted in the Venesection Letter, and So successful was the Giunta edition of Galen which would ensure his universal fame. At the that it was repeatedly reprinted, with as many close of the letter, he reveals that work was as nine coming from the press of Giunta, and already underway: three from the house of Froben of Basel before 65.
The three years and four months that elapsed
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between the publication of the Venesection The Fabrica is divided into seven books, each of Letter in April 539, and the shipment of manu- which is subdivided into chapters. Arrange- script and woodblocks of the Fabrica across the ment of the text follows the scheme proposed Alps from Italy to Basel, was a period of intense by Galen in De anatomicis administrationibus. and remarkable productivity for Vesalius. In Book I treats the bones and cartilage, working that relatively short time he prepared his revi- downwards from the head to the feet. The final sion of Guenther’s Institutiones anatomicae, he two chapters provide careful instructions for contributed to the Giunta edition of Galen, articulating a skeleton. The second Book is gave a series of lectures in Bologna, wrote a devoted to the muscles and ligaments, and paraphrase of all the books of Rhazes (which attempts to give the fullest possible description he later destroyed), and continued with his of every muscle and its function. Books III and teaching and dissecting responsibilities in IV deal with the vascular system and the Padua. At some time during that frenetic nerves. Book V is devoted to a description of period he also managed to conceive, prepare, the viscera, and includes a discussion of fetuses and compose the Fabrica. and the uterus. In Book VI the heart, lungs, diaphragm, trachea, and gland of the throat are dE hUmAnI corPorIS FAbrIcA, 543. described. The final Book VII studies the brain The title of Vesalius great work De humani cor- and demonstrates the successive steps in its poris fabrica was not original, and may have dissection. been suggested to Vesalius by a seventh-cen- tury Greek work by Theophilus Proto- The humanist classical Latin in which the Fab- sparatharius, based on Galen’s writings, and rica is written taxed the abilities of even the recently translated into Latin under the same most accomplished Latinist. Some of Vesalius’s title by Giunio Paolo Grassi at Venice in 536. It contemporaries, such as Fabricius ab Aquapen- was also the title chosen by Leonhart Fuchs dente (537–69), and Sylvius were critical of (50-566) for the work published by him at his Latin, which was described as unnecessarily Tübingen in 55, and in two volumes at Lyon prolix, pretentious, pompous, and repetitious. in 55-555. Felix Platter (536-64) entitled Humanist Latin is characterized by a complex his 583 work on anatomy which copied the sentence structure of multiple long clauses, illustrations from Vesalius’s work De corporis rhetorical literary flourishes, and a large wide- humani structura et usu. Adriaan van de Spiegel ranging vocabulary, all of which, by the stan- (578-65) also used the title for his anatom- dards of the day, were regarded as essential ical treatise published at Venice in 67. ingredients of elegant Latin. But it is a brand of Latin ill-suited to the lucid expression of scien- In his Dedication to the Emperor Charles V, tific discourse, and one that requires consider- Vesalius harks back to the Golden Age of Hip- able concentration on the part of the reader to pocrates, and laments the current state of med- grasp Vesalius’s meaning. The elevated style, icine, in particular the decline in the knowledge however, is occasionally relieved by a more and practice of human anatomy. He argues conversational idiom of homely metaphors and passionately for the revival of the teaching of anecdotes. anatomy in the universities, based on ancient models. Vesalius bitterly complains about the The pictorial initial letters that introduce each ignorance of the “butcher-barbers” in the tech- book and chapter are of considerable interest, niques of dissection, and urges that the task of and invest the text with a touch of macabre dissecting be restored to the professional edu- humour. There are two sets of initials, one cated anatomist, who should be the ultimate large, the other small. All show the anatomist authority on human anatomy. with his naked putti assistants engaged in var- ious acts associated with dissection and sur- The letter of Vesalius to the Basel printer gery, such as the procurement of cadavers, and Johannes Oporinus (507-568), which accom- the preparation of skeletons. panied the woodblocks sent from Venice, is included in the prefatory matter. Vesalius goes When Vesalius commenced teaching at Padua into considerable detail about the placement of he still accepted Galen’s word as sacrosanct, the woodblock illustrations and their accompa- but the more he worked on cadavers, the more nying text, and how the indexing of the illustra- he realized Galen had made mistakes. He tions by letters should relate to the corres- spoke out against Galen’s doctrines only when ponding anatomical description contained in he felt that the facts demanded such action, the main text. Other directions to the printer and never went out of his way to disparage include the choice of paper, which should be Galen or to attempt to undermine his solid and smooth to ensure the best impression authority. Instead Vesalius chose to take a fresh from the blocks. approach to the study and teaching of
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anatomy, by establishing facts based on direct new books. The real motive of Vesalius’s visit to repeated observation and not on tradition. the Emperor, however, was to seek a position Others before Vesalius had pointed out errors on the imperial medical staff. Vesalius eventu- in Galen’s texts. Berengario had been one of ally caught up with Charles V in Gelders at the the first to express in print the need to question beginning of September, and was appointed textual authority: physician in ordinary (medicus familiaris ordi- narius) to the imperial household. … in this discipline nothing is to be believed that is acquired either through the spoken Prior to taking up official duties as physician to voice or through writing; since what is required is seeing and touching … the Emperor, during the latter months of 543 and the early part of 544 Vesalius visited In testing Galen’s texts, Vesalius corrected or Padua to settle his affairs, and to perform one modified as necessary. In the Fabrica there are final dissection. His next port of call was 65 references to Galen, mostly relating to Bologna, where he was invited by the students modifications or corrections. But even though to deliver a lecture on the venous system and he was highly critical about some of Galen’s to perform a dissection. His final destination assertions, Vesalius still relied heavily on Galen. was Pisa where, on the invitation of Cosimo de’ In the absence of alternative explanations, Medici, Duke of Tuscany, he gave an inaugural Vesalius accepts Galen’s version. At other times course of lectures on anatomy at the newly he deliberately draws attention to Galen’s renovated University, and prepared two female errors by incorporating them into the illustra- skeletons, one of a nun, the other of a young tions. hunchback. He also performed an autopsy. Vesalius’s visit to Pisa was such a success, that Vesalius regarded his real enemies as those Duke Cosimo attempted to persuade Vesalius who blindly accepted Galen’s teachings to remain in Pisa by offering him a permanent without question, and who would not tolerate academic appointment. But having already any challenge to Galen’s authority, or even committed his services to Charles V, Vesalius allow for the possibility that Galen had made was obliged to reject the Duke’s offer. mistakes, which might cast doubt on that authority. The constant military skirmishes between the Holy Roman Empire and its troublesome EPITomE neighbour France and rebellions within the An abridged version of the Fabrica, entitled De confines of the Empire required Vesalius to humani corporis fabrica librorum epitome, was travel around the battlefields in the Emperor’s issued by Oporinus within weeks of the train. In the summer of 544, outside the appearance of his larger work in June 543. The besieged town of Saint-Dizier, he examined the Epitome consisted of twelve broadside leaves, viscera of René of Châlon, Prince of Orange and was intended for the use of students who (59-544), who had been mortally wounded could not afford the large cost of the Fabrica. It during the siege. Medical duties also included included most of the illustrations from the Fab- the treatment of soldiers’ wounds and amputa- rica, and added several new ones, including tion, which at that time involved cauterization “Adam and Eve” figures and woodcuts with boiling oil. These methods were soon to showing the progressive dissection of the brain. be replaced by the application of antiseptic Another illustration taken from the Fabrica is ointments, thanks to the reforms in field sur- the woodcut displaying the blood vessels and gery introduced by Ambroise Paré (57-590), nervous system, accompanied by an additional who, by an irony of history, was on the leaf of individual organs, which the reader is opposing side within the walls of Saint-Dizier. asked to cut out and paste to the master figure. Eight years later during the siege of Metz, the two surgeons again found themselves on oppo- On 9 August, several days after Vesalius’s site sides. Although Vesalius and Paré were not departure from Switzerland, a German version to encounter each other on this occasion, they of the Epitome translated by Alban Thorer did meet again later under different circum- (489-550), physician, professor, and Rector of stances. the University of Basel, was published by Oporinus. In the winter of 544 Vesalius’s father died, leaving him a large inheritance, including the coUrT PhySIcIAn family house in Brussels. Towards the end of On 4 August 543, immediately after the publi- the year Vesalius travelled to Brussels, where cation of the Fabrica and the Epitome, Vesalius he was married to Anne van Hamme. One year left Basel to seek an audience with the Emperor later the couple’s only child, a daughter Anne, Charles V, to present him with copies of his was born.
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Much of Vesalius’s time during the ensuing years was spent treating an infirm Emperor, whose frequent attacks of gout incapacitated him for weeks on end. The situation was not helped by the Emperor’s unbridled gluttony, and his unwillingness to accept his physicians’ advice to exercise dietary restraint. The Emperor also suffered from epilepsy, asthma, a persistent cough, an allergy to seafood, and insomnia. A sedentary life without physical exercise exacerbated his generally poor health.
Apart from the occasional dissection that chance brought his way, Vesalius essentially turned his back on anatomical research. A few years later he was regretting his decision, as intrigues and jealousy among the court physi- cians, caused him to make the impulsive vow to renounce any further medical research. At this low point of his life he claims to have destroyed manuscripts and drafts of several unpublished works, including his annotated copies of Galenic texts, a commentary of the whole text of Rhazes’s Ad Almansorem, and working notes on a book on materia medica. At the same time he was gaining valuable experi- ence as a surgeon, and was consulted on many ThE chInA rooT LETTEr And occasions by various dignitaries both within conTroVErSIES and outside the Empire. In 546 he was called The China Root Letter was written in response to the bedside of the Venetian ambassador, to an enquiry from Joachim Roelants, physician Bernardino Navagero (507-565), who had of Metz and an old friend of Vesalius, about the fallen seriously ill at Nijmegen. The ambas- therapeutic use of the root of the China smilax sador’s stubborn illness dragged on, but he was plant, recently in vogue as a medication to eventually restored to health. That same year relieve gout. Vesalius had used it to treat the Vesalius successfully performed the potentially Emperor’s gout, but was unsure about its effi- dangerous surgical procedure of draining the cacy. pleural space between the lungs and the chest wall in a case of empyema. In 548 when exam- Only about one-tenth of the letter was devoted ining Maximilian of Egmont, Count of Buren to the China root. The rest is taken up with a (509–548), Vesalius predicted the exact hour pugnacious defence of the Fabrica against the of the count’s imminent death. When the attacks of the Galenists, who, claimed Vesalius, prophecy was fulfilled with uncanny accuracy, had stifled the pursuit of scientific enquiry it caused a sensation, which only served to add during his student years in Paris. In particular to Vesalius’s reputation. However, not all of the China Root Letter was directed against his Vesalius’s medical interventions were suc- old teacher Sylvius, who was at the forefront of cessful. There were also botched operations, the attacks. Sylvius had earlier warned such as that carried out on the foot of Cristo- Vesalius, that if he did not retract his lies about foro Madruzzo, Cardinal of Trent (5-578). Galen, their friendship would be over. When Vesalius refused to back down, the once cordial relationship that existed between the two men deteriorated into open hostility.
