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A Course in the History of Biology: II

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A Course in the History of Biology: II A Course in the History of Biology: II By RICHARDP. AULIE Downloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/abt/article-pdf/32/5/271/26915/4443048.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 * Second part of a two-part article. An explanation of the provements in medical curricula, and the advent of author's history of biology course for high school teachers, human dissections; (ii) the European tradition in together with abstracts of two of the course topics-"The Greek View of Biology" and "What Biology Owes the Arabs" anatomy, which was influenced by Greek and Arab -was presented in last month's issue. sources and produced an indigenous anatomic liter- ature before Vesalius; and (iii) Vesalius' critical The Renaissance Revolution in Anatomy examination of Galen, with his introduction of peda- urely a landmark in gogic innovations in the Fabrica. This landmark thus shows the coalescing of these several trends, all - 1- q -thei history of biology is De Humani Corpo- expressed by the Renaissance artistic temperament, and all rendered possible by the new printing press, - 1 P risi tFabrica Libri Sep- engraving, and improvements in textual analysis. - - ~~~tern("Seven Books on the Workings of By contrast with Arab medicine, which flourished the Human Body"), in an extensive hospital system, Renaissance anatomy published in 1543 by was associated from the start with European univer- sities, which were peculiarly a product of the 12th- Vesalius of -- ~~~~~Andreas E U I Brussels (1514-1564). century West. As a preface to Vesalius, the lectures In our course in the on this topic gave attention to the founding of the universities of Bologna (1158), Oxford (c. 1167), (See footnote) history of biology we sought to examine not only the internal evidence as Paris (1200), and Padua (1222) -archetypes of our to why the Fabrica is considered such a landmark, own colleges and universities-and examined the but also the antecedent forces responsible for the succeeding eight centuries' record of student life and emergence of so noble a work and the extent to migrations ("cessations"), faculty credentials, the which Vesalius may therefore be considered a part of granting of degrees, trends in medical curricula, and the "scientific revolution." (See, in references, Ve- -as a matter of particular interest today-student salius, 1543; O'Malley, 1965.) rebellions and campus unrest. Three influences on this revolution were identified: Of great importance to Renaissance anatomy was (i) the rise of the European universities, with im- the assimilation, by the faculties of medicine, of the "new science" from the Arab world. Latin transla- Author's address: Department of Biology, Washington Uni- tions of Arab medical works rapidly expanded and versity, St. Louis, Mo. 63130 modified the medieval quadrivium and trivium and An initial capital from the Fabrica. This letter "S" shows eventually rendered them obsolete (Rashdall, 1936; several cherubic children getting ready to dissect a dog. Thus Haskins, 1964). An important step forward was the the unknown engraver whom Vesalius employed displayed beginning of the dissection of cadavers first both talent and humor-and perhaps also allowed Vesalius to (the per- poke a little fun at his students. (From the 1543 edition, haps in 1275), probably to verify the cause of death courtesy John Crerar Library.) by plague (see fig. 1). Soon physicians began to give 271 Vesalius, a student in 1533-1536 at the conservative University of Paris, where these Greek texts and occasional dissections had only recently been in- troduced. Soon Vesalius displayed both his growing com- mand of Galen, which he had gained from his re- nowned teacher's new translation, and his skill at dissection, although he had but scant human material at his disposal (see fig. 3). Mention should be made of another renowned member of that faculty, Jacobus Sylvius (1478-1555), who always remained a faithful Galenist. Sylvius did not earn his medical degree until he was about 52 years old, but he then went on to stimulate Vesalius' interest in dissection, probably at first on lower animals. The strengthening of the Ga- lenic tradition, far from frustrating biology, served as a stimulus to progress. Medicine became a learned Downloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/abt/article-pdf/32/5/271/26915/4443048.