The iconography of Andreas Vesalius (André Vésale) anatomist and physician, 1514-1564 : paintings-pictures-engravings-illustrations-sculpture-medals, with notes, critical, literary, and bibliographical / by M.H. Spielmann.

  • Marion Spielmann
Date:
1925
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: The iconography of Andreas Vesalius (André Vésale) anatomist and physician, 1514-1564 : paintings-pictures-engravings-illustrations-sculpture-medals, with notes, critical, literary, and bibliographical / by M.H. Spielmann. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    to escape notice. The orbits, acutely angular on the inner side, frame the large and expressive eyes which direct their gaze to the spectator's left, and beyond. The root and the bridge of the nose are wide; so, too, is its base where the nostrils spring without elegance of form from the full cheeks. The nose is slightly tilted, its tip turned up and inclined strongly forward. The thick-lipped mouth is bordered by a full moustache, horizontal in direction of its growth or training, and beneath the lower lip a tuft with a wide bare patch on either side. The beard, of medium length and thickness, is of the wavy kind and is square-trimmed. The ear is of normal shape; the curly hair covers the head thickly except upon the temples, and in the middle projects over the forehead. It is, as will be seen, a type essentially Flemish in its kind which widely persists to-day, and may frequently be recognized in Belgium. It would be easy to mention men whose names are known to the world who recall at once the portrait of Vesalius : the poet and publicist, Monsieur Emile Cammaerts, provides a good example. Above the right eyebrow of Vesalius will be seen a black spot which seems to be intentional on the engraver's part; especially does it appear so if we examine light impressions of the print and see the marks of the tool. It is to this spot that Roth attaches rather exaggerated importance. Speaking of this portrait he says: The head maybe recognized by the concave nose and by a small birth-mark (or wart— Muttermal) above the right eyebrow. There is no need to suppose that this mark is due to a fault on the part of the engraver .... It appears also in the engraving of the frontispiece [title-page] of the Fabrica of 1555.* Although it must be allowed that the mark may be a birth-mark or a wart, why may it not equally have been a fault of the engraver in misinterpreting a touch of the draughtsman's pencil, or the accident of a hard core in the wood too little reduced by the woodcutter's knife ? It is a moot point. For it is certainly true that this block was printed, mark and all, in the Epitome and Fabrica of 1543, and was uncorrected in the Radicis Chynai of 1546. At the same time, the mark was not introduced into the little portrait of Vesalius in the dissecting scene in the title-page of the same, the first edition of the Fabrica (1543). In this small head a simple line—and that not quite in the same place — takes the place of the Muttermal, and falls into the scheme of the other lines composing the modelling of the forehead. In a softened form it * Roth : Op. at., p. 450.