Sylvius wrote two further attacks on Vesalius: in 549 in Galenus De ossibus ad tyrones versus quidem a Ferdinado Balamio Siculo, a revised edition of Balamio’s translation of Galen’s text- book on osteology; and in 55 in Vaesani cuiusdam calumniarum in Hippocratis Galenique rem anatomicam depulsio. Although Sylvius does not mention Vesalius by name, he refers to him as “vaesanus”, meaning madman
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– an obvious and demeaning pun on his name. ThomAS gEmInUS His attack on Vesalius had now become per- The first person to copy the illustrations of the sonal, bitter, almost hysterical, and ultimately Fabrica without Vesalius’s permission was damaging to Sylvius’s reputation. When he Thomas Geminus (d. 56), whose Compen- exhorted the Emperor to intervene and punish diosa totius anatomie delineatio first appeared in “this traitor”, even his fellow Galenist col- 545. An English edition was issued in 553 leagues realized he had gone too far, and recog- with a completely different text, followed by a nizing that these were the malicious second English edition in 559. outpourings of an angry old man, began to dis- tance themselves from him. By accepting Despite Vesalius’s bitter complaints about the Galen’s anatomy as an article of orthodox faith, poor quality of the reproductions, which, he Sylvius could not bring himself to contemplate claimed, misrepresented him, and did him a the possibility that Galen might have been in disservice, it is unlikely that he ever actually error, and that he may never have performed saw a copy of the Compendiosa. To reproduce dissections on human subjects. For if these the Vesalian woodcut illustrations Geminus charges were true, Sylvius’s reputation and resorted to engravings, which were accom- credibility as a teacher would be brought into plished with great skill. Indeed, Geminus’s question. He was fighting not only for Galen’s illustrations may be interpreted as a tribute to honour, but also his own. Desperately Vesalius’s anonymous artist, who, ironically, clutching at straws, Sylvius tried to explain the was not acknowledged by Vesalius in the Fab- anatomical discrepancies between Galen’s rica. Geminus’s fine engravings contrast starkly descriptions and those by sixteenth-century with the text printed in an inelegant black anatomists as the result of morphological letter, that is punctuated with many typo- changes that had occurred in the human body graphical errors and misreadings. since the second century. Sylvius’s death in 554 spared him the misery of having to confront the As with most imitators of the Fabrica, Geminus second edition of the Fabrica, published the failed to grasp the significance of the close rela- following year. tionship between text and illustration that Vesalius had striven to achieve. Nevertheless, Although Vesalius made no written response his Compendiosa contributed to the spread of to this latest attack, a former student acquain- Vesalius’s renown, particularly in England. But tance from Paris, René Hener [Renatus as an anatomical treatise, without the Vesalian Henerus] of Lindau, answered on his behalf in text, it was of questionable value, though it Adversus Jacobi Sylvii depulsionum anatomi- probably had its use in assisting barber- corum calumnias pro Andrea Vesalio, published surgeons to acquire some basic knowledge of at Venice in 555. He described Sylvius’s invec- anatomy and dissection skills. tive as tragic, extremely abusive, and unworthy of its author’s years and accomplishments, and Geminus’s original copper plates were subse- attributes his behaviour to envy towards the quently taken to France by the poet and doctor younger Vesalius. Jacques Grevin (circa 539-570). Through his efforts, a Latin edition was published in Paris PLAgIArISmS And UnAUThorIzEd coPIES by André Wechel in 564, entitled Anatomes The illustrations of the Fabrica were openly totius, aere insculpta delineatio, cui addita est copied almost immediately. In his published epitome innumeris mendis repurgata … per writings Vesalius makes several references to Iacobum Grevinum. Although Vesalius’s name plagiarism of his work. In its modern connota- appears quite prominently on the title page, tion, plagiarism is defined as the unlawful act of there is no mention of Geminus. Another Latin copying somebody else’s work and passing it version appeared in 565, and a French transla- off, without acknowledgment, as one’s own. In tion was issued in 569 entitled Les portraicts Vesalius’s day, the term had a broader applica- anatomiques de toutes les parties du corps tion to refer to any unauthorized copying, even humain. if the original author is named. In anticipation of the illustrations of the Fabrica being copied, A different kind of plagiarism is manifest in the Vesalius had taken the precaution of securing two-volume edition of the Fabrica produced in licenses to protect his intellectual property in Lyon in 55 by Jean de Tournes. It is unusual in the territories of the Republic of Venice, the that it plagiarises only the text of the Fabrica, Papal States, and the Holy Roman Empire. But and omits the illustrations, apart from four in sixteenth-century Europe, where legal copy- small woodcuts of the cranium. right did not exist, outside these areas Vesalius was powerless to stop the pirates. In February 553, on the eve of Epiphany, Emperor Charles V announced his intention to
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abdicate in stages over the next five years. The Vesalius. A woodcut of the King’s death by Spanish crown was inherited by his son Philip Jacques Tortorel, after the design of Jean Per- II of Spain, and the crown of the Holy Roman rissin, shows Vesalius in consultation with the Empire was handed over to his brother Ferdi- court surgeon Ambroise Paré at the king’s bed- nand I. Charles eventually retreated to the side. Hieronymite convent of Juste in the Spanish Extremadura. As a reward for his faithful On his return to Brussels in mid-July 559, service, Vesalius was granted a life pension, and Vesalius made preparations to move with his was created a Count Palatine, but he had lost a family to Spain with Philip’s retinue. Bad courteous and generous master. In June 556 he weather delayed departure, and finally on 3 was named as a physician to the household of August Vesalius left Brussels with his family. King Philip II. His official title was not protomedicus to Philip II, as he would probably have wished, but the dE hUmAnI corPorIS FAbrIcA. 555. lesser post of “physician to the Netherlanders In 546 during a prolonged stay in Ulm, while at the court of Madrid.” In Spain medicine had the Emperor recovered from his latest attack of not quite reached the standards of the rest of gout, Vesalius had made a visit to Basel, pos- Europe, and Vesalius later complained about sibly to discuss publication of a second edition the stultifying atmosphere of medicine there. of the Fabrica with Oporinus. Between the end Nevertheless, his services were sought after by of August 550 and October 55, during a number of foreign embassies in Madrid. another long sojourn, this time in Augsburg, Vesalius began making preparations for the In the spring of 56, while convalescing from a new edition. The entire text was reset in larger long illness in Alcalá, the seventeen-year old type, and a new woodcut title page was sup- Don Carlos (545–568), Philip II’s eldest son, plied. Most of the woodcut illustrations used in and heir to the Spanish throne, while pursuing the 543 edition, except for the title page, were a young woman, fell down a set of stone steps reused in the new edition. Textually, there were and caused serious injuries to his head. The several substantive changes, such as additions wound festered and developed into an abscess made in the light of new findings, deletions, that covered his entire face, neck, chest, and and a large number of stylistic changes made in upper arms. The physicians in attendance an effort to produce a more elegant Latin. treated the heir with cupping and applied var- ious restoratives, but to no avail, as Don At the same time as the second edition of the Carlos’s condition deteriorated. On the Fabrica was published, a new edition of the eleventh day the king was sent for, and with Epitome, with the final leaf reset, also appeared. Vesalius made the thirty-five kilometre journey from Madrid to Alcalá. As a last resort, the cen- VESALIUS ThE PhySIcIAn tury-old relics of the Blessed Fray Diego, a Between 553 and 556 Vesalius spent consider- Franciscan friar, were brought from a nearby able time with his family in Brussels, where he monastery and placed alongside Don Carlos. established a lucrative private practice as a Meanwhile Philip retreated to a monastery to consultant physician, and acquired a reputa- pray for his son. The following morning there tion throughout Europe, though not everyone had been a remarkable improvement in Don was convinced of Vesalius’s abilities as a physi- Carlos’s condition, which was attributed to the cian. Cardinal Granville remarked sarcastically miraculous relics of Fray Diego, while the that Vesalius always declared his patients’ mal- physicians believed the credit for healing adies to be mortal, so that in the event of should have gone to them. death, he would be exonerated from any blame, but if the patient were to live, he would In 56 Giovanni d’Arragona, marquis de Terra- be said to have brought about a miraculous nova, was wounded in the chest during a tour- cure. nament, and developed a traumatic lung empyema. Vesalius, who had enjoyed some In 558 he was called on to attend Anna van recent successes in the treatment of the condi- Egmont, Princess of Orange (533-558), who tion, was consulted by the Palermo physician died despite Vesalius’s ministrations. The fol- and anatomist Giovanni Filippo Ingrassia lowing year he was called urgently to Paris to (50-580). Ingrassia followed Vesalius’s the court of King Henry II who had been mor- instructions for draining the thoracic space, and tally wounded when a piece of his opponent’s the marquis eventually made a full recovery. broken lance lodged in his eye socket during a The grateful and much relieved Ingrassia wrote tournament. The King subsequently died from up and published Vesalius’s “consilia”. complications from his injuries. The post- Between October 563 and January 564, when mortem examination was conducted by the Spanish court was in Monzón, the English
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ambassador, Sir Thomas Chaloner (5-565) was successfully treated by Vesalius for kidney stones with a concoction of liquorice and barley.
rEcEPTIon oF ThE FAbrIcA: SUPPorTErS And dETrAcTorS Following the successful publication of the second edition of the Fabrica, and the death of Sylvius, Vesalius may have anticipated a period of respite from the controversies that his anatomical writings had provoked. It must have come as something of an unpleasant sur- prise, when in 56, nineteen years after the publication of the Fabrica, there appeared a book entitled Apologia in anatome pro Galeno contra Andream Vessalium [sic] Bruxellensem, by one Francesco dal Pozzo [Franciscus Puteus], a practicing physician from Vercelli, who had attended Vesalius’s lecture at Bologna in 544. This outrageously hostile tirade against Vesalius repeated most of the accusations made by Sylvius – that Vesalius had falsified Galen’s words, while deliberately ignoring some of Galen’s assertions. The worst of Vesalius’s crimes was his assertion that Galen had never dissected a human cadaver. Few would have paid much attention to this latest loppio had discovered. Among Falloppio’s attempt to defame Vesalius, had Pozzo not other discoveries were the uterine tubes rashly named the anatomists who he claimed shaped like trumpets, which were named after were opposed to Vesalius. One of those named him. was Gabriel Cuneus, professor of anatomy at the University of Pavia, who indignantly Vesalius was probably glad to receive Fal- sprang to Vesalius’s defence in his Apologiae loppio’s calm, rational, and scientifically irre- Francisci Putei pro Galeno in anatome examen, proachable critique to his Fabrica, after years of published at Venice in 564, in which he fighting implacable and emotional Galenist accused Pozzo of mendacity and professional apologists. He took no offence at Falloppio, and jealousy. It was erroneously thought by many, in fact commended him as a seeker of truth. including Girolamo Cardano and the editors of The only sign of irritation came in Vesalius’s the 75 Leiden edition of Vesalius’s Opera omnia, Boerhaave and Albinus, that Cuneus was a pseudonym of Vesalius himself.
One of Vesalius’s greatest admirers was Gabriel Falloppio (53?-56), whose only book pub- lished during his lifetime was Observationes anatomicae in 56. Falloppio pointed out that Vesalius had failed to observe a third ossicle of the ear, first discovered by Giovanni Filippo Ingrassia. Vesalius had claimed the sacrum consisted of six pieces, whereas the normal number was five. Falloppio contested Vesalius’s belief that the veins contained three kinds of fibres that controlled the flow of blood. Vesalius accepted these corrections, as well as Falloppio’s account of dentition, which he admitted was far superior to his own. He also accepted, though only conditionally until he was able to verify it for himself, Falloppio’s account of the levator palpebrae, the muscle responsible for raising the eyelid, which Fal-
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published reply to Falloppio, his Anatomicarum the Galenic tradition, performing in practice Gabrielis Falloppii Observationum examen, in the methodology that Galen had only been which he delivers a damning assessment of able to suggest in theory. Valverde for whom he had a strong dislike, and whom Falloppio, perhaps imprudently, had FInAL yEArS And dEATh praised. Unfortunately Falloppio died before he Early in 564 Vesalius petitioned Philip for per- was able to read Vesalius’s response. mission to be absent from court in order to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The reason for Another anatomist who was critical of Vesalius the pilgrimage is not known for sure, but was Matteo Realdo Colombo (circa 56-559). numerous rumours have circulated since 564. A former student of Vesalius’s, Colombo suc- According to a letter written by the French ceeded him as chair of anatomy at Padua in diplomat and religious reformer Hubert 543. Although Vesalius has been much Languet (55-58) to the Wittenberg pro- maligned for criticizing Galen, Colombo was fessor of mathematics and medicine Caspar the first to point out Vesalius’s own mistakes in Peucer (55-60), Vesalius had been per- applying animal anatomy to humans – the very forming an autopsy on a Spanish grandee, who fallacy of which Vesalius had accused Galen. was presumed dead. Upon opening the chest, When he returned to Padua, an outraged Vesalius saw that the subject’s heart was still Vesalius publicly ridiculed Colombo, calling beating. Vesalius was reported to the Inquisi- him an “ignoramus” and stating that “what tion who found him guilty of vivisection and meagre knowledge [Colombo] has of anatomy sentenced him to death. On the king’s interces- he learned from me.” In 545 Colombo trans- sion the death sentence was overturned on ferred to the University of Pisa, and finally in condition that Vesalius make a trip to 548 to the Collegia della Sapienza in Rome. Jerusalem and Mount Sinai to expiate the Colombo’s only published work was De re crime. There is no evidence to support this anatomica, which appeared in 559 shortly story, nor a similar account by Ambroise Paré, before his death. which substitutes a woman for the grandee. The story is probably apocryphal, though quite Another of Vesalius’s critics was Bartolomeo feasible, as human vivisection was considered Eustachi (d. 574), papal physician and to be a most serious crime. Colombo’s successor at the Collegia della Sapienza. In his Opuscula anatomica, published According to another account, Vesalius decided at Venice in 563, Eustachi chastised Vesalius to leave Spain because of the hostile treatment for the severity of his attack on Galen, sug- he had received at the hands of the Spanish gesting that he was motivated by a desire to medical fraternity – a repetition of the kind of draw attention to himself through controversy. reception he had been given in Brussels and Galen, claimed Eustachi, had been misquoted, elsewhere while serving the Emperor Charles taken out of context, and deliberately misinter- V. His lack of popularity, coupled with the fact preted by Vesalius, who also ascribed to Galen that revolt was brewing in the Netherlands words he did not write. Eustachi concedes that against Spanish rule, resulting in Flemings Galen may have made mistakes, but asserts being regarded with suspicion and hostility, that he never did so deliberately in order to persuaded him to leave Spain. Yet another deceive, and is offended by the suggestion that account, by the Flemish botanist Charles de Galen had intentionally passed off animal l’Écluse (56-609), relates that Vesalius had anatomy as human. He goes on to point out been suffering from a long illness, which had that Vesalius himself had relied on animals in been followed by a slow and difficult period of his treatment of the eyes, tongue, larynx, and recovery. His pilgrimage was made as a peni- kidneys. For Eustachi many of Vesalius’s criti- tent Christian giving thanks for his delivery cisms were trivial, and served to mask from death. While the reasons for Vesalius’s Vesalius’s ambitious nature and his jealousy of departure remain obscure, his death during his Galen. return journey from the Holy Land is shrouded in even greater mystery. Not all Galenists were opposed to Vesalius. Hieronymus Gemusaeus (505-544), Professor Vesalius set off for Palestine with a letter from of Medicine at Basel, and one of the editors of Philip requesting unimpeded passage across the Greek edition of Galen published at Basel borders. On the initial part of the journey he in 538, declared the Fabrica a masterpiece. In was accompanied by his wife and daughter, but the second edition of his Commentarius de in France, possibly after an explosive quarrel, anima of 545 Philipp Melanchthon (497-560) they parted company. While the wife and adopted many of Vesalius’s conclusions, and daughter went on to Brussels, Vesalius made affirms that Vesalius had been working within for Marseilles where he took a boat to Venice. It
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is quite possible that while he was in Venice he personality made him few close friends, and his made the short trip to Padua, for by this time aggressive manner alienated many colleagues. Falloppio had died, leaving the chair of His lonely death on a remote island far from anatomy at Padua vacant. Vesalius may have home, his burial in an unmarked grave, with no contemplated applying for the post, as he had grand funeral at home to celebrate his achieve- earlier shown indications that he would have ments, make his personal life all the more welcomed a return to academic life. According tragic. to one Pietro Bizzari, Vesalius received an offer from the Venetian Senate to take up the post Yet Vesalius should not be judged on his per- on his return from his pilgrimage. sonal shortcomings, most of which are conjec- tural, but on his achievements as an Vesalius eventually reached Jerusalem safely, extraordinary anatomist. His vanity and but the return journey was catastrophic. driving ambition, seen by many as faults, pro- During a stormy passage during which supplies vided the motivation and single-mindedness on board ran low, Vesalius fell ill, and was put required to produce the Fabrica, and to lay out off the ship onto the Ionian island of Zante a new path for the study and teaching of (present day Zakynthos) where within a short anatomy. time he passed away. The precise place of his death is unknown, but it is believed that he The special chapters of the Fabrica that was buried in the churchyard of Santa Maria explained the method of dissection were an delle Grazie in the main town of Zante. The innovation. Vesalius insisted that the anatomist church and its graveyard were destroyed in an take charge by undertaking his own dissections earthquake in 893, but a project to locate the without the assistance of a barber. He consis- remains of Vesalius is currently underway. tently stressed the necessity of a purely scien- Some accounts blame his premature death on tific approach to anatomy, based on repeated his parsimony, for had he travelled on a vessel direct observation. There was nothing new in of the Venetian fleet and not on a cheap and this, as it had been professed on many occa- disreputable pilgrim ship, he might have sur- sions by Galen, and later by others. But vived the voyage. Vesalius demonstrated this belief through per- sonal example. He not only raised the standard concLUSIon of anatomical dissection to new heights, he Despite the wealth of material written about also redefined the status of the anatomist, by Vesalius the anatomist, we still know very little elevating him from his hitherto lowly station to about Vesalius the man. It is, therefore, very that of the physician. He helped make anatomy difficult to make any kind of accurate assess- respectable. ment of the kind of person he was. Evidence would strongly suggest, however, that he was Vesalius transformed the teaching of anatomy not a particularly likeable person. He had many in a number of significant ways. Wherever he faults, some of which were embedded in his lectured, he always had a skeleton at hand for complex personality, and for which he cannot the fundamental study of the bones, and to be held fully responsible. Like many other intel- demonstrate and reinforce in the memory the lectuals of his age he was ambitious and self- location of various structures in the body. serving, quick to anger, and completely unforgiving to those who had opposed or Like other medical men of the early sixteenth offended him. The inability to forgive and century, Vesalius made a major contribution to forget caused him much criticism in his own the reform and development of anatomical ter- lifetime and still taints his reputation. For a minology, which had been in a state of disarray. man who expressed himself so passionately Vesalius often provided medical terms in sev- about plagiarism, Vesalius himself appropri- eral languages for ease of comprehension, but ated the work of others without acknowledg- his preference was a return to the Latin, or Lat- ment. It should also be pointed out that it was inized version of the original Greek. not Vesalius’s writings that were plagiarized, but the majestic illustrations that informed his His most important pedagogical innovation, texts. Yet nowhere, except in the Tabulae however, was the introduction of illustration anatomicae, does he acknowledge his artists into the classroom, and, more significantly, into and blockcutters, even anonymously. the printed book. Vesalius realized the enor- mous potential of the printed book as a We know a little about the many acquain- medium for the spread of scientific knowledge. tances he encountered during his life, mostly At the same time he understood the role played persons from the upper echelons of society as by good illustrations. Where words were inad- well as professional colleagues. But his difficult equate to express a particular idea, an illustra-
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tion could demonstrate the point much more eloquently and directly. The close association of image and text was relatively new, with Leon- hart Fuchs’s De historia stirpium, published by Isingrin the year before the Fabrica, being an obvious precursor. In the Fabrica Vesalius takes the use of illustration one step further: by employing an outstanding artist and block- cutter to create anatomically accurate images, he is responsible for bringing art into medicine.
