A History of Human Biology

Ancient Egypt

**The term anatomy comes from the Greek word anatome which means “dissection”, and logos which stands for “study of”, hence the “study of dissection”.**

The Ancient Egyptians are responsible for naming most of the major organs and external structures of the body. Texts written as long ago as 3000 B.C. used words such as… "brain" ”meninges” “cerebrospinal fluid”

The taboo against dissecting the bodies of the dead goes back many centuries; it was prohibited by both ancient Greek and Roman religions. Since ancient times, The dissection of human cadavers has been controversial.
Human dissection was see as evil by certain religions and belief systems. Dissection was considered desecration.
it was prohibited by both ancient Greek and Roman religions.

First known dissection between 600 and 500 BC.

The first recorded medical dissection of the human body was performed by the Greek philosopher Alcmaeon.

Anatomy taboo?
The interior of our bodies is hidden to us. What happens beneath the skin is mysterious, fearful, amazing. Many religions saw human dissection as a sin (desecration of the body). anatomical studies were banned in many societies. Very few illustrations existed and not much knowledge about anatomy was passed on.

The brain was not always held in high regard.

•The ancient Egyptians also did not think much of the brain. In fact, when creating a mummy, the Egyptians scooped out the brain through the nostrils and threw it away.

•However, the heart and other internal organs were removed carefully and preserved. These organs were then placed back into the body or into jars that were set next to the body.

They left only the heart in place, believing it to be the center of a person's being and intelligence. The other organs were preserved separately, with the stomach, liver, lungs, and intestines placed in special boxes or jars today called canopic jars. These were buried with the mummy.
Animals were also mummified, but the brain was just trash.

The Greek philosopher, Aristotle, thought the heart, not the brain, was the location of intelligence and thought.

Aulus Cornelius Celsus In the year 30 AD the Roman physician Aulus Cornelius Celsus published a collection of Greek medical writings. It is he states, "to open the bodies of the dead is necessary for learners.“

In 180 AD., the Greek physician Galen followed Celsus's advice when he first published the results of his work on anatomy, based on two clandestine (secret) dissections.

Galen dissecting a pig
2nd Century - Galen’s dissection of a pig
Shown here is the dissection of a swine with more animals being bundled in on the right. Lint, p. 22.

SCHOOL OF ANATOMY
Alexandria, Ancient Greece

In 275 BC, Herophilus founded the first school of anatomy at the Museum of Alexandria.

This anatomical demonstration shows a professor in full robe overseeing a dissection and an assistant poised to make his incision. Lint, p. 34.

The Hippocratic Corpus catalogued in Alexandria’s renowned library was a collection of works by Hippocrates himself and successor physicians practicing at his school on the eastern Aegean island of Kos.

Aristotle Aristotle thought that thinking and feeling came from the heart.
We can see remnants of that belief still in our language! “think with your heart”, “heart-ache”, Love you with all my heart”.
The brain was that to act as a radiator to keep the body cool! Before the first dissection…

Aristotle was named the “Father of Comparative Anatomy and Physiology”.

However, he believed that the brain cooled the heart by secreting “phlegm”, and that the arteries contained only air. Future discoveries debunked this theory of Aristotle.”

The Physician Herophilos was the first physician to dissect human bodies and is considered to be the founder of Anatomy. Herophilos reversed the longstanding notion made by Aristotle that the heart was the "seat of intelligence". He argued instead that this seat was the brain.

Hippocrates - the “Father of Medicine” Hippocrates was hailed as the “Father of Medicine”. He gathered data and conducted experiments to show that disease was a natural process (not a curse). He also showed that the symptoms of a disease were caused by the natural reactions of the body to the disease process. Hippocrates - the “Father of Medicine” Hippocrates was the first physician known who actually considered medicine to be a science, and to be separate from religion.

“Anatomy is the foundation of medicine,” the classical Greek physician Hippocrates declared, “and should be based on the form of the human body.”

Hippocrates is said to have written the Hippocratic oath, an oath that every new doctor-to-be still says to this day. It reflected Hippocrates high ideals. The Hippocratic Oath The Hippocratic Oath was written in ancient Greece in the 5th century BCE, and is a direct inspiration for oaths of office that physicians swear upon entry into the profession today.

FIRST SCHOOL OF ANATOMY AT THE MUSEUM OF ALEXANDRIA In 275 BCE, Herophilus of Chalcedon (a follower of Hippocrates) founded the first school of anatomy at the Museum of Alexandria, encouraging his students to overcome their fear of dissecting human bodies.

