Art and Anatomy in Renaissance Italy


Book Description

Known as the "century of anatomy," the 16th century in Italy saw an explosion of studies and treatises on the discipline. Medical science advanced at an unprecedented rate, and physicians published on anatomy as never before. Simultaneously, many of the period's most prominent artists--including Leonardo and Michelangelo in Florence, Raphael in Rome, and Rubens working in Italy--turned to the study of anatomy to inform their own drawings and sculptures, some by working directly with anatomists and helping to illustrate their discoveries. The result was a rich corpus of art objects detailing the workings of the human body with an accuracy never before attained. "Art and Anatomy in Renaissance Italy "examines this crossroads between art and science, showing how the attempt to depict bone structure, musculature, and our inner workings--both in drawings and in three dimensions--constituted an important step forward in how the body was represented in art. While already remarkable at the time of their original publication, the anatomical drawings by 16th-century masters have even foreshadowed developments in anatomic studies in modern times.




Picturing the Book of Nature


Book Description

Because of their spectacular, naturalistic pictures of plants and the human body, Leonhart Fuchs’s De historia stirpium and Andreas Vesalius’s De humani corporis fabrica are landmark publications in the history of the printed book. But as Picturing the Book of Nature makes clear, they do more than bear witness to the development of book publishing during the Renaissance and to the prominence attained by the fields of medical botany and anatomy in European medicine. Sachiko Kusukawa examines these texts, as well as Conrad Gessner’s unpublished Historia plantarum, and demonstrates how their illustrations were integral to the emergence of a new type of argument during this period—a visual argument for the scientific study of nature. To set the stage, Kusukawa begins with a survey of the technical, financial, artistic, and political conditions that governed the production of printed books during the Renaissance. It was during the first half of the sixteenth century that learned authors began using images in their research and writing, but because the technology was so new, there was a great deal of variety of thought—and often disagreement—about exactly what images could do: how they should be used, what degree of authority should be attributed to them, which graphic elements were bearers of that authority, and what sorts of truths images could and did encode. Kusukawa investigates the works of Fuchs, Gessner, and Vesalius in light of these debates, scrutinizing the scientists’ treatment of illustrations and tracing their motivation for including them in their works. What results is a fascinating and original study of the visual dimension of scientific knowledge in the sixteenth century.




Italy’s Eighteenth Century


Book Description

In the age of the Grand Tour, foreigners flocked to Italy to gawk at its ruins and paintings, enjoy its salons and cafés, attend the opera, and revel in their own discovery of its past. But they also marveled at the people they saw, both male and female. In an era in which castrati were "rock stars," men served women as cicisbei, and dandified Englishmen became macaroni, Italy was perceived to be a place where men became women. The great publicity surrounding female poets, journalists, artists, anatomists, and scientists, and the visible roles for such women in salons, academies, and universities in many Italian cities also made visitors wonder whether women had become men. Such images, of course, were stereotypes, but they were nonetheless grounded in a reality that was unique to the Italian peninsula. This volume illuminates the social and cultural landscape of eighteenth-century Italy by exploring how questions of gender in music, art, literature, science, and medicine shaped perceptions of Italy in the age of the Grand Tour.




Hall of Medicine


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Human Anatomy


Book Description

An understanding of the structure and function of the human body is vital for anyone studying the medical and health sciences. In this book, Leslie Klenerman provides a clear and accessible overview of the main systems of the human anatomy, illustrated with a number of clear explanatory diagrams.




Forgotten Healers


Book Description

Winner of the Margaret W. Rossiter History of Women in Science Prize A new history uncovers the crucial role women played in the great transformations of medical science and health care that accompanied the Italian Renaissance. In Renaissance Italy women played a more central role in providing health care than historians have thus far acknowledged. Women from all walks of life—from household caregivers and nurses to nuns working as apothecaries—drove the Italian medical economy. In convent pharmacies, pox hospitals, girls’ shelters, and homes, women were practitioners and purveyors of knowledge about health and healing, making significant contributions to early modern medicine. Sharon Strocchia offers a wealth of new evidence about how illness was diagnosed and treated, whether by noblewomen living at court or poor nurses living in hospitals. She finds that women expanded on their roles as health care providers by participating in empirical work and the development of scientific knowledge. Nuns, in particular, were among the most prominent manufacturers and vendors of pharmaceutical products. Their experiments with materials and techniques added greatly to the era’s understanding of medical care. Thanks to their excellence in medicine urban Italian women had greater access to commerce than perhaps any other women in Europe. Forgotten Healers provides a more accurate picture of the pursuit of health in Renaissance Italy. More broadly, by emphasizing that the frontlines of medical care are often found in the household and other spaces thought of as female, Strocchia encourages us to rethink the history of medicine.




Spaces, Objects and Identities in Early Modern Italian Medicine


Book Description

This collection, by an international team of scholars, presentsexciting research currently being undertaken on early modern Italywhich questions the conventional boundaries of medical history. Brings together historians of medicine and scholars ofdifferent backgrounds who are re-visiting the field from newperspectives and with the support of innovative questions andunexplored sources Explores crucial areas of intersection between the territory ofmedicine and that of law, politics, religion, art and materialculture and highlights the connections between these apparentlyseparate fields Challenges our understanding of what we regard as medicalactivities, medical identities, spaces and objects Addresses the study of medical careers, medical identities andspaces where medical activities were performed e.g. apothecaryshops, courtrooms, convents and museums




History of Anatomy


Book Description

A unique biographical review of the global contributors to field of anatomy Knowledge of human anatomy has not always been an essential component of medical education and practice. Most European medical schools did not emphasize anatomy in their curricula until the post-Renaissance era; current knowledge was largely produced between the 16th and 20th centuries. Although not all cultures throughout history have viewed anatomy as fundamental to medicine, most have formed ideas about the internal and external mechanisms of the body—influences on the field of anatomy that are often overlooked by scholars and practitioners of Western medicine. History of Anatomy: An International Perspective explores the global and ancient origins of our modern-day understanding of anatomy, presenting detailed biographies of anatomists from varied cultural and historical settings. Chapters organized by geographic region, including Africa, the Middle East, and Europe, review the lives of those that helped shape our current understanding of the human form. Examining both celebrated and lesser-known figures, this comprehensive work examines their contributions to the discipline and helps readers develop a global perspective on a cornerstone of modern medicine and surgery. Offers a comprehensive and multidisciplinary examination of the history of anatomy Traces the emergence of modern knowledge of anatomy from ancient roots to the modern era Fills a gap in current literature on global perspectives on the history of anatomy Written by an internationally recognized team of practicing physicians and scholars History of Anatomy: An International Perspective is an engaging and insightful historical review written for anatomists, anthropologists, physicians, surgeons, medical personnel, medical students, health related professionals, historians, and anyone interested in the history of anatomy, surgery, and medicine.




Early History of Human Anatomy


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