Others had questioned the validity of some of Galen’s statements before Vesalius, if only timidly. Vesalius’s approach was more aggres- sive, even arrogant, but never disrespectful, despite what his critics claimed. Indeed, Vesalius relied on Galen for much of the com- position of the Fabrica, and unwittingly re- peated many of Galen’s erroneous assertions. His real achievement was to force others to re- examine Galen, and to affirm or repudiate his statements on the evidence of personal direct observation. Wherever Galen was in error, it was the responsibility of the anatomist to make the requisite corrections.
Vesalius made no major anatomical discov- eries, and the Fabrica was not without errors of its own, as Vesalius’s critics were quick to point out. But its merits far outweigh its deficiencies, and most importantly, it laid the foundation for a new exposition of the human body that others could build on, improve and refine.
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hoLy romAn EmPIrE •Wesel Brussels • • Leuven
EUroPE cIrcA 550 • Paris • Augsburg
• Basel SWISS conFEdErATIon Borders of the Holy Roman Empire Padua • • Venice Inner borders rEPUbLIc oF VEnIcE
• Bologna PAPAL STATES
• Madrid
Moon is her domicile – denoting favour with princes. The only thing missing, according to THE EXHIBITION our decisions, is that no planet dominates the horoscope. 1 Girolamo Cardano. “De exemplis However, the astrological prognostication was centum geniturarum: XCIII” in Opera written with the benefit of hindsight, after omnia. Lyon: J.A. Huguetan & M.A. Vesalius had already become famous. Ravaud, 563. Vol. 5. 2 Gregor Reisch, (d. 55). Margarita Vesalius’s horoscope was cast in 547 by the philosophica, cu˜additionibus nouis, ab mathematician, astrologer, and physician, auctore suo studiosissima reuisiõe tertio Girolamo Cardano (50-576), and was first supadditis. Basel: Johann Schott, 508. published at Nuremberg in his Libri quinque. Cardano foresaw a great future for Vesalius: After receiving his master’s degree in 489 from the University of Freiburg, Gregor Reisch Most admirable expert in dissecting cadavers, comparable in merit to the entered the Carthusian Order. As an author ancients, he wrote a work which whilst his and pedagogue he is principally remembered first yet is so excellent as to solve all difficul- for his Margarita philosophica, an encyclopaedic ties; celebrated in life, now already Imperial work, illustrated with numerous woodcuts, physician, he is bound to be celebrated after covering all branches of knowledge. The book his death. If this is his birth-date, everything was intended for young students preparing for in it is up to the measure, for Mars is the university, and was extremely popular. First square of the mighty Moon in its eighth published in 503, it was re-issued many times. exhibits zeal and skill of hands. Mercury in Each of its twelve books treats a separate sub- the triple of Jupiter and Venus in the square ject: Latin grammar, dialectics, rhetoric, arith- exhibit an admirable mind and an eloquence metic, music, geometry, astronomy, physics, not only up to the mark, but even above it – natural history, physiology, psychology, and he is, indeed, an eminent physician. The ethics. The Margarita philosophica was one of Moon in opposition to the Sun gives the books recalled by Vesalius from his school memory and knowledge, and many enemies, years in Leuven. In particular he specifically indicating an illustrious person, seeing the remembered the image of the human head, birth-date is a nocturnal one. Saturn with indicating the sites and central connections of the heart of Scorpio, in the sixth of Mercury, the sense organs. This image was copied many indicates a profound mind, memory, and times for over a century. zeal. Spica Virginis in the heart of the sky indicates a glory due to skill as great as Another striking image from the book is the anyone’s. One must consider also Mars schematic male figure showing the division of facing the Sun in his exaltation while the the body into the three cavities or venters. (see above p. ) 7 FIS Vesalius 17_Layout 1 14-05-24 10:30 AM Page 28
3 Galen. “Περι ανατομικων εγχειρη- Galen’s most significant contribution to the study of anatomy was his De anatomicis admin- σεων βιβλιον ά[-θ]” in Γαληνου istrationibus, the text of which was lost Galeni Pergameni Opera απαντα : during the Middle Ages. It was not until the omnia. Basel: Andreas Cratander, 538. early 500s that the first nine books of the orig- Vol. , p. 9-97. inal Greek text were recovered (the final six books were not discovered until the twentieth 4 Galen. De anatomicis administra- century), and were published in this Greek edi- tionibus libri novem. Ioanne Guentherio tion of Galen’s works, edited by Joachim Cam- Andernaco medico interprete. Paris: erarius the Elder (500-574), Leonhart Fuchs Simon de Colines, 53. (50-566), and Hieronymus Gemusaeus
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(54-60). A Latin translation was prepared the wholesale restructuring of anatomical by Demetrio Calcondila (43-5), but investigation. remained unpublished until 59 when it was issued with the title De anatomicis aggression- The illustrated title page of Guenther’s Latin ibus in a collection of Galenic texts edited by translation is the same as that used by Colines Berengario da Carpi. In February 53 Guen- the previous year for the translation by ther’s revision of Calcondila’s translation, Thomas Linacre (460-54) of Galen’s renamed De anatomicis administrationibus, was Methodus medendi, vel de morbis curandis libri finely printed by Simon de Colines in Paris. On quatuordecim. The title page illustration is its publication it became one of the founda- divided into three parts, each with its own tions of anatomical study, and brought about theme. At the top right is the figure of the
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physician Saint Cosmas holding a book, signi- 5 Mondino dei Luzzi. Anatomia. Padua: fying the study of medical theory. On the left is Petrus Maufer, [circa 475] Saint Damian examining a phial of urine, sym- bolizing medical practice as a Christian exercise. A native of Bologna, and the son of an apothe- Between the two saints is the allegorical figure cary, Mondino dei Luzzi studied medicine at the of Christ the physician, miraculously healing a University of Bologna under Taddeo Alderotti leper. In the middle section are representations (circa 0–95), receiving his degree in 300. of the authorities of medicine: in the central Completed in 36, Anatomia owes its great panel Aesculapius and Dioscorides, symbolizing popularity to the simple, concise, and system- the healing arts, and materia medica respec- atic arrangement of its contents. Manuscript tively, are shown as full figures. Between the pil- copies of Anatomia circulated widely during the lars are portraits of four of the founding fathers fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, becoming of medicine: Hippocrates, Galen, Paulus the textbook of choice at most universities for Aegineta (65-690), and Oribasius (35-403), the teaching of anatomy for over two hundred each with a book in his hands. At the foot of the years. The first printed edition, displayed here, title page a heated debate is taking place was issued in Padua around 475. It is a tall folio around the dissection table. Significantly there of twenty-two leaves, printed in rotunda type. is no lector, and two men (possibly students) Today it is very rare, with only three copies are handling anatomical parts. No single figure known. At least four other editions were pub- dominates this animated scene, which marks a lished before the end of the fifteenth century, break from the formality of previous public and many more in the sixteenth century. anatomical demonstrations. In several respects the scene foreshadows the title page of the Fab- Compiled as a practical teaching manual for rica. students and surgeons, Anatomia is regarded as
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the first textbook devoted exclusively to letting; the “zodiacal man” reflects the anatomical dissection, and therefore the first common belief that medicine was controlled by work to treat anatomy as a distinct discipline, astrological phenomena; the “wound man” even though Mondino, by his own admission, illustrates the various possible sites for injury, had only ever dissected two cadavers, both with the thorax and abdomen showing the female. The brief text, with no scholastic appa- outlines of internal organs; the pregnant ratus, is organized around the processes of dis- woman is depicted in a frog-like squatting section, from the abdomen, to the thorax, and position – a common image in the late Middle finally to the head. Ages. All of the woodcuts were stock illustra- on LoAn From JonAThAn A. hILL tions widely used in Europe for didactic pur- poses in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Of particular interest is the woodcut of a dis- 6 Mondino dei Luzzi. Anatomia Mundini section in progress. The instructor sits in his per Carpum castigate, & post modum chair presiding over proceedings, while reading cum apostillis ornata, ac noviter from a textbook of anatomy. Below is a surgeon impressa. Venice: Sessa, 57. Bound or barber performing the dissection on a with Anatomia, quam de partibus cadaver laid out on the dissection table. An humani corporis inscripsit [Paris: ostensor points out the various bodily parts Simon Du Bois], 53. being discussed to the audience of students. This was the standard format for dissection Mondino’s Anatomia was republished many from the early fourteenth century right up to times during the late fifteenth and early six- the time of Vesalius. (see dissection scene teenth centuries. This pocket size copy actually above p. ) contains two editions of the Anatomia, both edited by Berengario da Carpi. 8 Jacopo Berengario da Carpi. Commen- on LoAn From taria cum amplissimis additionibus ThE oSLEr LIbrAry, mcgILL UnIVErSITy super Anatomia Mundini : una cum textu ejusdem in pristinum et verum nitorem redacto. Bologna, 5.9 7 Fasciculus medicinae. Venice: Caesar Jacopo Berengario da Carpi. Isagogae Arrivabene, 5. breues, p[er]lucide ac uberrime , in anatomiã humani corporis a cõmuni Before its first printing at Venice in 49, the medicor˜u academia usitatã a Carpo in Fasciculus medicinae circulated in manuscript almo Bononi˜esi gymnasio ordinariã during the fifteenth century. It consists of three chirurgie ¸ doc˜ete, ad suor˜u scholasticoru˜ independent medieval treatises, and was ˜p ces in lucem date. Bologna, 53. intended as a manual for medical students and barbers. The identity of the compiler has often Jacopo Berengario (460-530) taught anatomy been attributed to Johannes de Ketham, about at the University of Bologna after obtaining his whom nothing is known beyond the fact that medical degree there in 489. His birth name he was a German physician. He has sometimes was Barigazzi, but for unknown reasons he been identified as a Johan von Kirchheim, who changed his name to Berengario, adding the was active at the University of Vienna between suffix of his birthplace, Carpi. 455 and 470, but a precise identification cannot be established. In fact some believe that He learned anatomy and dissection from his Ketham had nothing to do with the Fasciculus, surgeon-barber father, whom he often assisted. but was merely an owner of one of the manu- As a youth he was tutored by the great printer- scripts. However, his name does appear in the scholar Aldo Manuzio (449-55), who spent explicit to the 49 edition, though it is missing from 469 to 477 teaching in Carpi. After com- from the 493 Italian translation. The Fasciculus pleting his medical training, Berengario prac- includes short treatises on uroscopy and phle- ticed for a time in Rome, where he amassed a botomy by Pietro da Montagnana, advice on fortune treating syphilis sufferers with mercury, pestilence by Pietro da Tossignano, and frequently with dire consequences for his Mondino’s important textbook on anatomy. patients. His reputation badly tarnished, he left Rome in a hurry. In 50 he moved to Bologna The Fasciculus is the earliest printed book to and became a lecturer in surgery at the univer- include anatomical illustrations of any signifi- sity, where he was very popular with his stu- cance. Each section has a traditional diagram: dents. At the outbreak of plague in Bologna in urine glasses arranged in a circle helped the 508 he became the city’s Commissioner of physician determine the nature of disease; a Health, a post he held until 5. With friends male figure is marked with the sites for blood- in high places, the avaricious and sometimes
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violent Berengario escaped punishment for a folio of over a thousand pages was Berengario’s number of incidents of assault and robbery. Yet most significant contribution to anatomical he earned the reputation of being a good sur- knowledge, and provided a complete guide to geon and developed a large clientele of wealthy earlier anatomical writings. It was also one of patrons. In 57 Lorenzo di Piero de’ Medici, the first printed anatomical works to contain Duke of Urbino (49–59) received a head illustrations. wound in battle, and Berengario was one of the practitioners summoned to attend to him. In 5 Berengario published a condensed ver- After a failed operation performed by another sion of the Commentaria, entitled Isagogae surgeon, Berengario tended the Duke and breves, a small quarto of eighty leaves, richly brought about a complete recovery. He illustrated with woodcuts. It was republished, recorded this experience in his Tractatus de frac- with changes and revisions, in 53, 530, and tura calve sive cranei (Bologna, 58), which he 535, at Bologna, Strasbourg, and Venice dedicated to the Duke. The treatise was respectively. Isagogae breves provides a concise reprinted many times until well into the seven- yet thorough description of human anatomy, teenth century. based on the evidence of the senses. The func- tion of each part and its relation to the body as In 54 Berengario produced an edition of a whole are discussed, as well as the diseases to Mondino’s Anatomia, a work he admired for its which each part is subject. Although an practicality and brevity. Examining previous admirer of Mondino, Berengario often chal- editions of Mondino, he found that parts of the lenges his statements, and thereby by implica- original text were missing, while other parts tion, the teachings of Galen. He is, therefore, were expanded or altered, and set about one of the first sixteenth-century commenta- restoring Mondino’s text to its original purity. tors to voice distrust of authority. Regarding Seven years later, in 5 Berengario completed anatomy as a progressive accumulation of his monumental Commentaria. This lengthy knowledge, he reminds his readers not to
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accept the word of others without independent aureole of sunbeams. There are five skeletal fig- verification. ures, some of them poorly drawn. Several improvements were introduced in the 53 edi- Berengario was the first to describe several tion of the Isagogae. Illustrations of the heart anatomical structures, including the ossicle of and the brain especially were the best pro- the middle ear, anastomosis between the portal duced to that date. vein and the inferior vena cava, the existence of a The identity of the artist of the illustrations is single umbilical vein, the tympanic membrane, unknown, though several candidates have and the vermiform appendix. He contradicts been suggested, including Rosso de Rossi Galen’s claim that the rete mirabile, which is to (496-54) of Florence, whose name has occa- be found only in certain animals, exists in sionally been associated with some of the illus- humans. He also lay to rest the persistent fallacy trations in Charles Estienne’s anatomical work that the uterus consists of seven cells. (see below). The name of Ugo da Carpi who was known to be working in Bologna in the Berengario was one of the first to advocate pri- 50s, has been suggested as the blockcutter. vate dissections, which, he reasoned, allowed investigation into those parts of the body, such An English translation by Henry Jackson with as the bones, muscles, nerves, veins, and the title Μηκροκοσμογραφια, or A Description arteries, which could not be easily observed of the Little World or Body of Man, being a Prac- during a public dissection. tical Anatomy, was issued in 660 – 5 years after the publication of the last Latin version. Among the most striking of Berengario’s illus- COMMENTARIA on LoAn From dr trations are six figures displaying the abdom- EUgEnE S. FLAmm inal muscles, one of them surrounded by an
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10 Johann Dryander. Anatomiae, hoc est, completed his medical degree at Mainz, and in corporis humani dissectionis pars prior : in 534 was appointed royal physician of Koblenz qua singula quae ad caput spectant and Trier. recensentur membra, atq; singulae partes, singulis suis ad uiuum commodissimè The University of Marburg, founded in 57 by expressis figuris, deliniantur : omnia recens Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse (504-567), was nata. Marburg, 537. the first Protestant university. In 535 Dryander was appointed as the chair of medicine, and A contemporary of Vesalius, Johann Eichmann spent the rest of his academic life in Marburg, (500-560), better known under his adopted becoming Rector of the University from 547 to Hellenized name of Dryander, was a native of 554. He was also appointed physician to Philip Wetter in Upper Hesse (Germany). After of Hesse, but found that his duties at court obtaining his M.A. from the University of Erfurt brought in a reduced salary, and also prevented in 54, he continued his studies in medicine at him from devoting his full attention to Bourges, before moving to the University of teaching. Dryander also published a number of Paris in 58. Dryander left Paris in 533 – the books on mathematics. year in which Vesalius enrolled at the same institution. There is no evidence that the two As in other European universities the medical men ever met each other. After Paris Dryander curriculum at Marburg was based on the writ-
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ings of Galen, the Aphorisms of Hippocrates, uted to Copho, entitled Anatomia porci, and De and the Canon of Avicenna. To supplement generatione embrionis written by Gabriele these works, Dryander planned a comprehen- Zerbi (445-505), late professor of medicine at sive treatise on the anatomy of the whole the University of Bologna. human body. The plan was not realized, but the first part, devoted to the head, was issued In the dedication to Philip of Hesse, Dryander in September 536 with the title: Anatomia stresses the fundamental importance of capitis humani. The book was essentially a col- anatomy to medicine, and like Berengario, lection of woodcut illustrations with explana- encourages his students to conduct their own tory captions. A second edition followed, in dissections. He emphasizes the application June 537 with the revised title Anatomiae, hoc of anatomy in surgery and pathology to deter- est, corporis humani dissectionis pars prior. The mine the cause of death and the nature of dis- new edition, a quarto of seventy-two pages, ease. had a longer introduction, more detailed illus- trations, and new figures of the thorax, heart, The woodcut illustrations, the sketches for and lungs, increasing the number of illustra- which were drawn by Dryander himself, were tions to twenty-three. The book concludes cut by a local Marburg blockcutter, Georg with a six-page section containing brief Thomas, whose cipher of a compass extracts from a thirteenth-century text attrib- (the symbol of Saint Thomas) appears on sev-
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eral illustrations. The woodcuts present a sequential dissection of the head, and display the surgical instruments necessary for the task, along with instructions on their use. Dryander provides accurate depictions of all parts of the brain. Other illustrations depict a dissection of the neck, the base of the skull, the jaw, and the teeth. Four additional illustrations, copied from Berengario, describe the skull and its sutures. With each part of the brain Dryander associ- ates a particular faculty or sense. For instance, multiple cavities in the pia mater fill with air to give us our sense of smell.
