History of anatomy in the university of Cambridge, U.K.

Clinical Anatomy 6:188-191 (1993)

HISTORY OF MEDICINE

History of Anatomy in the University of Cambridge, U.K. HAROLD ELLIS

Department of Anatomy, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, U. K.

T h e University of Cambridge proudly claims to have the oldest Chair of Anatomy in the United Kingdom; George Rolfe obtained this appointment in 1707. H e had previously taught anatomy privately in Cambridge and held the post until 1728. However, the history of the teaching of anatomy at the university is even older than this.

T h e University of Cambridge was founded about 1231 and the first college, Peterhouse, was founded in 1284 by Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely. T h e estab- lishment was for a Master and 14 Fellows, and one of the fellowships was to be available for medicine. T h e early history of the university is obscure, particularly so because in the riot of 1381, the mayor and Burgess burned all the university documents in the market- place to cries of “away with the skill of the clerks.”

Medicine was probably studied from the earliest times, although medical degrees were not instituted until about 1460. Indeed, the whole of the fifteenth century produced only a dozen MBs and 23 MDs! By the sixteenth century, there were a total of 199 graduates.

An important landmark was the arrival in 1528 of David Edwardes, a lecturer in Greek at Oxford, to teach and examine in anatomy. He was important because he published, in 1532, the first book printed in England devoted to the subject of anatomy. It was entitled Brief but Excellent Introduction to Anatomy; today only one copy is known to exist, in the British Museum. T h e text reveals that the author had carried out human dissections, the earliest evidence of practical anatomy in England.

T h e introduction of practical anatomy into the medical curriculum was one of the important contributions of John Caius (1510-1573). Born John Kees, he latin- ized his name on becoming a student at Gonville Hall. After Cambridge, he studied in Padua, where he shared lodgings with Vesalius. In spite of this, he re- mained a conservative Galenist. On returning to Eng-

land in 1545, Caius introduced annual anatomical dem- onstrations at Barber Surgeons Hall in London and arranged that four persons put to death for felony should be made available for anatomizing each year. In 1565, while President, he obtained permission from Queen Elizabeth I that the same number of bodies should be available for the Royal College of Physicians and also that two further bodies should be provided for his Cambridge college. This he refounded at his own expense with money obtained from his extensive medical practice in London, and in 1557 the college was renamed Gonville and Caius. T h e following year, Caius was appointed its Master and in 1571 the first medical scholarship in England was founded there. T h e college continues its medical tradition to this day.

T h e arrangements for dissection in Cambridge were carefully laid down; the Master was to ensure that the students treated the body with respect and the dissection was followed by a solemn burial at Saint Michael’s on which 26 shillings and 8 pence were to be spent. T h e funeral was to be attended by the Master and all members of the college. In addition, it was also re- quired that the Regius Professor of Physic (a position founded in 1540) should perform one anatomical dissection per year. However, this duty was performed only irregularly. Indeed, up to the nineteenth century, much of the teaching in Cambridge was based upon the colleges and its Fellows rather than university appoint- ments. Even until the present day, students are admit- ted by the colleges and not by the university.

One should note that one of the earliest of the medical scholarships at Gonville and Caius was awarded to William Harvey in 1593, when he was 16 years of age. Although he studied medicine at Cambridge and witnessed at least one autopsy in his college, he went on to

Received for publication October 1, 1992; revised October 3, 1992. Address reprint requests to Harold Ellis, Department of Anatomy, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3DY, UK.

0 1993 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

History of Anatomy in Cambridge 189

applied anatomical and physiological studies, which led to the publication of De motu cordis, outside the walls of his university.

T h e seventeenth century continued the awakening interest in anatomy, taking place mainly in those colleges to which medical Fellows were attached. How- ever, the Fellows spent much of their time in London, where they would have their medical practice and where they would also instruct in anatomy for the Com- pany of Barber Surgeons. Undoubtedly the most distinguished anatomist of that century at Cambridge was Francis Glisson (c. 1598-1677), who was successively Scholar and Fellow at Gonville and Caius College and Regius Professor of Physic from 1636 until his death. There is no evidence, however, that he ever gave a course of lectures at the university during the 41 years that he occupied the chair, Much of his time was spent in practice in London and he became president of the Royal College of Physicians in 1667. Glisson’s claim to fame is principally based on his anatomical studies. His Anutomiu Hepatis, published in 1654, described his technique of studying the internal anatomy of the liver by injecting the vessels and then corrosion of the paren- chyma. T h e sheath of the portal tracts retains its name of Glisson’s capsule to this day. His Tractutus de En- tricullo etzntestinis was published in 1677, the year of his death. I t describes the abdominal cavity and its con- tents and discusses both anatomy and function. He details his theories of irritability and spontaneous con- traction of muscle and contradicts the theory of the flow of animal spirits in nerves. Glisson continued the experimental tradition of William Harvey. As an example, his studies on the action of the diaphragm were made by observation at a laparotomy on a living dog.

