Vesalius/Sandifort, Tabulae Ossium Humanorum, 1782
Andreae Vesalii Anatomici Summi Tabulae Ossium Humanorum. Denuo Edidit, Earumque Explicationem Adauxit Eduardus Sandifort, Medicinae, Anatomes Et Chirurgiae, In Academia Batava, Quae Leidae Est, Professor. Lugduni Batavorum, Apud { S. Et. J. Luchtmans, P. Van Der Eyk Et D. Vijgh. 1782.
Folio in quarter brown cloth and blue paper boards. Paper title labels on spine and front board. All edges and corners worn, chipped, and bumped. Front hinge internally reinforced. Rear hinge cracking inside. Marginal toning of prelims and text leaves. Deckle edges. Minimal foxing. Otherwise, clean, bright, and tight throughout. 50 pages of explanation of the plates followed by 27 tables arranged on 24 leaves.
Ffep, title, iv, 50, (2), 24, rfep.
“These twenty-four copperplates were made from those which were employed for the Boerhaave-Albinus edition of Vesalius’ work, as far as osteology is concerned. The order is changed, however. The text contains only the explanation of the plates. … Sandifort, Eduard, at one time physician at The Hague, was afterward successor to Albinus in the chair of anatomy and surgery at Leyden, where he received the doctor’s degree in 1763, where he died in 1819 at an advanced age. Like Albinus he directed his efforts to the development and perfection of anatomic drawing...although most of his works pertain to pathologic anatomy.” (Choulant)
Andreas Vesalius was born in Brussels in 1513 or 1514. His De Humani Corpora Fabrica of 1543 revolutionized the study of anatomy for centuries to follow. The plates in that famous text were by Jan Van Kalkar.
Vesalius’ plates have been extensively studied over the centuries. With regard to his skull plates, Saunders and O’Malley state, “These are the first meager beginnings in physical anthropology. Although conscious of racial differences, Vesalius attempted to establish a norm for skull shape of which the four abnormal types were variants.” Vesalius’ plate of a human skull and a dog skull was critical to demonstrating the defects in Galen, who clearly relied on quadrupeds to assume human anatomy. The Vesalian spinal column is imperfectly curved because the true specimen would have been mounted on an iron bar, bent imperfectly. Vesalius’ sacrum has six segments (which Gabriel Falloppio pointed out). There are difficulties in reconciling proportion in Vesalius’ complete skeletons as well.