Dryander, like Berengario, felt a close affinity with Mondino, and in 54 published an anno- tated version of Mondino’s text, amended in the light of the recently recovered De anatomicis administrationibus of Galen. Dryander acknowledges Vesalius, and others “who grace the subject of anatomy.”
He also borrowed without permission certain illustrations from Vesalius’s Tabulae anatomicae sex. Vesalius mentions the “plagiarist” in his letter to his printer Johannes Oporinus in the Fabrica, chastising him as a “slave to the sordid sought an injunction to compel Estienne to dis- printer at Marburg and Frankfurt,” without play his name as co-author. The court eventu- knowing his true identity. In the introduction ally decided in favour of Rivière, whose name to the Fabrica, Vesalius gives Dryander a duly appeared on the title page. A French trans- favourable mention, but when he found out lation, containing two plates not included in the that Dryander had privately criticized him for Latin edition, was issued in 546. his lack of respect towards his former teacher Johann Guenther, Dryander’s name was De dissectione partium corporis humani is a good deleted from the 555 edition of the Fabrica. example of fine Parisian sixteenth-century printing by Estienne’s stepfather Simon de Col- ines. The sixty-two full-page woodcut illustra- 11 Charles Estienne. De dissectione par- tions printed from fifty-six blocks are striking tium corporis humani libri tres. Paris: works of art, full of mannerist conceits and Simon de Colines, 545. macabre touches. One block is signed “S.R” [i.e. Stephanus Riverius]. Several blocks are Charles Estienne (circa 505-56), also known marked with the name of the artist Jean Jollat by his Latin name Carolus Stephanus, was a (active 530-545), and are variously dated member of a distinguished family of printer- 530, 53 or 53. Others bear the emblem of scholars. He studied medicine under Sylvius at the Lorraine cross, thought to be the mono- the University of Paris, receiving his degree in gram of the blockcutter Jacquemin Woeiriot. medicine in 540. Between 544 and 547 he was a lecturer of anatomy at the Faculty of The illustrations in Estienne’s book vary in Medicine, Paris, but in 55 resigned from his quality, but overall they display considerable post in order to devote his energies to the artistry and originality. The outlines of blocks family’s printing business. In 56 he was inserted into a number of the figures depicting imprisoned for debt, and spent the final two internal structures, are clearly visible in some of years of his life in jail. the impressions. It has been suggested that the blocks were originally prepared for a com- Although the imprint of Estienne’s volume pletely different purpose, and that the anatom- post-dates that of the Fabrica, the book was ical element was added later. The female actually completed in 539, but publication was figures were modelled on a series of erotic delayed by a legal wrangle between Estienne mythological engravings, entitled Loves of the and Etienne de la Rivière [Stephanus Riverius], gods by the Italian artist Giovanni Jacopo until then a relatively unknown barber-surgeon Caraglio (d. 565). The images have been and artist employed by Estienne. Rivière had altered by the insertion of anatomical blocks
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which disguise their original erotic intention. Observing that Rhazes’s text had over the years become corrupt through mistranslations The text of De dissectione is written in the spirit and misreadings, compounded by an unintelli- of the Galenic tradition, but Estienne occasion- gible lexicon, Vesalius saw a need to revise ally contradicts Galen and at other times sup- Rhazes, not in the form of a literal translation, plements what Galen had written. When he is but as a paraphrase, in which obscure passages not in agreement with Galenic teaching, Esti- were explained. In addition, stylistic improve- enne is conciliatory in his approach, in contrast ments were made, glosses and marginalia were to the much more aggressive Vesalius. Like added, and the confusing names of drugs and Berengario da Carpi and Vesalius, Estienne medications were clarified. The subject of the affirms that the rete mirabile is absent in dissertation was probably suggested to humans. Vesalius by his teachers in Paris, although the manuscript of his grandfather’s commentary of
12 Andreas Vesalius. Paraphrasis in nonum librum Rhazae medici arabis clariss. ad Regum Almansorem de affec- tuum singularum corporis partium curatione. Basel: Robert Winter, 537.
In February 537 Vesalius published his bach- elor’s dissertation, a paraphrase of the ninth book of the compendium of therapeutics by the Arab-Persian physician, Rhazes, written for King Al-Mansu¯ r of Khurasan.
The Kita˜b al-Mansu¯rı¯, which was translated into Latin by Gherardo da Cremona (3 or 4-87) in the twelfth century as Liber ad Almansorem, was based mainly on the texts of Hippocrates and Galen. The first printed ver- sion of Gherardo’s translation of Ad Alman- sorem (as the book is commonly referred to) appeared in Milan in 48; it was reprinted in Venice in 497, and in Lyon in 50.
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Annotations in Vesalius’s hand
Rhazes which was in his possession, may have & emendatiores redditi. Venice: D. Bernar- contributed to his choice of topic. dini, 538.
Vesalius was dissatisfied with the undistin- One month after the publication of the Tabulae guished printing of his dissertation when it first anatomicae sex in 538, Vesalius completed a appeared in Leuven in February 537, for in revision of Johann Guenther’s Institutionum March of the same year he had the work anatomicarum secundum Galeni sententiam, reprinted in Basel by Robert Winter. Most which served as a digest of Galen’s writings noticeable was the change in the spelling of and as a textbook on dissection. Originally “Galen” from block capitals in the first printing, published in Paris in 536, and again in Basel to regular spelling in the second. Vesalius’s para- the same year, the Institutiones anatomicae phrase was also later included in Heinrich Petri’s enjoyed great success with Guenther’s stu- edition of Rhazes published in Basel in 544. dents, including Vesalius. In the flattering prefatory letter addressed to 13 Johann Guenther. Institutionum Johannes Heems of Armentières (Armenteri- anatomicarum secundum Galeni senten- anus), Professor of Medicine at the University tiam ad candidatos medicinae libri quatuor of Leuven, dated 5 May 538, Vesalius reveals … ab Andrea Vesalio Bruxellensi, auctiores his reasons for revising Guenther’s text a mere
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two years after the original publication, and dei Vitali in Venice in June 538. An undated without Guenther’s authorization. Because of edition was reprinted around 540, also at the careless negligence of the printers who pro- Venice. Both of these editions mention Vesalius duced the 536 edition, and as many people on their title pages, as does a later Wittenberg had asked him to undertake the revision, edition of 585, but his name is omitted from Vesalius acceded to the request “for the benefit the edition printed at Pisa in 550. of many”, and is confident that “the most lib- eral and most learned” Guenther would not be The copy on display is Vesalius’s own copy, offended. In republishing Guenther’s work which is richly annotated, evidently with a Vesalius corrected and expanded Guenther’s new edition in mind. The annotations correct text with his own anatomical findings. In this more errors in typography and layout, and regard the edition resembles an annotated make significant emendations to the text, copy of Guenther’s original. Seen in another through additions, deletions, and revisions. light, it was an opportunity for Vesalius to Although the Institutiones anatomicae were express his personal vanity and to display his republished at least four times, no edition considerable learning. incorporates the changes made by Vesalius in his copy. The revised version was printed by Bernardino on LoAn From STUArT roSE
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14 Jacobus Sylvius. Ordo, et ordinis ratio in in favour of the anatomical writings of Galen, legendis Hippocratis et Galeni libris. and Guenther’s dissection manual, Institutiones Paris: A. Wechel, 54. anatomicae.
This work, together with In Hippocrates et The Tabulae anatomicae sex were first printed Galeni physiologiae partem anatomicam isagoge, in Venice in 538 by Bernardino dei Vitali, who published in 54, represent Sylvius’s pedagog- had also been responsible for Berengario da ical activity in Paris during Vesalius’s student Carpi’s Isagogae breves of 535, and Guenther’s years in the French capital. Both works were Institutiones anatomicae in 538. The Tabulae significant contributions as student aids in anatomicae were printed without a title page, arranging, organizing, and abstracting the vast in the form of six large broadsides, with dimen- corpus of Galen. His efforts, which were much sions of approximately 5 x 34 cm. The appreciated by his students, brought him suc- woodcut illustrations are surrounded by text, cess and popularity. explaining the lettered references on the fig- ures.
The first three tables, drawn by Vesalius him- self, depict the portal, caval, and arterial sys- tems. Each part is named in Latin and Greek, and occasionally also in Arabic and Hebrew. Many of the Latin terms, which had been coined by Sylvius and Guenther, often in Hell- enized forms, were designed to replace the Arabic “barbarisms” about which Vesalius and other humanists frequently complained. The second table shows the “azygos” vein, a term coined by Guenther, meaning literally “a vein without a partner.” In discussing this vein, Vesalius enters the controversy on bloodletting, on which he subsequently elaborates in his Venesection Letter (see below #6).
The three remaining figures, of a skeleton of an eighteen-year old youth that Vesalius himself had prepared (Tabulae IV-VI), were drawn by Jan Stefan van Calcar (circa 499-circa 546), a Flemish artist from the studio of Titian. In spite of their undoubted popularity, the Tab- ulae anatomicae are today extremely rare; only two complete copies are known to have sur- vived, one at the Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana in Venice, the other at the Hunterian Library at 15 [Andreas Vesalius. Tabulae anatomicae the University of Glasgow. A number of facsim- sex.] iles have been published, firstly in London in 874, secondly in Leipzig in 90. The plates Jost de Negker. Arteria magna haorti ex sinistro were also reproduced in Icones anatomicae, cordis sinu oriens, & vitalem spiritum toti corpori jointly published in 934 by the New York deferens, naturalemq; calorem per contractionum Academy of Medicine and the University of & dilatationem temperans. [Augsburg, circa Munich. 540] In his letter to the printer Johann Oporinus On 6 December 537 Vesalius performed his which introduces the Fabrica, Vesalius com- first official dissection on a nineteen-year old plains about certain plagiarisms of his Tabulae youth. A surviving notebook written by Vitus anatomicae, identifying them by their place of Tritonius, a student who attended one of origin, rather than by the names of the perpe- Vesalius ’s classes, records the event. It notes trators, which were probably unknown to him that Vesalius abandoned the old format, estab- at that time. The plagiarist identified as the lished by Mondino in the early fourteenth “babbler of Augsburg” was Jost de Negker century, by combining the roles of lecturer, (circa 485-circa 544), also known as Jobst de dissector, and ostensor. Vesalius also recom- Necker, a Flemish woodcutter who was active mended his students to discard Mondino’s text in Augsburg.
