Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 1.djvu/858

Rh 814 A N A T M Y [HISTORY. The same character is iue to Winslow, a native cf Denmark, but, as pupil and successor of Duverney, as well as a convert to Catholicism, naturalised in France. and finally professor of anatomy at the Royal Gardens. His exposition of the structure of the human body is distinguished for being not only the first treatise of de scriptive anatomy, divested of physiological details and hypothetical explanations foreign to the subject, but for being a close description derived from actual objects, without reference to the writings of previous anatomists. About the same time Cheselden in London, the first Monro in Edinburgh, and Albinus in Leyden, contributed by their several treatises to render anatomy still more precise as a descriptive science. The Osteographia, of the first-mentioned was of much use in directing attention to the study of the skeleton and the morbid changes to which it is liable. This work, however, magnificent as it was, was excelled by that of Albinus, who, in 1747, published engravings descriptive of the bones and muscles, which perhaps will never be surpassed either in accuracy of outline or beauty of execution. The several labours of this author, indeed, constitute an important era in the history of the science. He was the first who classified and exhibited the muscles in a proper arrangement, and applied to them a nomenclature which is still retained by the consent of the best anatomists. He gives a luminous account of the arteries and veins of the intestines, represents with singular fidelity and beauty the bones of the foetus, inquires into the structure of the skin and the cause of its colour in different races ; represents the changes incident to the womb in different periods of pregnancy, and de scribes the relations of the thoracic duct and the vena azygos with the contiguous parts. Besides these large and magnificent works, illustrated by the most beautiful en gravings, six books of Academical Annotations were the fruits of his long and assiduous cultivation of anatomy. These contain valuable remarks on the sound structure and morbid deviations of numerous parts of the human body. Albinus found a worthy successor in his pupil Albert Von Haller, who, with a mind imbued with every depart ment of literature and science, directed his chief attention, nevertheless, to the cultivation of anatomical and physio logical knowledge. Having undertaken at an early age (twenty-one) to illustrate, with commentaries, the physio logical prelections of his preceptor Boerhaave, he devoted himself assiduously to the perusal of every work which could tend to facilitate his purpose; and as he found numerous erroneous or imperfect statements, and many deficiencies to supply, he undertook an extensive course of dissection of human and animal bodies to obtain the requisite information. During the seventeen years he was professor at Gottingen, he dissected 400 bodies, and inspected their organs with the utmost care. The result of these assiduous labours appeared at intervals in the form of dissertations by himself, or under the name of some one of his pupils, finally published in a collected shape, between 1746 and 1751 (Disputationes Anatomicce Selections), and in eight numbers of most accurate and beautiful engravings, representing the most important parts of the human body, e.g., the diaphragm, the uterus, ovaries, and vagina, the arteries of the different regions and organs, with learned and critical explanatory observa tions. He verified the observations that in the footus the testicles lie in the abdomen, and showed that their descent into the scrotum may be complicated with the formation of congenital hernia. Some years after, when he had retired from his academical duties at Gottingen, he published, between 1757 and 1765, the large and elaborate work which, with singular modesty, he styled Elements of Phy&iolo jy. This work, though professedly devoted to physiology, rendered, nevertheless, the most essential services to anatomy. Haller, drawing an accurate line of distinction between the two, gave the most clear, precise, and complete descriptions of the situation, position, figure, component parts, and minute structure of the different organs and their appendages. The results of previous and coeval inquiry, obtained by extensive reading, he sedulously verified by personal observation ; and though he never rejected facts stated on credible authorities, he in all cases laboured to ascertain their real value by experiment. The anatomical descriptions are on this account not only the most valuable part of his work, but the most valuable that had then or for a long time after appeared. It is painful, nevertheless, to think that the very form in which this work is composed, with copious and scrupulous reference to authorities, made it be regarded as a compila tion only ; and that the author was compelled to show, by a list of his personal researches, that the most learned work ever given to the physiologist was also the most abundant in original information. With the researches of Haller it is proper to notice those of his contemporaries, John Frederick Meckel, J. N&quot;. Lieberkiihn, and his pupil John Godfrey Zinn. The first, who was professor of anatomy at Berlin, described 1748-. the Casserian ganglion, the first pair of nerves and its distribution, and that of the facial nerves generally, and discovered the spheno-palatine ganglion. He made some original and judicious observations on the tissue of the skin and the mucous net ; and above all, he recognised the 1753-E connection of the lymphatic vessels with the veins, a doctrine which, after long neglect, was revived by Fohmann and Lippi. He also collected several valuable observa tions on the morbid states of the heart and brain. Lie berkiihn published in 1745 a dissertation on the villi and glands of the small intestines. Zinn, who was professor of medicine at Gottingen, published a classical treatise on the eye, which demonstrated at once the defects 1755. of previous inquiries, and how much it was possible to elucidate, by accurate research and precise description, the structure of one of the most important organs of the human frame. It was repubtished after his death by Wrisberg. About the same time Weitbrecht gave a copious and minute account of the ligaments, and M. Lieutaud, who had already laboured to rectify many errors in anatomy, de scribed with care the structure and relations of the heart and its cavities, and rendered the anatomy of the bladder very precise, by describing the triangular space and the mammillary eminence at its neck. The study of the minute anatomy of the tissues, which had originally been commenced by Leeuwenhoeck, Malpighi, and Euysch, began at this period to attract more general attention. De Bergen had already demonstrated the general distribution of cellular membrane, and showed that it not only incloses every part of the animal frame, but forms the basis of every organ, a doctrine which was adopted, and still more fully expanded, by his friend Haller, in opposition to what was asserted by Albinus, who maintains that each part has a proper tissue. &quot;William Hunter at the same time gave a clear and ingenious statement of the difference between cellular membrane and adipose tissue, in which he maintained the general distribution of the former, and represented it as forming the serous membranes, and regulating their physiological and pathological pro perties, doctrines which were afterwards confirmed by his brother John Hunter. A few years after, the department of general anatomy first assumed a substantial form in the systematic view of the membranes and their mutual con-i nections traced by Andrew Bonn of Amsterdam. In his A. Bon inaugiiral dissertation De Continuationibus Membranarum, 1780. 1757, W. Hui 1757.
 * 1732.