In Western Europe between 1500 and 1700 the human skeleton became an object: a scientific object, a natural object, an artistic object, an artisanal object, independent of its bodily origins yet retaining a troubling moral status. The act of making a skeleton created a scientific object that also had aesthetic value, with qualities of authenticity, accuracy, and whiteness. Beginning with Vesalius, many anatomists included instructions on how to make a skeleton in their anatomical texts, and many more taught their students how to do this. Skeletons became central to anatomical instruction, both for medicine and for art. By the end of the seventeenth century, skeletons increasingly were found in cabinets and collections, and their aesthetic qualities, particularly their whiteness, became critical. However, the emotional and moral impacts of making skeletons remained unspoken.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Article
Cynthia Klestinec;
(2018)
Vesalius among the Surgeons
(/isis/citation/CBB331646601/)
Article
Jonathan Sawday;
(2018)
They Shall No More Be Remembered by Their Name: Cartography, Anatomy, and the Renaissance Eponym
(/isis/citation/CBB354173130/)
Chapter
Fabio Zampieri;
(2021)
The University of Padua Medical School from the Origins to the Early Modern Time: A Historical Overview
(/isis/citation/CBB530598396/)
Chapter
Elide Casali;
(2012)
"Anatomie Astrologiche". Melotesia e pronosticazione (sec. XVI-XVII)
(/isis/citation/CBB282078112/)
Chapter
Massimo Rinaldi;
(2012)
Perspicuitas ed evidentia nella letteratura medica e anatomica dell’età moderna
(/isis/citation/CBB655104260/)
Chapter
Maria Pia Donato;
(2012)
Anatomia, autopsia, sectio: problemi di fonti e di metodo
(/isis/citation/CBB267957700/)
Chapter
Rafael Mandressi;
(2012)
Dividere per conoscere. La "parte" come concetto nel pensiero anatomico in Età Moderna
(/isis/citation/CBB107896265/)
Book
Nelli-Elena Vanzan Marchini;
(1993)
Dalla scienza medica alla pratica dei corpi: Fonti e manoscritti marciani per la storia della sanita
(/isis/citation/CBB987889704/)
Article
Joaquin Fortanet;
(2015)
Anatomía de la monstruosidad: la figura del monstruo como objeto de la mirada médico-anatómica moderna
(/isis/citation/CBB962468586/)
Chapter
Alexander Kästner;
(2020)
Reading Moral Conduct and Physical Characteristics: the Classification of Suicide in Early Modern Europe
(/isis/citation/CBB055126233/)
Chapter
Berg, Sara van den;
(2013)
Dwarf Aesthetics in Spenser's Faerie Queene and the Early Modern Court
(/isis/citation/CBB001201693/)
Article
Danielle Jacquart;
(2017)
L’harmonie des parties du corps entre Moyen Âge et Renaissance
(/isis/citation/CBB257155938/)
Article
Belle S. Tuten;
(2021)
Correcting the unnatural breast: gynecomastia and gender in medieval medicine
(/isis/citation/CBB904428889/)
Chapter
Oliver, Lisi;
Mahoney, Maria;
(2010)
Episcopal Anatomies of the Early Middle Ages
(/isis/citation/CBB001253080/)
Article
Jorge L. García;
(2020)
The Aesthetic Dimension of Scientific Discovery: Finding the Inter-Maxillary Bone in Humans
(/isis/citation/CBB167572957/)
Article
Vivian Nutton;
(2018)
1538, A Year of Vesalian Innovation
(/isis/citation/CBB166343013/)
Article
Jennifer F. Kosmin;
(2018)
Midwifery Anatomized: Vesalius, Dissection, and Reproductive Authority in Early Modern Italy
(/isis/citation/CBB376381318/)
Article
Clayton, Martin;
(2012)
Medicine: Leonardo's Anatomy Years
(/isis/citation/CBB001320448/)
Book
Rosa Piro;
(2019)
Glossario Leonardiano: Nomenclatura dell'anatomia nei disegni della Collezione Reale di Windsor
(/isis/citation/CBB871556073/)
Chapter
Long, Kathleen;
(2010)
Odd Bodies: Reviewing Corporeal Difference in Early Modern Alchemy
(/isis/citation/CBB001220296/)
Be the first to comment!