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Negker’s copies of the figures are scarcely dis- plates to the advantage of the Germans and tinguishable from the originals. In the text that have so far as possible transformed from accompanies the first table Negker acknowl- good Latin into the unregulated German edges Vesalius as the author, and justifies the tongue the principal matters which never addition of a German text to accompany the before have been described in German Latin original: because this artistic description of all the The problem of an inadequate German vessels and bones of the body is extremely anatomical terminology was also faced by necessary for every surgeon, and since in Germany surgeons only rarely understand Alban Thorer in his German translation of the Latin, I, Jobst de Necker, as a lover of the Epitome of 543. German nation have translated these artistic
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The chart displayed here corresponds to Table III of the Tabulae anatomicae sex. It shows the heart and aorta and 47 of its branches, including the rete mirabile, which despite Galen’s assertions, does not in fact exist in humans. The fact that it is depicted in Vesalius’s work is an indication that he was still very much under the influence of Galen’s teachings. on LoAn From dr brIAn morrISon
16 Andreas Vesalius. Epistola, docens venam axillarem dextri cubiti in dolore laterali secandam melancholicum succum ex venae portae ramis ad sedem pertinentibus, purgari. Basel: Robert Winter, 539.
Bloodletting (phlebotomy) had been used as a fundamental therapeutic measure in the treat- ment of certain ailments since the time of Hip- pocrates, and was embedded in Greek humoral pathology. The practice, which used lancets, cupping glasses, or leeches, was still being per- formed until well into the twentieth century. In the Paraphrasis of Rhazes, Vesalius made fre- quent references to bloodletting. In 538 he In 54 an outbreak of pleurisy, or “pain in the returned to the subject briefly in the Tabulae side” (dolor lateralis), as it was called, struck anatomicae sex. The following year he takes up Paris. A local physician, Pierre Brissot, claimed the question at greater length in his Epistola, to have had great success in treating the dis- docens venam axillarem dextri cubiti in dolore ease by venesection. Brissot’s account triggered laterali secandam melancholicum succum ex a torrent of controversy, which raged for several venae portae ramis ad sedem pertinentibus, pur- years. While enthusiastically endorsing the gari [A letter, teaching that in cases of pain in ancient Greek procedures for bloodletting, the side, the axillary vein of the right elbow be Brissot in true humanist fashion, takes the cut, and that the melancholic juice is purged opportunity to denigrate Arab methods of from the branches of the portal vein extending bloodletting, which he claimed had deviated to the fundament] known, for the sake of from the teachings of Hippocrates and Galen. brevity, as the Venesection Letter. It was first The dispute revolved around the method of published by Robert Winter at Basel in 539, bloodletting to be used: revulsion or derivation. and again five years later, by Heinrich Petri in In ancient medicine, infection was believed to 544. be the result of local humours that had escaped from the blood stream. The direction of flow of In the Venesection Letter Vesalius placed himself the humour could be induced to proceed in the in the Brissot camp. Still a disciple of Galen, opposite direction towards a spot where it Vesalius based his rationale for the site of vene- could be evacuated from the body. The issue of section on an understanding of the significance whether to draw blood from the same or oppo- of the azygos system. He agreed with the Hip- site side to the infection became a major bone pocratic and Galenic view that venesection of contention for sixteenth-century practi- should normally be employed at a point as tioners. close as possible to the site of the pain, but he adds that this procedure should only be carried The Arab method of bloodletting was almost out in cases of pleurisy, and not for other kinds exclusively revulsive. Blood was taken from a of pains in the side. He concurs with Hip- vein as distant as possible from the infection. pocrates that in cases of thoracic pain beneath Bleeding close to the infection, it was believed, the diaphragm, purgatives should be used. But would increase the flow of toxic blood to the in cases of inflammation of the chest above the site of the infection, and thereby aggravate the diaphragm, Vesalius warns that noxious blood disease. As the controversy escalated, argu- should never be drawn through a vital organ ments for and against the two positions like the heart. Because of the position of the became increasingly heated. azygos vein, which issues from the right of the vena cava above the heart, in line with the
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veins of the right arm, blood should be drawn from the axillary vein of the right elbow.
Vesalius supports his argument with a rough sketch showing the veins that nourish the thorax, and those that are connected to the arms. The drawing was not intended to be a realistic representation, as is evident from the exaggerated size and configuration, but as a teaching device to be used in his lectures.
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dE hUmAnI corPUS FAbrIcA 543 Other factors, too, contributed to Basel’s rise to prominence. It was home to one of the leading universities in Europe. Founded in 460, it 17 Andreas Vesalius. De humani corporis played a prominent role in the Protestant Ref- fabrica libri septem. Basel: J. Oporinus, ormation. The city provided refuge to such 543. humanist scholars as Erasmus, Hans Holbein, Huldrych Zwingli (484-53), Johannes Oeco- lampadius (48-53), and other leading intel- PrInTIng In bASEL lectuals who added to the city’s reputation for The question has frequently been raised as to religious tolerance and scholarship. Situated on why Vesalius chose to have the Fabrica printed the Rhine, the city was ideally placed geo- in Basel instead of nearby Venice, which would graphically on the main European trade routes, have been the logical choice, as one-fifth of the with convenient access to France, Germany, total number of medical books published in the and Italy as well as northern markets. fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries had been produced there. The first collected edition ThE PrInTEr of Galen’s works in Latin was issued in 490 Johannes Oporinus (507-568), who was born and in Greek in 55. The Venetian presses Johan Herbst, had a multi-faceted career. From could boast a host of other famous medical a family of painters, his first inclination was to works. follow in his father’s footsteps. But he excelled at school and instead was sent to boarding- Venice had earned a reputation for the fine school in Strasbourg where he studied Latin printing of scholarly editions. In terms of the and Greek for four years. Returning to Basel, number of books printed, and the number of and with insufficient means to enter university, printers and publishers active in the city-state, he supplemented his income from teaching by Venice occupied a predominant position within copying Greek theological manuscripts in the the European book trade. But in the first three Froben printing house. One of his tasks was to decades of the sixteenth century political tur- help with the preparation of the text of moil, French invasions, and defeat by the Erasmus’s edition of Irenaeus. It was at this League of Cambrai, resulted in the widespread time, that, following the fashion of the day, he disruption of commerce in the Republic. The Hellenized his name to Oporinus, meaning Venetian printing and publishing industry was “autumn”. He now began to study law, and deeply affected. As a direct result of the dwin- learned Hebrew. dling Venetian market, commercial opportuni- ties were seized upon by printers north of the In 56 his employer Johannes Froben badly Alps, as the main centres of printing shifted injured his foot and faced the prospect of away from Northern Italy to Paris, Lyon, amputation. Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Antwerp, and Basel. Bombastus von Hohenheim (493-54), better known as Paracelsus, was sent for and suc- The growing reputation of Basel for scholarly ceeded in healing Froben. Paracelsus stayed on printing was largely due to the patronage of in Basel and gave lectures at the University of Desiderius Erasmus (466-536), who in 55 Basel, which were attended by Oporinus, who transferred publication of his Greek translation now turned his thoughts towards a career in of the New Testament from Aldus in Venice to medicine. He became Paracelsus’s secretary, Johann Froben (circa 460-57) in Basel. Very laboratory assistant, and valet, but finding it soon the Swiss city became the leading centre impossible to work for the highly eccentric and of publishing in the scholarly languages, partic- unpredictable physician, he eventually left his ularly in the disciplines of theology and science. employment and, disillusioned, abandoned all The tradition that had been begun by Johann thoughts of a medical career. He returned to Amerbach (d. 53) and Andreas Cratander teaching and, as his reputation as a classicist (circa 490-circa 540) was continued by the grew, he was rewarded with successive profes- Froben dynasty, and, from 54, by Johannes sorships in Latin and Greek in 533 and 537 Oporinus (507-568). Basel had also earned a respectively. In 536, while still holding his uni- place of preeminence in the printing of versity position, he purchased the Cratander woodcut illustrations, mainly through the col- printing house in partnership with three other laboration of Hans Holbein the younger (497- local printers, Robert Winter, Thomas Platter 543) with the Froben printing house. That (499-58), and Balthasar Lasius (active 536- reputation was further enhanced by the publi- 543). One of the books issued under their joint cation in 54 of Leonard Fuchs’s magnificent imprint was Guenther’s Institutiones anatom- botanical treatise De historia stirpium. icae. After several years the partnership began
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to deteriorate, and was eventually dissolved. italic in popularity. Each line of text measures Oporinus, having already resigned his univer- 8.5 centimetres, the average number of lines sity position, struck out on his own, and in 54 per page being fifty-seven. There are about five established his own printing house, which thousand characters to the page, excluding flourished for the next twenty-four years. He spaces. became the foremost printer of his generation in Basel, acquiring a deserved reputation for TITLE PAgE the accuracy of his printing. The famous woodcut title page of the Fabrica, depicting the tumultuous scene of a public Among his stocks in trade were editions of the anatomy conducted by Vesalius in Padua, has classics, many of which he himself edited. He received extensive commentary, and a wide printed more than fifty Greek texts. Also range of interpretations. The outdoor location, prominent among his output were works by probably in the courtyard of the university, is the Church Fathers and the Protestant reminiscent of a theatrical spectacle. At the Reformers of his own day. John Foxe (56- same time it is a pictorial representation of a 587) worked as a corrector in Oporinus’s revolutionary new method of expressing and printing shop between 555 and 559, and had communicating knowledge. In calculated con- the original Latin version of the Book of Martyrs trast to the traditional dissection scene as published by Oporinus in 559. Because of his depicted in the Fasciculus medicinae, in the close association with the Reformers, Oporinus centre is the figure of the leading actor, was placed on the first Index librorum pro- Vesalius, performing a dissection on a female hibitorum issued by Pope Paul IV in 559. He cadaver, opened to display the abdominal also fell afoul of Protestant censorship over the cavity with some of the organs removed. Tow- printing of Theodore Bibliander’s Latin transla- ering above the dissection scene is an articu- tion of the Qur’an, for which he was briefly lated skeleton, reflecting Vesalius’s custom of imprisoned. displaying a skeleton at his anatomy demon- strations and symbolizing the importance of His scholarly background in medicine, the osteology to the study of anatomy. In this scene ancient languages, and his fine printing record Vesalius has taken the initiative and is per- made Oporinus the ideal choice of printer for forming the combined roles of instructor, dis- Vesalius’s great work. Besides the two editions sector, and ostensor – one of the basic tenets of of Fabrica, and the two versions of the Epitome, the “new” anatomy he was promoting. Gone is in Latin and German, Oporinus also printed the isolated lector in his elevated chair looking the second edition of Vesalius’s Paraphrase of down on what is taking place. Meanwhile the Rhazes, the Venesection Letter, and the China squabbling barber-surgeons have been rele- Root Letter. gated to a subservient role of sharpening the tools of dissection beneath the table. On 4 August 54 Vesalius wrote to Oporinus that the woodblocks for the Fabrica were ready Also richly symbolic is the depiction of the for shipment to Basel; they arrived safely in the audience of about seventy to eighty people middle of September. The blocks were accom- crowded around the dissection table, hanging panied by proofs and detailed instructions for from pillars, and peering through archways and their placement. Vesalius stated his intention to windows. The onlookers are from all walks of travel to Basel for the duration of printing, and life, as is evident from their costume, ranging would bring with him the privilege granted by from university dignitaries, professors, clerics, the Senate of Venice against unlawful printing. physicians, midwives, to the curious public. In A second privilege, from the Holy Roman accordance with Vesalius’s pedagogical creed, Empire, would arrive from Brussels. Finally a students are assisting the anatomist with his third privilege, from the King of France, had work. The two figures in the foreground on been promised. Work on the monumental each side of the table are given special promi- volume began probably on October 54. In nence. It is possible that the figure on the left January 543 Vesalius arrived in Basel to com- represents Wolfgang Herwart of Augsburg (b. mence the arduous task of proof-reading. Fab- 54), while the man on the right, admonishing rica was completed by the end of July 543. It the barking dog, may be the Paduan philoso- was printed on demy-size paper, probably pher, Marcantonio Genua (49-563); both manufactured locally. Each gathering consists men had encouraged Vesalius not to lose heart of three quired folio sheets, producing twelve with his project during moments of doubt, and pages. There is total number of 7 pages. The are hereby acknowledged. Another interpreta- text is printed mainly from sixteen-point tion is that the latter figure represents Galen, roman type. Italicized passages are composed who having never dissected a human body, is in “Basel italic” which had replaced Aldine eagerly watching and learning. It has been sug-
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sign of his elevated status – he is engaged in the dissection of the flexor muscles of the fingers and their tendons of a large woman, undoubt- edly the same woman that is being dissected on the title page.
On the table lies a variety of instruments, a candle, an ink-well and a sheet of paper – the same objects as on the title page. The text inscribed on the paper is from Chapter 43 of the Fabrica, describing the very procedure that Vesalius is performing. The edge of the table declares Vesalius’s age as twenty-eight, and the year 54 in roman numerals. On the reveal beneath the table top is the phrase “ocyUS IUcUndE ET TUTo”, paraphrased from Ascle- piades by Celsus, meaning “swiftly, pleasantly and safely” which the Vesalius family adopted as its personal motto.