T h e eighteenth century witnessed the appointment, in 1707, of the first professor of anatomy, George Rolfe. H e had already delivered private courses in anatomy in Cambridge for some years, but little else is known about him, not even his dates of birth and death. After unheeded warnings, he was deprived of his chair for neglect of his duties. He was, however, the first of a total now of 17 professors of anatomy over nearly three centuries.

In 1717 the first anatomy school was opened; perhaps appropriately, it was accommodated in a building first used as a theatre. It was demolished in the mid- nineteenth century. Of the seven eighteenth-century professors, undoubtedly the most colorful was Sir Busick Harwood, who held the chair from 1785 to 1814, when he died in his 69th year. Harwood trained as a surgeon in London and first practiced in India. In 1779 he went to Cambridge and took his MB degree in 1785, the year after he had been elected Fellow of the Royal

followed extensive experiments, many performed in public, on the transfusion of blood from sheep to dogs. He proved to be the first really active Professor of Anatomy; the first to make a collection of spirit- preserved injected specimens for teaching and to give regular courses on human and comparative anatomy. I t may be apocryphal that he served, cooked, to his guests at dinner the fish that he had used in his preceding anatomical classes! He was particularly interested in the olfactory organs and believed, correctly, that in humans the organ of smell is located in a small area in the roof of the nasal cavity, which was against the current belief at that time. Today, Hanvood’s grave can be seen in the grassy grounds of Downing College. This curious fact is because it was to be the site of the chapel of this new college. However, the chapel was eventually built on the opposite side of the college grounds, leaving Harwood alone beneath the turf. T h e tradition continues to this day that the medical students of Downing have an annual Busick Harwood dinner, at which alcoholic libations are poured by candlelight over his grave.

An important landmark in the teaching of anatomy was the passing of the Anatomy Act of 1832, which laid down provisions for the legitimate supply of bodies for dissection and signalled the demise of the grave rob- bers, or “Resurrectionists.” Perhaps as a consequence, a new anatomical building was constructed in Downing Street (a short walk from the site of the present department) and opened in 1833. Only a month later, a vio- lent riot broke out, vividly described by C. Knight Watson in his book, A Cambridge Professor of the Lust Generution, published in 1870:

Scarcely had the new building been erected before a great riot took place, which did a vast amount of damage both to the building and to the collection. Some low and turbulent blackguards had been excited to storm the museum with a view to regain possession of a body which, in strict accordance with the provisions of the Anatomy Act, had been removed for dissection from the workhouse. T h e passions of this lawless crew, hounded on by men who ought to have known better were still further excited by catching a glimpse of one or more wax models . . . which were such excellent facsimiles that they were taken for real bodies by the infuriated multitude. Of course the usual inefficiency of the police was supplemented by the pluck of the gownsmen, and the cads were thoroughly licked.

This building was not well built and had only a small Society. His MB thesis was on blood transfusion and dissecting room. It was moved into larger premises in

190 Ellis

1891 and finally into its present building on the Down- Clinical Anatomy there in 1931. Harris was a tireless ing preclinical site in 1938. research worker with a particular interest in bone

George Humphrey FRS, a surgeon who had been growth in children. His Bone Growth in Health and Dis- appointed to the staff of Addenbrooke’s Hospital, ease was published in 1933. His name is given to the Cambridge, a t the early age of 22, became the first transverse lines on the X-rays of long bones, which Professor of Human Anatomy in 1866. This marked represent lines of arrested growth and correlate with the separation of this subject from zoology and com- episodes of illness. It was Harris who planned the new parative anatomy. Humphrey introduced an anatomy building of the department, which was opened just course that forms the basis of today’s teaching. He before World War 11. On his retirement at the age of 65, published his classic Treatise of the Human Skeleton he became Professor of Anatomy first in Cairo and then Including the Joints, with illustrations drawn by his at Khartoum. wife, and became the first president of the Anatomi- Harris was succeeded in Cambridge by James Dixon cal Society of Great Britain and Ireland in 1887. He Boyd in 1951. Born in the United States, Boyd went to was knighted in 1891. Ireland with his family at the age of nine and qualified

T h e story of anatomy in Cambridge over the last 100 in medicine at Queen’s University, Belfast. He became years is best told through its succession of distinguished demonstrator in the Department of Anatomy there and heads of department. spent a year at the Carnegie Institute in Baltimore

