Galen on anatomical procedures : de Anatomicis administrationibus / translation of the surviving books with introduction and notes by Charles Singer.

  • Galen
Date:
1956
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Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: Galen on anatomical procedures : de Anatomicis administrationibus / translation of the surviving books with introduction and notes by Charles Singer. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    size and shape [Figs. 2-4]. So also arteries, veins, and nerves 220 conform to the bones. Since, therefore, the form of the body is assimilated to the bones, to vv^hich the nature of the other parts corresponds, I would have you first gain an exact and practical knowledge of human bones. It is not enough to study them casually or read of them only in a book: No, not even in mine, which some call Osteologia, others Skeletonsy and yet others simply On Bonesthough I am persuaded that it excels all earlier works in accuracy, brevity, and lucidity. Make it rather your serious endeavour not only to acquire accurate book^knowledge of each bone but also to examine assiduously with your own eyes the human bones themselves. This is quite easy at Alexandria because the physicians there employ ocular demonstration in teaching osteology to stu-^ dents.^^ For this reason, if for no other, try to visit Alexandria. 221 But if you cannot, it is still possible to see something of human bones. I, at least, have done so often on the breaking open of a grave or tomb. Thus once a river, inundating a recent hastily made grave, broke it up, washing away the body. The flesh had putrefied, though the bones still held together in their proper relations. It was carried down a stadium and, reaching marshy ground, drifted ashore. This skeleton was as though deliberately prepared for such elementary teaching. And on another occasion we saw the skeleton of a brigand, lying on rising ground a litde off the road. He had been killed by some traveller repelling his attack. The inhabitants would not bury him, glad enough to see his body consumed by the birds which, in a couple of days, ate his flesh, leaving the skeleton as if for demonstration. If you have not the luck to see anything of this sort, dissect an ape^^ and, having removed the flesh, observe each bone with care. Choose those apes likest man, with short jaws and small canines. You will find other parts also resembling man s, for they can walk and run on two feet. Those, on the other hand, like the dog/faced baboons, with long snouts and