The seemingly disproportionate representation gested that the bearded man on the right of Vesalius’s body parts, in particular the large looking down from a balcony is the printer head and the short arms, has puzzled many Johannes Oporinus. Much more interesting is commentators. Yet the fact that the portrait the identification of the beardless head, seem- was also used both in the 555 edition of the ingly suspended in space, immediately to the Fabrica and in the China Root Letter, suggests left of Vesalius, and looking over his shoulder, that it is an accurate representation of as the artist Jan Stefan van Calcar. The curi- Vesalius’s physical appearance. It has been ously naked figure holding on to a pillar to the speculated that Vesalius manifested signs of left of the scene may represent surface hypochondroplasia, a kind of short-limbed anatomy, or he may be looking on in horror at dwarfism, though he never made any reference the fate that awaits him. One student is to this condition. reading a book with the initials “C.G.”, signi- fying “Claudius Galenus”,stamped on the ThE ArTISTS cover. In contrast, another student holding a The identification of the artist or artists of the closed book points at the dissection suggesting illustrations of the Fabrica, has confounded his- that there is more to be learned from observa- torians since the time of the book’s publication. tion than from books. The monkey and the Many names have been put forward, but the dog, obligatory victims at a public anatomy, most likely candidate is Jan Stefan van Calcar, await their turn to be dissected. They have also who executed the three skeletal figures for been interpreted as oblique references to Vesalius’s Tabulae anatomicae sex in 539. Galen’s reliance on animal anatomy. Those who challenge this attribution point to the fact that the skeletons in the Tabulae At the top of the picture are the punning coat- anatomicae are markedly inferior to the skeletal of arms of the Wesel family (“three weasels figures and muscle men of the Fabrica. This courant”), flanked by the Lion of St. Mark rep- may be true, but working with a poorly articu- resenting the Republic of Venice. The ox’s head lated skeleton, the artist was merely drawing on the entablature is the emblem of “Il bò,” the what he saw. Secondly, the inferior quality of popular student name for the Hospitum bovis, the earlier plates may be due to the block- acquired by the University of Padua in 539. cutter’s lack of technical skill. Unfortunately, Vesalius never acknowledged his artist, but at The title page to the Fabrica soon became the the end of the Venesection Letter of 539, with prototype for other representations of public his thoughts on a large anatomical work, he anatomy lessons for over a century. makes reference to Jan Stefan, “the distin- guished contemporary artist”, whom he hopes PorTrAIT to engage in his grand venture. But any collab- The portrait of Vesalius at the age of twenty- oration between anatomist and artist is always eight that appears at the end of the introduc- likely to be fraught with tension and difficul- tory matter, is said to be the only authentic ties, and there is the strong probability that representation of the anatomist. Dressed in the Vesalius and Stefan fell out at some stage same rich garments as on the title page – a sure between the publication of the Tabulae
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anatomicae and the Fabrica. Later in the China the Fabrica. Root Letter, in a telling admission, Vesalius says While evidence strongly points to the blocks that he no longer had “to put up with the bad being prepared in the Venetian workshop of temper of artists and cutters who made me Titian, some commentators have gone so far as more miserable than the bodies I was dis- to attribute the illustrations to Titian himself. secting.” By not acknowledging his artist, Indeed, an edition of the Fabrica produced in Vesalius was acting in a manner that was true 706 by the Augsburg publisher Andreas to his complex character. Quick to take offence, Maschenbauer from the original woodblocks, and unable to forgive those who has offended confidently declares on its title page that the him, Vesalius takes his revenge by remaining figures were designed by Titian. There are sev- silent about his collaborators. The art critic eral objections to this attribution. Firstly, by the Giorgio Vasari (5-574) in the second edition 540s Titian was at the height of his powers, of his Vite de piu eccelenti pittori (568), declares and his paintings were commanding huge unequivocably that Jan Stefan was the artist of sums. It is, therefore, extremely unlikely that he
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would take on such a utilitarian task as illus- quite an accomplished artist, and may have trating a book of anatomy. Secondly, if Vesalius done some of the smaller illustrations himself, could afford to hire such an eminent artist as though the larger illustrations were probably Titian, whose collaboration would have added beyond his artistic capabilities. The most likely enormous prestige to the book, why was his explanation is that Vesalius employed several name not mentioned in the Fabrica? It has even artists and blockcutters, including Jan Stefan been suggested that the Fabrica was an elabo- van Calcar. It is also likely that the best of the rate plagiarism of the anatomical drawings of illustrations, the three skeletal figures and the Leonardo da Vinci. fourteen muscle men, were drawn by Stefan, and transferred to woodblocks by a highly tal- The identity of the artist may never be ented but unnamed blockcutter. Recent resolved, as new evidence is unlikely to become research has unearthed evidence suggesting available. Stylistic analysis of the illustrations that the blockcutters were Francesco Marcolini has produced nothing definitive. Vesalius was da Forli and one of his workmen, a German, Johann Britt.
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ThE ILLUSTrATIonS The smaller woodcuts of individual parts do In portraying the three skeletons, the artist suc- not represent the idealized body, but are partic- ceeds in imbuing them with emotion, as they ular to the cadaver being dissected, such as the consider their mortal destiny. illustration showing a human skull with a missing tooth, propped up by a dog’s skull. The fourteen large ecorchés figures, the “muscle men,” are unquestionably the out- It was not until 904 that it was realized that standing artistic achievement of the Fabrica. the rural backgrounds to the muscle men fig- The series is arranged sequentially to demon- ures form a continuous panorama of the strate a progressive dissection, layer by layer, Euganean Hills along the river route from beginning with surface of the whole body, and Padua to Venice – a journey that Vesalius made ending with a forlorn figure leaning against a many times. Placed in a natural setting, strewn wall, the remaining flesh hanging from his with ruins and other memento mori, the figures body. The figures may be divided into two cate- seem to inhabit a twilight zone between the gories: those in which the figures are repre- living and the dead. The backgrounds are sented as dead, supported by pulleys, ropes, delineated with the same precision as the and other devices, and those in which the fig- muscle men themselves. The use of landscape ures appear to be alive and dynamic, flexing gives the image a sense of reality and perspec- their muscles and moving under their own tive, and became a standard trope for anatom- locomotion. Despite the naturalism of the fig- ical illustration for the next few hundred years. ures, they represent an idealized human form that in reality does not exist. The artists invite One of the most remarkable features of the the observer to enter their world through the Fabrica is the series of pictorial initial letters application of the imagination. that introduce each book and chapter. This kind of embellishment had long been used in manuscripts as well as in printed books. The letters, which show the anatomist with his naked putti assistants engaged in various acts associated with his trade, provide glimpses of practical anatomy and surgery of the time. Care is taken to strike a harmonious balance between the form of the letter and the background scene, which enliven the text with a degree of macabre humour, and provide an ironic commentary on the activities of Vesalius. They serve as a kind of pictorial footnote.
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The letters fall into two groups. There are four Spain, on whose medical staff Vesalius would large initials – I O Q T – used at the beginning later serve. of each of the seven books into which the Fab- rica is divided; and seventeen smaller letters at The Epitome was intended as a much con- the head of each chapter. densed version of the Fabrica, for the use of Small L and O depict the body of an executed students. Vesalius refers to it as a semita criminal being handed over to students under (gateway) to the Fabrica. The sheer bulk and official supervision; an ecclesiastical figure price of the Fabrica make it clear that the book holding a crucifix watches as putti remove the was not aimed at the student market, but body of a female from the scaffold, while sol- rather at a wealthier class of reader, perhaps dier guards stand by. Large O and I show a noc- practicing physicians and teaching faculty. The turnal disinterment. Epitome was better suited to students’ needs, as, in contrast to the Fabrica, it could be conve- SUrVIVALS And LoSSES niently carried to lectures, and cost one-sixth of It has been estimated that between eight hun- the price of the Fabrica. dred and one thousand copies of the 543 Fab- rica were printed. In a census carried out in Consisting of twelve folio leaves measuring 56 x 984, 54 copies had been located, though the 40 cm, the Epitome returns to the earlier model actual number of surviving copies is probably of the Tabulae anatomicae sex, where the illus- greater. The largest concentration is in institu- trations take on greater significance than the tional libraries in the United States, with fifty- text. The delineations of the distribution of the seven examples. The United Kingdom has blood vessels, and the figure of a skeleton twenty-six copies, Germany eight, the Nether- leaning against a tomb are the same as those lands six, and Canada four. A further thirty-one used in the Fabrica, except for the removal of are spread across Europe, leaving twenty the epitaph “vivitur ingenio, caetera mortis copies known from auction records, but whose erunt” (genius lives on, the rest is mortal) from whereabouts are unknown. Many copies have the side of the tomb. The newly introduced disappeared or have been destroyed over the “Adam and Eve” figures represent surface centuries. Two copies once at the University of anatomy, with explanatory text describing Leuven were destroyed by fire when the library external aspects of the body. was deliberately set alight by German troops in Other new illustrations display stages of the 94. Another casualty of enemy action in dissection of the brain. For the sake of Leuven occurred during the Second World War, economy, smaller anatomical parts are spread when the woodblock of the title page to the at the feet of the figures. The two illustrations 555 edition of the Fabrica was destroyed. In displaying the blood vessels, nerves, and vis- the same war, books from the Leopoldina cera, invite the reader to cut out certain Library in Halle that had been buried in a mine anatomical parts from the leaf supplied, back for safe-keeping were plundered by Soviet them with thicker paper, and paste them upon troops, including a copy of the Fabrica. Another the larger figure to form multi-layered copy, once in the possession of the Belgian manikins. royal family, has also vanished. on LoAn From dr EUgEnE S. FLAmm
One of the copies destroyed at Leuven in 94 was for many years mistakenly thought to have 19 Andreas Vesalius. Von des Menschen been the dedication copy to Emperor Charles V. Cörpers Anatomey, ein kurtzer, aber The real hand-coloured dedication copy was vastnützer Asszug. Basel: J. Oporinus, until recently owned by Dr Haskell Norman of 543. San Francisco. It was sold at auction by Chris- ties of New York on 8 March 998, and is now Concerned about plagiarism and unauthorized in the possession of a private collector. copies in the German-speaking lands, Vesalius commissioned Alban Thorer (489-550), physician, professor, and Rector of the Univer- sity of Basel, to produce a German version of 18 Andreas Vesalius. De humani corporis the Epitome, using the original woodcuts, fabrica librorum epitome. Basel: J. under his direction. It was published by Opor- Oporinus, 543. inus on 9 August, several days after Vesalius’s departure from Switzerland. It is the only work The Epitome was completed two weeks after of Vesalius to be translated into a vernacular the Fabrica on 3 August 54, and was pub- language during his lifetime. The translation lished in June 543. It was dedicated to the has more illustrations than the Latin version, Emperor’s son, Philip II, the future King of and adds a second dedication, to Ulrich, Duke
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of Württemberg (487-550). The text is set edition of Rhazes, based on a reexamination of mainly in schwabacher type. The German earlier translations. Vesalius’s Paraphrase of translation is considerably rarer than the Latin Rhazes was incorporated into Thorer’s edition, version. Since the sheets were probably which was published in Basel by Heinrich Petri intended to be used as wall charts, full sets of in 544. the sheets are extremely rare, with only two copies recorded. Two incomplete copies are Translation of scientific texts into German was also known. especially difficult, as few German anatomical works existed, and consequently there was Thorer had translated a number of Byzantine little in the way of a specialized anatomical Greek medical texts into Latin, and a treatise vocabulary. Thorer had to coin new words, and on the plague, an outbreak of which struck many phrases required parenthetic explana- Basel in 539. When Vesalius arrived in Basel in tions or paraphrase to make their meaning 54, Thorer was engaged in preparing a Latin clear.
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20 Andreas Vesalius. Epistola rationem modumque propinandi radices Chynae dedocti. Basel: J. Oporinus, 546.
In 546 Vesalius travelled to Ratisbon. On his arrival a letter from his friend Joachim Roe- lants, a physician of Mechlin, was awaiting him, asking for his opinion about the preparation, use, and therapeutic value of the root of the China smilax. China root, a relative of sarsapa- rilla, had recently become popular as a replace- ment for guaiac wood - a medication employed in the treatment of muscle pain and gout. In his reply Vesalius claimed little knowledge of the root. He had tried it to treat the Emperor’s gout, but only with limited effectiveness. He concluded that he saw no reason to replace guaiac wood with China root.
Earlier, Vesalius had interceded on behalf of Roelants’s son who had gone to Paris to study A variety of the smilax plant. P.A. Mattioli. Commentarii in medicine. Vesalius wrote to several professors at sex libros Pedacii Dioscoridis Anazarbei de medica materia. Paris, including his old teacher Sylvius. In his Venice: Ex officio Valgrisiana, 565 letter Vesalius asked Sylvius in passing his opinion about the Fabrica. Sylvius admitted that rica against the attacks of the Galenists. while there was much merit in the Fabrica, he Vesalius railed against the conservative forces regretted that Vesalius had not treated Galen he encountered during his years in Paris that with more respect. He attributed Vesalius’s had stifled the pursuit of scientific enquiry. manner to his youth and the negative influence Mentioning Sylvius by name, Vesalius repeats of those Italians opposed to Galen. What his assertion that traditional authority must offended Sylvius most of all was Vesalius’s state- yield to the evidence of the senses, particularly ment that Galen had never dissected human in the case of Galen who, claimed Vesalius, had bodies. He ended the letter with an ultimatum, probably never performed a human dissection, that unless Vesalius withdrew his “false state- having based his anatomical knowledge on the ments” regarding Galen, he would no longer be dissection of monkeys, not humans. able to remain on amicable terms. on LoAn From dr EUgEnE S. FLAmm
Sylvius’s accusations and ultimatum provoked a 21 Thomas Geminus. Compendiosa totius belligerent response from Vesalius. Word of the anatomie delineatio. London: John letter reached Roelants who asked Vesalius Herford, 545. what he had written to Sylvius. Vesalius had not kept a copy of the letter, but remembered the 22 Thomas Geminus. Compendiosa totius contents. He penned a lengthy reply to Roelants, anatomie delineatio. London: T. explaining what had passed between him and Geminus, 559. his old teacher. The letter was intended to be a private communication to Roelants, but as The first unauthorized reproductions of the copies of it were beginning to circulate, plates of the Fabrica were done by Thomas Vesalius’s brother Franciscus, who was studying Lambrechts, better known by the name of medicine at Ferrara, took it on himself to have Thomas Geminus (d. 56). Engraver, printer, the letter published in Basel by Oporinus, in and scientific instrument maker, Geminus was order to forestall unauthorized versions. On a native of Lixhe in the principality of Liège in hearing about his brother’s intentions, Vesalius Flanders, and may have arrived in England rewrote the original letter and sent it to his around 54 as a refugee from religious perse- brother along with instructions to Oporinus on cution. In 545 he issued the Compendiosa totius printing requirements. The letter was published anatomie delineatio, which translated the in 546 under the title Epistola rationem mod- woodcut illustrations of the Fabrica and the umque propinandi radices Chynae dedocti. Epitome into copperplate engravings, which were accompanied by the Latin text of the The short discussion on the China root occu- Epitome. pies only about one-tenth of the letter, the rest is taken up with Vesalius’s defence of the Fab- Publication of the Compendiosa so enraged
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Vesalius, that in the China Root Letter he wrote: his introduction: Just now in England … the illustrations of In my delineation of the whole body my Epitome have been copied so poorly and according to its parts, I have followed without artistic skill … that I should be Andreas Vesalius of Brussels, who is by far ashamed if anyone were to believe me the most skilled man of our times in this art. responsible for them … Everything has been I have followed him and, if I am not mis- shamefully reduced, although figures of this taken, have kept pace with him, but by a sort can never be exhibited large enough … short cut. For what he produced at great I should much prefer to provide printers length in many verbose books, I, in so far as I with the illustrations than have them copied was able, collected into a kind of com- unskillfully … with the favour of the gods, I pendium, engraved by me on copper and shall spare no efforts to vanquish those pla- published for the general use of students giarists who are wont to seize upon the labours of others since they are unable to The Compendiosa was dedicated to Henry VIII. steal anything original from one another As Geminus informs us, he had been com- manded by the King, who wished to improve But in fact, far from ignoring Vesalius, Geminus the practice of surgery in England, to issue a gives high praise to the author of the Fabrica in new edition of the Fabrica.