Alexander Macalister FRS, having qualified in med- under Dr. G.L. Streeter, which no doubt laid the basis icine in Ireland, was elected Professor of Zoology at for his later career as a distinguished embryologist. He Trinity College, Dublin, in 1869 while still an under- became Professor of Anatomy at the London Hospital graduate. He therefore found himself in the position of Medical School at the age of 31. On transferring to being unable to enter for an honors degree in zoology as Cambridge, Boyd introduced the foundations for mod- he would have had to be his own examiner! He was ern anatomical research in the department. He in- appointed from the Chair of Anatomy at Trinity to stalled the first electron microscope and built up a Cambridge, in succession to Humphrey, in 1883. Mac- magnificent collection of human embryos. He was the alister was a prolific writer and a dedicated teacher in joint author of a well-known text in embryology and the dissecting room. Under his leadership, there was a worked extensively on placental development. His considerable increase in student numbers, to nearly monograph on the placenta (with William Hamilton) 200. His personal library, which included a first edition was published after his untimely death following pro- of Vesalius, forms the basis of the present departmental longed illness in 1968. library. He died in office in 1919. Sir Richard Harrison FRS came from the Chair of

James Wilson FRS succeeded to the chair in 1920 Anatomy at the London Hospital Medical College to and held it for 14 years until his retirement. After succeed Boyd in 1968. A distinguished embryologist, qualifying in medicine in Edinburgh and having dem- marine biologist, and comparative anatomist, he is par- onstrated in anatomy there, Wilson became Professor of ticularly well known as an authority on the dolphin. He Anatomy in Sydney, Australia, where he was joined as a retired in 1984 to be replaced by Professor Henricus demonstrator by Grafton Elliot Smith, whose research (Hans) Kuypers FRS, who had been Professor of Anat- on monotreme and marsupial brains laid the founda- omy at Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, tions of Elliot Smith’s future career in neuroanatomy. and who had then returned to his native Holland as Wilson found a large school of 280 students with an Foundation Professor of Anatomy at Erasmus Univer- inadequate supply of bodies, but this shortage was soon sity, Rotterdam. Kuypers was a brilliant neuroscientist remedied. His particular interest was in embryology, and an innovative experimenter. He developed the use and he also introduced an advanced course in anatomy of fluorescent dyes as retrograde tracers and, more for third year students, which remains an important recently, the herpes simplex virus as a transneuronal feature of the department today. tracer. Under his leadership, the department was

Henry Harris held the chair from 1934 to 1951. A awarded the highest rating for research by the Univer- Welshman, he first took a degree in physics in Cardiff. sity Grants Committee in 1989. He died suddenly in He entered University College, London, as a medical that year at the age of 64. student at the age of 30; he was already married and T h e department is now chaired by another distin- supported his family by teaching evening classes. After guished neuroanatomist, Professor Raymond Lund qualifying, he demonstrated in anatomy at UC under FRS, a graduate of University College, London, who Sir Grafton Elliot Smith and was appointed Professor of took up the post a t the beginning of 1992 after having

History of Anatomy in Cambridge 191

been chairman of the Department of Anatomy in ACWNOWLEDGMENTS Pittsburgh.

Currently, the Department of Anatomy, with its Sub-Department of Veterinary Anatomy, has an annual intake of some 300 medical and veterinary students, a senior staff of 21 teachers, together with 24 senior research students, 32 graduate research staff, and 10 departmental demonstrators. Its research interests are particularly in neuroanatomy, neuroen- docrinology, experimental embryology, and electron microscopy. T h e dissecting room has an active teaching and research program (Ellis and Logan, 1991). Like many other departments of anatomy, both in this country and overseas, Cambridge demonstrates both the considerable revival in teaching and the broadening of research interests that have taken place in anatomy in recent years.

T h e author acknowledges his very heavy depend- ence on the sources listed in the references, where considerable further information is available.

REXERENCES Ellis, H. and B. Logan 1991 Topographical Anatomy-the

Cambridge Experiment. Clin. Anat., 4.212-215. Fairfax Fozzard, J.A. 1983 Professors of Anatomy in the Univer-

sity of Cambridge: T h e first 261 years of the Cambridge University Department of Anatomy 1707-1968. Cam- bridge: Fosslia.

Langdon-Brown, W. 1946 Some Chapters in Cambridge Medi- cal History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Pratt, C.W.M. 1981 T h e History of Anatomy in Cambridge, Department of Anatomy (privately printed).

Rook, A., ed. 1971 Cambridge and its Contributions to Medicine. London: Wellcome Institute of the History of Medicine.

History of anatomy in the university of Cambridge, U.K.

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