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Illustrations from the Wellcome Library Vesalius's Method of Articulating the Skeleton and a Drawing in the Collection of the Wellcome Library

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Illustrations from the Wellcome Library Vesalius's Method of Articulating the Skeleton and a Drawing in the Collection of the Wellcome Library Medical History, 2000, 44: 97-110 Illustrations from the Wellcome Library Vesalius's Method of Articulating the Skeleton and a Drawing in the Collection of the Wellcome Library MONIQUE KORNELL* ne ofthe recent acquisitions ofthe Wellcome Library, a sixteenth-century Italian drawing of the bones of the pelvis (Plate 1), is particularly significant because it clearly depicts the copper wires and iron rod used in the method of articulation of the skeleton described by Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564) in the thirty-ninth chapter of the first book of De humani corporis fabrica, published in 1543.1 This procedure was the most detailed yet to have appeared in print and it was further enlivened by its visual de- L__________________________ monstration in initial letters decorating the book.2 * Monique Kornell, MA, PhD, Iconographic of the human skeleton by Andreas Vesalius of Collections, Wellcome Library for the History & Brussels', Bull. Hist. Med., 1946, 20: 433-60; and Understanding of Medicine, 183 Euston Road, more recently in Andreas Vesalius, On the fabric London NWI 2BE. of the human body. A translation of "De humani corporis fabrica libri septem"; Book I. The bones I am indebted to Dr Robert R Coleman of The and cartilages, by William Frank Richardson, in Medieval Institute, University of Notre Dame, collaboration with John Burd Carman, San, for his kind assistance with the Biblioteca Francisco, Norman Publishing, 1998, pp. 370-84. Ambrosiana drawings collection, to Dr Kliment P For a commentary on the chapter, see also M Gatzinsky of the Department of Anatomy, Roth, Andreas Vesalius Bruxellensis, Berlin, Georg Gothenburg University, Sweden, for his Reimer, 1892, app. X, pp. 462-5; Glauco de consideration of the anatomical content of the Bertolis, 'La preparazione degli scheletri in paper, and to Mr William Schupbach, curator of Andrea Vesalio', Acta med. Hist. patav., 1964-65, the Iconographic Collections of the Wellcome 11: 37-49. Library, for his comments. I am also grateful to 2 See Samuel W Lambert, 'The initial letters of Dr Antonio Clericuzio of the Dipartimento di the anatomical treatise, "De humani corporis Scienza e Societa, Universita di Cassino, and to fabrica", of Vesalius', in Samuel W Lambert, Dr Jeffrey Spier, Dr Florian Harb and Mr Willy Wiegand and William M Ivins, Jr, Three Richard Reed, for their assistance and comments. Vesalian essays to accompany the "Icones anatomicae" of 1934, New York, Macmillan, "'"Quo artificio humani corporis ossa & 1952, pp. 1-24, on pp. 8, 13-14. A new set of cartilagines inspectioni praeparentur", in Andreas initials were cut for the second edition of the Vesalius, De humani corporis fabrica, Basel, J Fabrica of 1555, with the exception of four large Oporinus, 1543, pp. 155-62. An annotated initials which were the same in both editions. Of translation is provided by J B de C M Saunders these, the large "O" initial of putti boiling bones and Charles Donald O'Malley, 'The preparation in a cauldron at a hearth (illustrating this article, 97 Monique Kornell To clean the bones, Vesalius advised macerating them in a large cauldron of boiling water in preference to the practice of covering a cadaver with lime, then placing it in a stream of flowing water in a perforated box for several days, as illustrated in the initial letter "C". Following its removal from the box, the skeleton was further cleaned with a knife, leaving the ligaments of the joints untouched. The skeleton was then placed in the sun, the pose being fixed by the drying ligaments. This method was rejected by Vesalius not only because it was "troublesome, dirty, and difficult" but also because it rendered a skeleton unsuitable for instruction as the joints would be obscured by the dried and blackened ligaments.3 In addition, one could add that while the above process took several days, Vesalius's preferred method could be completed in several hours, depending on the age of the subject. Sweeping aside any lingering stigma stemming from the papal bull of Boniface VIII of 1299, Detestande feritatis,4 which forbade the boiling of bones for the repatriation for burial of the remains of those who had died abroad, Vesalius is as forthright in his chosen means of cleaning the bones of flesh in chapter 39 of book I, as he was in publicizing his use of cadavers stolen from tombs and cemeteries. Squeletop&e, ou de la preparation des os, des p. 97 and Fig. 5), was used to decorate the first articulations, et de la construction des squeletes, chapter of the first book of both editions of the Paris, Mequignon-Marvis, 1819. Fabrica and as well as Vesalius's