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In addition to their engraved title pages, each Compendiosa would be of benefit to those who edition of the Compendiosa contained forty-one were performing surgery but who had no Latin. pages of engravings printed from fifty plates, Accordingly, in 553 he produced an English including all the large plates from the Fabrica, version. The plates remained the same, but the most of the important smaller plates, and the captions accompanying were translated into Adam and Eve figures from the Epitome. In English by Nicholas Udall (505-556), poet, some instances the figures are reversed, as is all playwright, and translator of Erasmus. the lettering. The background to the muscle Although the title page retains the Latin title of men figures has been removed, and replaced the original, the work was given a new text with tufts of grass and small stones. with the caption title A Treatyse of Anatomie wherin is conteyned a Compendious or Briefe Sales of the Compendiosa appeared to have Rehersal of al and singular the Partes of Mans gone well in England especially as its produc- Body, which was compiled from several earlier tion was underwritten by the monarch. But works. There are close resemblances between perhaps mindful of the fact that the surgeons this text provided by Geminus and Thomas and barbers of England were considered to be Vicary’s Anatomie of Mans Bodie, first published inferior to the university-trained physicians, in 548, no copies of which have survived; a Geminus decided that an English version of the second edition appeared in 577 which allows a
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comparison with the text of the Compendiosa. 23 Juan de Valverde de Amusco (circa Vicary’s work was itself a compilation gleaned 55-circa 588). Anatomia del corpo from a late fourteenth-century manuscript humano. Rome: Ant. Salamanca, based on the writings of Henri de Mondeville &Antonio Lafreri, 560. and Guy de Chauliac. In 559 Geminus pub- lished a second English version, a reprint of the 553 edition. Each version of the Compendiosa Another so-called “plagiarism” appeared in was dedicated to a different monarch – Henry Rome in 556. The work, written in Spanish by VIII, Edward VI, and Elizabeth. The 545 edi- Juan Valverde de Amusco (circa 55-circa tion has the distinction of being the first book 588), was entitled Historia de la composicion del in England to have an engraved title page. The cuerpo humano. The book proved to be very title page of the 559 edition features a portrait popular and was translated into Italian six times between 559 and 68, into Latin four of Elizabeth which is thought to be the first times, and twice into Dutch. Two of the Latin depiction of the newly crowned queen fol- (566 and 57), and one of the Dutch editions lowing her accession to the throne. (568), printed in Antwerp by Christoph 545 EdITIon on LoAn From Plantin (circa 50-589), were unauthorized. dr EUgEnE S. FLAmm
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Valverde had studied medicine in Padua and one hand and a knife in the other. The image Rome under Vesalius’s rivals, Realdo Columbo has been compared to Michelangelo’s painting and Bartolomeo Eustachi. Almost all of the in the Sistine Chapel of Saint Bartholomew in book’s forty-three plates were taken directly the Last Judgment. Other illustrations, rich in from the Fabrica; only four were original illus- mannerist excesses, include two figures holding trations. Like Geminus, Valverde preferred the their flayed bodies open; a dissected figure dis- medium of engraving on copper. The designs secting a cadaver; and a torso encased in were drawn by Gaspar Becerra (50?-568?), a armour displaying its abdominal organs. contemporary of Michelangelo (475-564), and Valverde also made several alterations to the the engravings are thought to have been car- Vesalian originals, including the skeletons, the ried out by Niccolò Beatrici (507?-570?), muscles of the eye, nose, and larynx. Moreover, whose monogram “NB” appears on several of although Valverde’s text relied heavily on the plates. Vesalius’s, he makes about sixty textual correc- tions and additions, mostly in the captions to One of the most striking original plates is that the illustrations. of an ecorché figure holding up its own skin in
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The title page of the Latin edition, published at from four small woodcuts of the cranium. Rome in 560 with the title Anatomia del corpo humano, shows two skeletons supporting an In the sixteenth century Lyon became a centre elliptical shield bearing the title. Above are a for pirated editions of popular works. Realising monkey and a pig, frequently used in dissec- that the 543 Fabrica was beyond the pocket of tions, either as substitutes for human subjects, all but a few wealthy students, the printer- or for purposes of comparative anatomy. The scholar Jean de Tournes tried to capitalize on title page also includes the standard memento this gap in the market, by producing a small mori of bones, skulls, and hour-glass. The format (sixteenmo) pocket size version aimed scenes in the lower part reflect different at the lower end of the book-buying public. moments from the anatomical demonstration. The two volumes stand in stark contrast to the On the left the anatomist teaches a student impressive folio of 543. how to articulate a skeleton. In the centre is a dissection being performed by teachers and students. On the right a dissection of a woman is underway. This title page design was reprinted several times with minor modifica- tions.
Valverde regarded himself as a faithful follower of Vesalius by constantly stressing the impor- tance of direct observation, the leading role of the anatomist, and the use of illustration. Vesalius, on the other hand, had little tolerance for Valverde, and regarded him as an imposter. Later he wrote to Falloppio: Valverde who never put his hand to a dissec- tion and is ignorant of medicine as well as of the primary disciplines, undertook to expound our art in the Spanish language only for the sake of shameful profit …
There are innumerable things in the Spanish compendium of Valverde from which it can be readily seen that neither he nor his teacher Colombo was even superficially versed in the writings of Galen and others.
Vesalius argued that the copying of the illustra- tions from the Fabrica produced a distortion of the originals. Looked at from another point of view, it could be argued that Valverde’s (and Geminus’s) versions of Vesalius’s anatomy, were in fact a tribute to the genius of its creator. Indirectly, through their efforts, the dissemina- tion of Vesalius’s ideas reached a wider audi- ence. In this sense plagiarism may be seen as a form of homage to the original creator.
24 Andreas Vesalius. De humani corporis fabrica, lib. VII. Lyon: J. de Tournes, 55. volumes.
This two-volume unauthorized edition of the Fabrica, produced in Lyon in 55 by Jean de Tournes, represents a different kind of plagia- rism. Because the principal appeal of the Fab- rica was in its illustrations, this edition is most unusual, in that it reproduces only the text of the Fabrica, and none of the illustrations, apart
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Perhaps the most notable difference between dE hUmAnI corPorIS FAbrIcA 555 the two editions is the woodcut title page. The 555 title page is much inferior to the 543, and 25 Andreas Vesalius. De humani corporis clearly was not executed under Vesalius’s fabrica libri septem. Basel: J. Oporinus, supervision. The new title page is heavy and 555. flat, the lines more coarse. The head of the anatomist has become enlarged, the number of rings on his fingers has been reduced to one. Copies of the 543 Fabrica were still available in Gone are the plants and foliage growing out of 547 from Oporinus, who was probably reluc- the masonry. The folds and wrinkles of the gar- tant to embark on printing a second edition, ments have also disappeared. The nude figure while sheets of the first edition remained holding on to the pillar is now fully clothed. unsold. But at some point between the end of One of the dogs has been replaced by a goat. August 550 and October 55, during a long The skeleton supported by a staff in the 543 sojourn in Augsburg, Vesalius began making edition, now holds a scythe, transforming it preparations for a second edition. Type for the into the grim reaper. Oporinus’s name no revised edition had been cast in moulds bor- longer appears in the imprint. rowed from Francisco de Enzinas, but after the printing of five books the type became too Many of the illustrations that had appeared worn for subsequent use. New type was there- crowded in the first edition, are now spaced fore required, but unfortunately Enzinas had further apart, and the accompanying text has died. Eventually Oporinus had the opportunity been rearranged. Index letters that had been to buy the moulds outright and printing difficult or impossible to see have had some of resumed. It was completed in August 555. the hatching removed to make them more vis- ible. Several illustrations were removed, while The text of the new edition brought major others were extensively reworked, and still typographical improvements. It was set in others replaced by completely different images. larger type than the 543 edition, with more space between the lines, and fewer words per The initial letters are substantially the same, line. Among the textual changes was the dele- except for the introduction of a large V for the tion of the names of people with whom beginning of the dedication to Charles V, and Vesalius had quarreled, such as Sylvius, Fuchs, the beginning of book V. It differs from the Dryander, and Colombo, or people who had other pictorial letters in that it depicts a died since the original printing of 543. Even the mythological theme - the story of Marsyas, “divine Galen” of 543 had by 555 become who challenges Apollo to a music contest, with simply “Galen.” the winner choosing a penalty for the loser. The contest is presided over by the Muses. Apollo is Some material was revised in the light of new the victor and decrees that Marsyas is to be findings. The chapter dealing with the fetal skinned alive. On the left of the image sit the covering, for example, was greatly improved, Muses in judgment; on the right Apollo is and a long passage refuting Galen’s assertion about to flay Marsyas. This has been inter- that the intraventricular septum was perme- preted by some as an allegory of Vesalius able, was added. Several chapters were flaying his Galenist adversaries. The small set rearranged, while a new chapter on instru- of initials was redesigned. ments was inserted. Reference to students ille- gally bringing bones home for study was VESALIUS’S oWn AnnoTATEd coPy dropped. The story behind the remarkable discovery of Vesalius’s own annotated copy of the 1555 edi- Most of the textual changes were purely sty- tion of the Fabrica is best told by its owner: listic and did not alter the overall meaning. In many cases a word or phrase has been I am sure that most serious collectors, what- exchanged for a more eloquent or accurate ever their field of interest, dream of discov- expression, thus demonstrating that Vesalius ering or acquiring one very special item. In was as much concerned with verbal detail as the field of rare books in science and medi- with anatomical. Sentences were altered in cine, a copy of De humani corporis various ways, such as the rearrangement of fabrica owned and extensively annotated by clauses, change of word order – all in an Andreas Vesalius is truly unique! That the attempt to write a more elegant humanist annotations were most likely meant for a Latin. There is a new index, and a long list of third edition of this book, which was never errata – strong evidence that Vesalius was not published, makes this discovery even more present in Basel during the printing. incredible and important.
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As a collector of rare books, I have always was certainly the case with the 555 edition been attracted to books with annotations. I of De humani corporis fabrica that I pur- am fascinated by the handwritten notes of chased at auction in 007. I am convinced past readers, some of them written hun- that the extensive annotations throughout dreds of years ago. Who were they? Where this particular copy made it unattractive to were they when they wrote them? Why did other collectors, and the book did not attract they write them? Lastly, there is always the much attention at auction. highly unlikely possibility that they were written by a significant figure, someone we It was soon after I acquired the book that I would still know today. began to examine it thoroughly. Initially, it was the extent of the annotations that I find it very fortunate that most collectors intrigued me most. The 555 edition of De seem to view annotations as defects and put humani corporis fabrica is a large folio of over more value on non-annotated copies. This 800 pages, and the annotations cropped up
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throughout the book, from the beginning to was rewriting sentences and paragraphs almost the last page. I have many other rather than making notes. In other anno- annotated books in my collection, and none tated books I own, sentences are underlined of them have as many annotations as this and there are marginal notes, but nothing one. like the rewriting of paragraphs I was seeing here. I also found the nature of the annotations to be very unusual. In many cases sentences I could also see that this person had read the and even paragraphs had been crossed out entire book very carefully. There were and rewritten in the margin. On some pages, numerous corrections to the smallest details these marginal notes had also been crossed throughout the book… spelling errors, out and rewritten. Although I could not read commas to periods, colons to semicolons. them, I could see that they were written in Not an easy task for such a large volume of Latin and it was clear that the annotator difficult Latin reading. I also noticed that the
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name of Vesalius’ father, Andreas, was crossed out in the introduction… curious indeed!
These annotations were clearly not those of a typical student or casual reader, and to me, writing. Examples of handwriting by they raised the possibility that they were Vesalius are extremely rare, largely because made by Vesalius himself. But how does one he burned his early books and papers, as go about determining if the annotations related in his book Epistle on the China Root were by really written by Vesalius? published in 546. There are fewer than ten known existing letters that had been written An obvious place to start would be to com- by Vesalius, but after an extensive search on pare the handwriting of the annotations the internet, I was able to get hold of excel- with known specimens of Vesalius’ hand- lent photocopies of two Vesalius letters from
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the Waller Manuscript Collection at Uppsala University.
When I received the copies of these letters and compared them with the annotations, I had by far my most exciting experience ever as a collector. The handwriting of the anno- Even though I could neither read nor under- tations was absolutely identical to the hand- stand the annotations, I knew that this was writing in the letters. There was match after a book of great significance and value, not match… between words, letters, spacing, just to collectors, but also to many others, flourishes at the end of words… everything including scholars and historians. What was matched! I was then certain that this was an Vesalius writing, and why? The annotations annotated copy of Vesalius’ De humani cor- had to be translated. poris fabrica written by his own hand. It was clear to me that a discovery of such
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great importance would require a world The volume has been on deposit at the Fisher class scholar in medical history to interpret Library since 0. the contents, but who? I have always been interested in the history of medicine, and There are 3 recorded copies of the second edi- one name I was very familiar with was Dr. tion of the Fabrica. Most of them are in institu- Vivian Nutton, Emeritus Professor at the tional or university libraries, with forty-five in UCL Center for the History of Medicine. the United States, thirty-three in the United When I emailed Dr. Nutton and told him Kingdom, and thirty-five in the rest of Europe. what I thought I had, he responded with There are at least three copies in Canada. interest, but also cautioned that I should not on LoAn From dr gErArd VogrIncIc be too hopeful that the annotations were by Vesalius himself. He requested that I send him some images of the annotated pages, 26 Jean Perrissin and Jacques Tortorel “La and he would then get back to me with his mort du Roy Henry deuxieme aux opinion. tournelles a Paris le x iullet. 559”. [Geneva: J. de Laon, circa 570.] It was only after Dr. Nutton saw the images and began translating the annotations that In the summer of 559 Vesalius was summoned he became as excited as I was. It was also to Paris to attend to Henry II, King of France, clear to him, based on his translation of the who had been grievously wounded in a tourna- annotations, that they could only have been ment. The contest was part of the three-day written by Vesalius. This was confirmed by double wedding celebrations in honour of Dr. Nutton when he came to thoroughly Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy, and Mar- examine the book in person. I was amazed guerite, sister of Henry II, and between Philip II at Dr. Nutton’s talent after I received his and Marguerite, daughter of Henry II. The transcript of the annotations and read his weddings had been arranged as part of the fantastic paper giving the first scholarly dis- Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis of 559, ending cussion of them. It was a thrilling experience hostilities between Spain and a Franco-Papal for me to watch a world class historian at alliance. On 30 June a joust between King work, and I could see that he was at least as if not more thrilled than I was at this spec- Henry and Gabriel, comte de Montgomery, tacular discovery. seigneur de Lorges (530-574) took place, despite dire warnings from Michel de Nos- Andreas Vesalius’ own copy of De humani tradamus (503-566) about the outcome of the corporis fabrica… one of the most important contest. In the ensuing exchange a piece of de books in history, extensively annotated by Montgomery’s shattered lance penetrated the its own author, undiscovered for centuries. king’s visor and lodged itself just above his The word incredible doesn’t even begin to right eye. The royal physicians, who included describe it! Ambroise Paré, managed to extract several splinters from the king’s eye socket, but Henry By Dr. Gerard Vogrincic MD, FRCPC
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fell into a fever watched over by an anxious 28 Andreas Vesalius. Anatomicarum court that feared the worst. As the king’s con- Gabrielis Falloppii Observationum dition deteriorated, all medical measures were examen. Venice: Francisco de Fran- tried, including thrusts into the heads of exe- ciscis, 564. cuted criminals in an attempt to determine whether the lance might have penetrated the The purpose of Observationes anatomicae was brain. With further medical consultation to correct some of the errors contained in the urgently required, word was sent to Philip II to Fabrica, and to present new anatomical mate- dispatch Vesalius to Paris immediately. Vesalius rial in the cause of research. A copy was sent to arrived on 3 July, and after examining the king, Vesalius, who acknowledged receipt of the gift realized that Henry would not survive the in a letter that he gave to Paolo Tiepolo, Vene- injury. The king, in pain and delirious, lingered tian ambassador to Philip II, to convey to Fal- on another week. On 0 July at o’clock in the loppio. But as Tiepolo was delayed for several afternoon, at the age of forty, and in the twelfth months in Spain, by the time he reached year of his reign, Henry II, King of France, died. Venice, Falloppio was already dead. Three A post-mortem examination was conducted on years later Vesalius’s letter was published in the king’s body by Vesalius, who determined Venice as Anatomicarum Gabrielis Falloppii the cause of death as cerebral compression Observationum examen, by which time with subdural haemorrhage. Vesalius, too, was dead. on LoAn From dr EUgEnE S. FLAmm The dramatic death of Henry II is captured in this woodcut by Jacques Tortorel, after the design of Jean Perrissin. Around the King’s 29 Andreas Vesalius. Opera omnia deathbed is gathered a host of dignitaries. In anatomica & chirurgica; cura Her- the centre of the scene are the figures of manni Boerhaave ... & Bernhardi Vesalius and Ambroise Paré standing side by Siegfried Albini. Leiden: J. du Vivie, et side, with Vesalius on the left. J. & H. Verbeek, 75. volumes.