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 Fig. 1. Perhaps the earliest known picture of the dissection profession, and anatomy, through the work of Ve- of a human cadaver: from a Norman or Anglo-Norman manu- salius, a scientific enterprise. script dated about the beginning of the 14th century or per- haps as early as 1275; courtesy Bodleian Library, Oxford Vesalius' critical use of the new Galenic texts University. The female body has been opened from xiphi- quickly bore fruit at the more progressive University sternum to pubic symphysis, apparently by a layman, who of Padua, where he taught anatomy from 1537 to holds the liver, while a physician and a monk view the pro- 1542, pursued his dissections, revised the Guinter edi- ceedings, perhaps offering advice. Notice that various organs -kidneys, heart, stomach-are scattered about in untidy fash- tion of Galen, and pushed his Fabrica toward publica- ion. The first dissections were primarily for diagnostic tion (see cover illustration). In the course of his purposes, rather than to study anatomy (Singer, 1957, pp. 73, studies he compared his findings at the dissection 74). table with the Galenic texts: he was asking "whether the method of anatomy could corroborate specula- "anatomies" and to write down their own ideas. The tion" (Saunders and O'Malley, 1947, p. 86). He ad- Galenic influence is seen in the work of Mondino de' vanced anatomy when using books I-IX of the Ana- Luzzi (1270-1326; sometimes called the "Restorer of tomical Procedures as his dissection manual. He ad- Anatomy"), whose Anathomia (1316), while record- vanced anatomy even while continuing to support the ing his efforts to verify Avicenna, shows that he him- old Hippocratic vascular conceptions; for example, in self carried out dissections. Mondino thus reempha- attempting to improve on venesection techniques sized the study of anatomy. Also significant was the (bloodletting) he more accurately traced out the work of Berengario da Carpi (c. 1460-1530), whose hemorrhoidal veins and branches of the azygous. illustrated Short Introduction to Anatomy (1523) Gradually he became convinced that Galen, whom he formed an important link between Mondino and always revered as "the prince of physicians," had Vesalius. The practice of dissection in the medical based his Anatomical Procedures on nonhuman ma- schools, though not rigorous, and the preparing of terials. For example, he stressed Galen's error in anatomic manuscripts with simple diagrams for supposing the lower jaw to be composed of two teaching purposes, indicate a growing and continuous separate pieces. But apparently Vesalius was un- tradition of anatomy in Europe since at least the 13th aware of Abdul Latif's correct observations of three century (Ketham, 1491; Da Carpi, 1535). Eventually centuries before, when he reported (O'Malley, 1965, this tradition, by showing the need for fresh transla- p. 153-154): tions from the Greek, found expression in the "Hu- manistic Revival" in the early part of the 16th cen- The jaw of most animals is formed of two bones tury (Hall, 1956). joined together at the apex of the chin ... In man, Many new editions of Galen emerged from this however, the lower jaw is formed of a single bone ... Galen and most of the skilled dissectors after the movement. They were translated directly from Greek time of Hippocrates asserted that the jaw is not a sources into Latin, and thus they began to compete single bone . with Arab influence in Europe (see fig. 2). Among them were the Natural Faculties, prepared by Thom- The history-of-biology lectures on this topic ex- as Linacre (1460-1524) in 1523, and the all-important amined in particular Vesalius' description of the Anatomical Procedures (1531) by Jean Guinter of skeleton and musculature, where he was at his best; Andernach (1505-1574), who was one of Vesalius' his descriptions of the vascular system, where the teachers (O'Malley, 1965, p. 46-61). To repeat the influence of Galen may be noted (see fig. 4); and his observations and experiments that Galen had done vivisection experiments, described in the second edi- soon became a natural desire of medical students and tion (1555) of the Fabrica-some of them repetitions physicians who benefited from this new humanism. of Galen. Among them was the youthful and audacious Andreas Vesalius' insistence on personal dissection, integra- 272 THE AMERICANBIOLOGY TEACHER, MAY 1970 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~-A Downloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/abt/article-pdf/32/5/271/26915/4443048.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 I~~~~~L-& ' IA a A11w t~~~~~~~~aLI Iil A mdcn eStScL 11 Fig. i\"n ancmfwicntiftl"tmU.61i fflile abbas tf Fig. 2. Part of the title page of the Liber Totius Medicinae ("Comprehensive Work on Medicine") by the 10th-century Arab physician Haly Abbas; courtesy John Crerar Library. This European edition in Latin was published in Lyons, France, in 1523. The engraver has Hippocrates, Haly Abbas, and Galen reading from ancient medical works, to show the respect held for the Greek and Arab heritage during the 16th century. But during this time Latin translations of Greek works were also beginning to appear-they were prepared directly from the Greek, not from Arabic: thus Arab works were to have less influence. tion of illustrations with the text, improvement of century ideas of inheritance and species change, as terminology, and critical evaluation of textual represented by the work of Pierre Louis Maupertuis sources, combined to make his work a major contri- (1698-1759) and of Georges Buffon (1707-1788); and bution to the teaching of anatomy, with strong in- 19th-century trends in the study of the role of min- fluences on biology as a whole.
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