Moody Medical Library

The Renaissance developed a remarkable group of artists who began to dissect the body to learn its anatomy. Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) is conceded to be the most versatile genius of the Renaissance and one of the most remarkable minds of all times.

As an artist, his best known works are The Last Supper and Mona Lisa. As an architect and engineer, he devised a system of locks to make the canals navigable, assisted in building the cathedrals in Como and Pavia, and planned cities with elevated highways above the streets. He devised a turbine engine, planned a steamboat, and drew plans for an army tank, flying machine and submarine.

Although not a physician, he was a master anatomist. He left 750 separate anatomical sketches, including extensive studies of the skeleton and muscles, heart, lungs, nerves, blood vessels, viscera and brain. He dissected more than 30 bodies, discovered the frontal and maxillary sinuses, and described in detail the structure and function of the valves of the heart. He was the very first to apply the cross-section in the study of anatomy.

William Harvey (1578-1657), born in Folkestone, England, was educated at Cambridge and received his medical education in Padua. He received the degree of Doctor of Medicine at Cambridge in 1602. In 1615, he was appointed lecturer to the College of Physicians in London.

Harvey's discovery of the circulation of the blood is considered one of the most significant events in the history of medicine. The following entry is found in his manuscript lecture notes: "William Harvey demonstrates by the structure of the heart that the blood is constantly passed through the lungs into the aorta… He demonstrates by the ligature the passage of blood from arteries to veins. Thus is proved a perpetual motion of the blood in a circle caused by the pulsation of the heart." Twelve years later his views were published at Frankfurt am Main (in 1682) entitled Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordiset Sanguinis in Animalibus. This work is considered a model of inductive reasoning. Harvey also published his observations in embryology: Exercitationes de Generotione Animalium in 1651. In this he observed, "All animals, even those that produce their young alive, including man himself, are evolved out of the egg."

Sir Christopher Wren carried out the first experiment of infusion in 1656. He injected wine, ale, opium, scamony and other substances into a dog’s vein and studied their effects. These experiments suggested blood transfusion to Dr. Richard Lower, who transfused blood from one animal to another and was the first to transfuse blood to man in 1667 using sheep blood.

Jean Baptiste Denis, physician to Louis XIV, preformed the first blood transfusion on man, using human blood, on June 15, 1667. This procedure saves thousands of lives everyday throughout the world. Cardiac surgery would be impossible without transfusions.

John Coakley Lettsom (1744-1815) was born of Quaker parents in the Virgin Islands; he received his M.D. from Leyden in 1769. Lavish in expenditure and generous in philanthropy, he was one of the founders of the Medical Society of London.

He was a prolific writer on a variety of subjects; the effects of stuffy air, substitutes for wheaten bread, tea, chlorosis in boarding schools, and the effects of hard drinking. Lettsom’s greatest contribution to modern medicine is his original account of alcoholism. He also wrote an excellent History of the Origin of Medicine in 1778.

In 1774, Joseph Priestly heated mercuric oxide with a burning glass and obtained a gas which was exceedingly favorable for combustion. He discovered oxygen but called it “dephlogisticated air.”

Antoine Lavoisier (1743-1794) repeated Priestly’s work in 1775 and two years later he proved conclusively that the substance called “dephlogisticated air” which combined with metals when calcined, was a characteristic constituent of acids. Lavoisier called the substance “oxygen” or generator of acids, and it has been called so ever since. Lavoisier gave Priestly full credit for the original discovery but Lavoisier was the first to recognize the true nature of the discovery and to correctly interpret Priestly’s facts.

In 1777 Lavoisier described the true nature of oxidation and saw that respiration was oxidation. He also showed that expired air contained carbon dioxide. Lavoisier’s discoveries in the field of respiration are comparable to those of Harvey in the field of circulation. He is the Father of Modern Chemistry for he proved the fallacy of the phlogiston theory. Science and mankind lost a gifted servant when Lavoisier was executed during the French Revolution because he had worked for the deposed monarch as farmer-general of taxes.

Jacques Daviel (1696-1762) was born in the village of LaBarre and received his medical degree from the medical school of Rouen. He started private practice in Marseilles and became associated with the medical school of Marseilles. Daviel practiced ophthalmology and became an expert in cataract surgery.

In 1747, he abandoned the couching method and began to operate by extracting the cataract. He moved to Paris where his fame as an ophthalmologist and cataract surgeon became worldwide. He received an appointment to the staff of the Hospital d’Invalides in Paris and became the oculist to the King of France. He was elected to the Academies of Paris, Dijon, Bordeaux, London, and Stockholm.

Dominique Jean Larrey (1766-1842) was born in Beaudean, France, and was trained in surgery by his uncle, Alexis Larrey of Toulouse. In 1792, he joined the Army of the Rhine and spent most of his life as an army surgeon; he became one of the greatest surgeons of his time.

Larrey was a devoted friend of Napoleon and accompanied him on his campaigns in Italy, Germany, Egypt, Russia and Waterloo. Larrey took part in 60 battles, 400 engagements and was wounded three times. At Borodino, he preformed 200 amputations in 24 hours. He invented the celebrated “flying ambulance” to pick up the wounded during a battle and remove them for treatment behind battle lines. Larrey is considered the father of modern military surgery.