One hundred and eighty-two years after the 27 Gabriel Falloppio. Observationes death of Vesalius, the first collected edition of anatomicae. Venice: Marc Antonio his works appeared in two large folio volumes, Ulm, 56. published at Leiden, under the editorial guid- ance of Hermann Boerhaave (668-738), and Gabriel Falloppio (53?-56) of Modena Bernard Siegfried Albinus (697-770), two of became the chair of anatomy at the University the leading lights of the University of Leiden in of Pisa in 548, before assuming Vesalius’s the eighteenth century. The collection omits former position at Padua in 55. In Padua he the Tabulae anatomicae sex, the Paraphrasis of succeeded in restoring some of the medical fac- Rhazes, and the Venesection Letter, but includes ulty’s former prestige that had been lost since the spurious Chirurgia magna. It also includes Vesalius’s departure eight years earlier. two other works not written by Vesalius - Fal- Although the two men never met, Falloppio loppio’s Observationes anatomicae, and the held Vesalius in high esteem, referring to him as Apologiae Francisci Putei pro Galeno in anatome, “the prince of anatomists, an admirable physi- examen, which the editors believed was cian, and a divine teacher.” He considered him- written by Vesalius under the pseudonym of self Vesalius’s disciple, and confessed to using Gabriel Cuneus. the Fabrica as the basic guide for his own research. The survival of the original woodblocks of the first and second editions of the Fabrica (see Reputed to be an excellent anatomist and below) was unknown to the editors, who researcher, Falloppio published only one book employed the great Dutch artist Jan Wandelaar during his lifetime: Observationes anatomicae, (690-759) to copy the illustrations and have published at Venice in 56. Other works pub- them engraved in copper. Wandelaar was a lished posthumously under his name, are prob- master of scientific illustration and was respon- ably spurious. In Observationes anatomicae, sible for the plates of several anatomical works Falloppio gave notice of his plan to write a by Albinus, including his spectacular Tabulae comprehensive and illustrated work on human sceleti et musculorum corporis humani, pub- and comparative anatomy, but it was never lished at Leiden in 74. Wandelaar also did the published. botanical plates for Carl von Linné’s Hortus Clif- on LoAn From fortianus in 738. oSLEr LIbrAry, mcgILL UnIVErSITy Capital for the production of this edition was
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raised by subscription. According to the sub- woodcut illustrations copied from De chirurgica scription list there were 09 copies ordered by institutione, written by Jean Tagault (d. 545), 80 individuals and institutions. Assuming that and published by the same printer, Vincenzo extra copies were printed for the regular book Valgrisi, in 544. Tagault’s illustrations were market, an estimated print run of 50-300 poor renditions of the skeletal figures from the copies is probable. The Fisher Library has two Tabulae anatomicae sex, while a fourth skeleton copies. was lifted from the Fabrica.
There is little doubt that, though feasible, this 30 [Prospero Borgarucci]. Andreae Vessalii collection of surgical notes is spurious. After all, Bruxellensis Chirurgia magna in septem Vesalius had taught surgery at Padua and had libros digesta. Venice: Vincenzo Val- acquired valuable practical experience as a field grisi, 568. surgeon in the service of Charles V, and during the last twenty years of his life had been regu- In addition to the numerous plagiarisms and larly consulted on surgical matters. Moreover, unauthorized copying of the Vesalian illustra- in Book IV of the Fabrica Vesalius had tions, other unscrupulous operators took expressed the intention of writing a book on
advantage of Vesalius’s reputation. In 568 surgery. But in trying to pass off the work as there appeared in Venice under his name an Vesalius’s, Borgarucci erred by including quota- octavo volume of over five hundred pages with tions from books that were published after the the title Chirurgia magna, allegedly edited by death of Vesalius. Despite the obvious lack of Prospero Borgarucci, professor of the Univer- authentication, Chirurgia magna was included sity of Padua. Borgarucci claimed to have dis- in the 74 Leiden Opera omnia edited by Boer- covered the manuscript in 567 in Paris. There haave and Albinus. were two issues of Chirurgia magna published on LoAn From dr gErArd VogrIncIc the same year, the first with a dedication of thirty pages, is dated September 568, the 31 Andreas Vesalius. Icones anatomicae. second with the dedication reduced to four Ediderunt Academia medicinae nova- pages, is dated October; the latter issue sup- eboracensis et Bibliotheca Universi- pressed the claim concerning the discovery of tatis monacensis. Munich: Bremer the manuscript. Three further editions came in Presse, 934. 569. The text was accompanied by three
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Following the publication of the 555 edition of icine, in collaboration with the University of the Fabrica, the woodblocks used to produce Munich, commissioned Dr Willy Wiegand of the illustrations, remained in the possession of the Bremer Presse of Munich to produce a Oporinus. According to Felix Platter (536- deluxe edition from the surviving blocks of the 64) they were offered for sale in Basel in 583. Fabrica and the Epitome, using a modern hand- Platter himself had considered buying the press. The new book, which excluded the text blocks to illustrate his anatomical treatise De of the Fabrica, was given the title Icones corporis humani structura et usu, printed by anatomicae. The missing plates were repro- Froben at Basel in 583, but decided against the duced in collotype. The title page of the 55 purchase, as the inclusion of the woodblock edition of Fabrica was not among the blocks illustrations would have made his book incon- discovered at Munich, but was traced to the veniently large for his students. Instead Platter Library of the University of Leuven. The collo- chose to illustrate his book with engraved type illustrations lack the three-dimensional plates reduced in size. It is likely that the wood- quality of impressions taken from the original blocks were purchased by Ambrose Froben, blocks, which because of considerable and that they remained in the possession of the improvements in printing techniques since the family until 603 when the firm went out of sixteenth century, could at last be seen in all business. The whereabouts of the blocks their glory. This is evident when one compares during the seventeenth century is unknown, the eighth muscle man, reproduced from a but they resurfaced in Augsburg at the begin- photographic impression from the 543 edition ning of the eighteenth century, when the of the Fabrica, with the ninth plate, produced printer/publisher Andreas Maschenbauer used from the original block. Also included in the them for abridged versions of the Fabrica, in volume were a full-size reproduction of the 706 and again in 73, in which he attributes single woodcut from the Venesection Letter and the drawing of the blocks to Titian. the six sheets of the Tabulae anatomicae. The Icones thus became the only complete reposi- The blocks remained in Augsburg until about tory of the Vesalian illustrations. 770, when the physician Johann Anton von Woltter (7-778) rediscovered them, and But the story does not have a happy conclu- took them to Ingolstadt. His intention was to sion. During the Allied bombing of Munich include the woodcut illustrations in a larger during the Second World War, the wonderful work in German for the benefit of Bavarian sur- woodblocks were tragically lost to the world geons, but ill health forced him to hand the forever. task over to the anatomist and surgeon Hein- rich Palmaz von Leveling (74-798), who had them printed in Ingolstadt in 78 and again in 32 Andreas Vesalius. The Fabric of the 783. Human Body. An Annotated Transla- tion of the 1543 and 1555 Editions of “De After Leveling’s death the blocks were in all humani corporis fabrica”. Basel: Karger, likelihood deposited in the University of Ingol- 03. volumes. stadt and, in the wake of the French invasion of 800, were transferred to the University of Given the enormous significance of the Fabrica, Landshut. In 86 they were again relocated, it is extraordinary that Vesalius’s magnum opus this time to the University of Munich, where has only recently been translated into English they disappeared from sight until 893, when in its entirety - four hundred and seventy years 59 of the blocks were once more rediscovered after its publication in Latin in 543. Parts of the in a cupboard in the University Library. The Fabrica had been published and cited in Eng- surviving blocks were examined and listed in lish prior to 03, but never the whole text. 895 by Professor Moritz Roth of Basel, With impeccable timing on the part of the Vesalius’s first biographer. For the next thirty- Karger publishing house, the first full English odd years they were again forgotten, until 93 translation of the Fabrica made its appearance when Dr S.W. Lambert of New York wanted to last year – just in time to coincide with the five make a study on the ornamental initials. A hundredth anniversary of the birth of Vesalius. search was undertaken, and although the ini- Appropriately, the book was published in tial letters were not found, the large blocks, Basel. which had been stored separately, unexpect- edly turned up. Of the 7 original woodblocks, The principal reason for such a long delay fifty had perished, including the eighth muscle undoubtedly lies in the problems of translating man, the portrait of Vesalius, thirty-nine of the Vesalius’s Latin, which, as mentioned above, smaller blocks, as well as the initial ornamental was notoriously verbose and difficult to com- letters. In 934 the New York Academy of Med- prehend. The translator’s introduction by
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Daniel H. Garrison discusses the characteristics of Vesalius’s Latin, and the difficulties involved with translating it into modern English, while attempting to retain as much of the flavour of the original as possible.
The two enormous volumes are brilliantly con- ceived and beautifully printed, and are pro- vided with a wealth of illuminating scholarly apparatus. Daniel H. Garrison and Malcolm H. Hast are to be highly commended for their dili- gence over many years in preparing the transla- tion of this complex book. The translation is based on the 543 edition of the Fabrica, col- lated against the 555 edition, and Vesalius’s own annotated copy of the 555 edition on dis- play in this exhibition. A system of colour- coded typography is employed to highlight the textual differences between the three versions, which are displayed either in footnotes, or in the appendix. Other typographical features provide an elaborate system of cross refer- encing. Icons of Vesalius’s head refer the reader to the original Latin text of 543. To assist the reader in understanding the anatomical terms used, certain words are printed in golden brown type within brackets to refer the user to modern anatomical dictionaries. Thumbnails of the illustrations in the margins signal other places in the text where a particular feature is discussed.
The prefatory matter provides a rich mine of information about Vesalius and the Fabrica. The excellent Historical Introduction by Vivian Nutton, and the Introduction to Book Two by Nancy C. Siraisi provide thorough and succinct accounts on Vesalius and on the background, production, reception, and significance of the Fabrica.
33 George Stanley Terence Cavanagh. The panorama of Vesalius : a ‘lost’ design from Titian’s studio. Athens, Ga. : Sacrum Press, 996.
In 90 it was first noticed that the back- grounds to the fourteen muscle men formed a continuous panorama. Cavanagh experi- mented with the figures by photographing them and developing the negatives in reverse. The first two plates were transposed in order to maintain the correct sequence.
The muscle men are here joined and arranged to form two panoramic sequences: “The front views”, and “The back views.”
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Francis, Henry Sayles. “The woodcut initials of SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY the Fabrica.” Journal of the Medical Library Association, v. 3 (943), 8-37. Many sources have been consulted during the writing of this catalogue. The following were French, Roger. Dissection and Vivisection in the found to be the most useful. European Renaissance. Aldershot: Ashgate, 999.
Carlino, Andrea. Books of the Body: Anatomical Guerra, Francisco. “The Identity of the Artists Ritual and Renaissance Learning. Translated Involved in Vesalius’s Fabrica 543.” Medical by John Tedeschi and Anne C. Tedeschi. History, v. 3 (969), 37-50. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 994. Hanigan, William C., W. Ragen, and R. Foster. Castiglioni, Arturo. “The Attack of Franciscus “Dryander of Marburg and the First Puteus on Andreas Vesalius and the Defence Textbook of Neuroanatomy.” Neurosurgery, v. by Gabriel Cuneus.” Yale Journal of Biology 6, no. 3 (990), 489-498. and Medicine, v. 6 (943), 35-48. Horowitz, Michael, and Jack Collins. “A Cazort, Mimi, Monique Kornell, and Kenneth Census of Copies of the First Edition of B. Roberts. The Ingenious Machine of Nature: Andreas Vesalius’ De humani corporis fabrica Four Centuries of Art and Anatomy. Ottawa: (543), with a Note on the Recently National Gallery of Canada, 996. Discovered Variant Issue.” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, v. 39 Choulant, Johann Ludwig. History and (984), 98-. Bibliography of Anatomic Illustration in its Relation to Anatomic Science and the Graphic Ivins, William M., Jr. “What about the Fabrica Arts. Translated and edited by Frank of Vesalius?” in: Three Vesalian Essays to Mortimer. Chicago: University of Chicago Accompany the Icones Anatomicae of 1934. Press, 90. New York: Macmillan, 95, p. 43-9.
Clark, Harry. “Foiling the Pirates: the Joffe, Stephan N. “A Census of the Edition of Preparation and Publication of Andreas 555 of Andreas Vesalius’ De humani corporis Vesalius’s De humani corporis fabrica.” fabrica.” International Archives of Medicine, v. Library Quarterly, v. 5 (98), 30-3. (009), -6.
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7 The woodcut title page to the 1543 edition o De humani corporis fabrica The engraved title page o the 1725 edition o Vesalius’s Opera omnia anatomica and chirurgica The redesigned woodcut title page to the 1555 edition o De humani corporis fabrica