Epistola, 'Issued on 27 September 1299, then again on rationem modumque propinandi radicis Chynae 18 February 1300 (August Potthast, Regesta decocti..., Basel, J Oporinus, 1546, p. 200. The pontificum romanorum inde ab anno post Christum other initials illustrated in the present article, "C" natum 1198 ad annum 1304, 2 vols, Berlin, (p. 100), in which a perforated box holding a Rudolph de Decker, 1874-5, vol. 2, nos 24881 cadaver is placed in a running stream and "P" and 24914). For the background to the bull, see (p. 101), in which putti anatomists articulate a Elizabeth A R Brown, 'Death and the human skeleton, are from the first edition. They decorate body in the later Middle Ages: the legislation of chapters 39 and 40 ("De ossium numero") of Boniface VIII on the division of the corpse', book I respectively, as well as appearing Viator, 1981, 12: 221-70, and Mary Niven Alston, throughout the Fabrica. 'The attitude of the church towards dissection 3Fabrica, op. cit., note 1 above, p. 155. before 1500', Bull. Hist. Med, 1944, 16 (3): Charles Estienne, who began writing his De 221-38. Although not aimed at the study of dissectione partium corporis humani, Paris, Simon anatomy, there is evidence that the bull had an de Colines, 1545, before the publication of impact on anatomical preparations. Mondino's Vesalius's Fabrica, describes both methods of fourteenth-century text on anatomy, a standard maceration on pp. 374-75. In Realdo Colombo's work through to the sixteenth century, posthumous De re anatomica, Venice, Nicolo acknowledges the usefulness of boiling the bones Bevilacqua, 1559, the fourth book on the skeleton but avoids it due to the "sin involved" (Charles concludes with an account of the cleaning and Singer, The Fasciculo di medicina, Venice, 1493, articulation of a skeleton along Vesalian lines. with trans. of the 1482 Latin edition of Bologna, For a history of maceration of bones and their Florence, R Lier, 1925, 2 parts, part 1, pp. 49, 94, articulation, see Adolf Faller, Die Entwicklung der 96; see also Alston, op. cit., p. 224, n. 16). This is makroskopisch-anatomischen Prdpierkunst von perhaps why, as Saunders and O'Malley suggest Galen bis zur Neuzeit, Basel, S Karger, 1948, pp. in op. cit., note 1 above, p. 435, the cleaning of 36-53, and Roth, op. cit., note 1, pp. 470-2. A the bones of flesh by the use of lime and running work not cited by Faller or Roth is J Cloquet's water remained a popular practice. thesis for the Faculte de Medecine de Paris, De la 98 Vesalius's Method of Articulating the Skeleton There are several documented instances of Vesalius articulating a skeleton, first as a student and later as an aid to his lectures on Galen's On the bones and those based on the Fabrica. In Louvain, c. 1536, after his studies in Paris had been interrupted by war, Vesalius took the opportunity to articulate his first skeleton when, while looking for bones among the remains of executed criminals left outside the city wall, he came upon a relatively intact and exceptionally dry cadaver, partially cleaned by birds.5 With the help of his friend, the mathematician, geographer and physician Gemma Phrysius (1508-1555), he secreted the body into Louvain where, after cleaning the bones by boiling them, he constructed the skeleton, replacing missing parts from other sources. In reporting this episode at the end of the thirty-ninth chapter of the Fabrica, Vesalius refers to Galen's similar encounter with the remains of a robber whose bones had been cleaned by birds.6 Aside from this "found" skeleton, the sources, when given, for Vesalius's other documented articulated skeletons were dissected fresh cadavers, the bones obtained in this manner considered more suitable for the purpose.7 Three plates of the Vesalius's Tabulae sex (Venice, B Vitalis, 1538) depict a skeleton that Vesalius had articulated for his students in Padua, and, while lecturing at the University of Bologna in 1540, he articulated the bones of a French priest and those of an ape.8 By doing so he was able to demonstrate that Galen's description of the lumbar vertebrae was based on non-human anatomy. With this sort of comparison in mind, Vesalius concludes his chapter by suggesting that students should also have the bones and skeletons of animals to hand and, with reference to Galen, particularly those of apes and dogs.9 Although Vesalius clearly believed that disarticulated bones provide a better view of their sinuses and heads, articulated skeletons were useful for teaching and display purposes, and Vesalius attributed to his own efforts the presence of articulated skeletons in universities.'0 A skeleton articulated by Vesalius is partially preserved to this day in Basel. While in that city to oversee the printing of the Fabrica, he was given in May of 1543 the body of an executed bigamist and attempted murderer, Jacob Karrer, to dissect. Vesalius articulated Karrer's skeleton and presented it to the University of Basel." 5Fabrica, op.
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