Hellenistic Greece and Human Dissection

The availability of the Corpus in the stimulating intellectual environment of Hellenistic Alexandria likely inspired medical scholars finally to take up the knife and undertake systematic human anatomical studies for the first time in classical history. One of these physician-scholars was Herophilus, who produced the treatise On Anatomy, synthesizing the results of many hundred human dissections.

A Step Backwards:

Rome and Anatomical Reversal

With the conquest of Alexandria by Rome, the advancements of medicine and science were stopped. Human dissections were outlawed and human dissection again became “taboo”. Anatomical texts were lost and knowledge regressed. Texts were recovered centuries later, but anatomical drawings were all destroyed.

1163 – Church makes law against human dissections in the hopes of curtailing dismemberments.

Early prints of anatomy looked very different from anatomical drawings we have now.
Anatomical images were still viewed as taboo, surreal, beautiful or grotesque.
Anatomical images continue to have a profound impact on the human mind. – Perhaps because this shines a light on our own mortality.

The pursuit of knowledge and science was seen as blasphemous and evil.

Illness was thought to be caused by sin, diabolical possession, witchcraft or other dark forces. From AD 300 to around 1700 all serious mental conditions were understood as symptoms of demonic possession.

Since illness was thought to be caused by supernatural agents, cures had to be essentially supernatural as well. Every cure was literally miraculous, and these miracles could be effected only by prayer, penance and the assistance of saints. To claim otherwise was heretical and blasphemous. The Christian ideal was that women should die rather than allow themselves to be helped by a physician.

Dissection and medicine advances decline
The Dark Ages Christian doctrine promises the resurrection of the body, which many thought to be impossible if a body were cut open. Crusaders that dies in battle would be dismembered and boiled to prevent possible dissection.

Leonardo da Vinci

The Renaissance saw a resurgence in interest in anatomy, in part urged by the studies of such artists as Leonardo da Vinci, who (in 1510) demonstrated the homology of muscular structures in humans and animals -- Leonardo, however, did not publish these drawings in his lifetime.

Da Vinci created more than 750 anatomical drawings that were never published.
This period marked the “rebirth” of an empirical study of anatomy.

The Reformation freed physicians in Protestant countries from the authority of the Catholic Church, and in 1565, London's Royal College of Physicians was given the authority to dissect of human cadavers.

The idea of “anatomy theatre” arose. Allowed for the observation of dissection performed in “theatres” by everyone regardless of their gender and class in society. However dissection was not allowed to be performed by women.

Criminals and Unclaimed Bodies of the Poor

As human dissections became more numerous, the need for a source of cadavers grew.

Criminals and the unclaimed bodies often satisfied the demand. England in the eighteenth century used the bodies of condemned criminals for medical research.
After public executions, riots would often break out as family members and surgeons fought over the bodies.

Sometimes the grabbing and pulling resulted in the bodies loosing limbs and heads!

Many surgeons turned to grave-robbing and hiring body-snatchers who would strangle poor people to death and then sell the bodies.

In 1829, William Burke was hanged in Edinburgh for murdering victims by asphyxiation in order to provide cadavers to physicians.

Riot In April 1788, New Yorkers rioted for three days upon discovering that bodies had been stolen from a graveyard. Five thousand people participated in a three-day riot against surgeons by rushing the hospitals.

In 1789, New York passed a law making it possible for doctors to obtain cadavers without resorting to body-snatching. A similar bill was passed in London only in 1832

The Council of Tours in 1163 led to the Church's formulation of a prohibition against human dissections in the hopes of curtailing the practice of dismembering and boiling the remains of Crusaders killed in battle before their shipment home.

Vesalius’s Fabrica is a masterpiece of accuracy and a work of extraordinary beauty as well. Vesalius, p. 210.

Andreas Vesalius
Andreas Vesalius was one of the founders of modern anatomy. He was sentenced to death for performing dissections (1564).
Andreas began to question classical medical texts and ideas. Historical anatomical texts were written during the time when dissection of humans was been forbidden by Greek and Roman religious law.

Historical texts on human anatomy was formed using animal dissections coupled with a fair amount of “guesswork”. In 1543 he published his masterpiece, De corporis humani fabrica, in seven volumes, providing the first accurate drawings of human anatomy.

The interior of your body is hidden from the world and from you. What we are and what occurs beneath our skin can be to some... MYSTERIOUS... FEARFUL... AMAZING...
Throughout history, many religions viewed human dissection as a sin - a desecration of the body. Anatomical studies were banned in many societies and were held in secret, if at all.
Perhaps it reminds us of our own mortality?