6o8 



COMPARATIVE ANATOMY 



his vertebral theory of the skull until 1823. In the meanwhile a German 

 naturalist Oken published, in 1807, a similar conception of the skull as a 

 composite of enlarged vertebrae. Quite unrestrained by sound morpho- 

 logical principles, Oken compared the upper jaw with the arms, the lower 

 jaw with the legs, and the fingers and toes with the teeth. 



BASISPHENOIO 



ORBITOSPHENOID 

 PRESPHENOID 

 TRONTAL 

 VOMER 

 PREFRONTAL. 

 NASAL 



SUPRAOCOPITAL 



EXOCCIPITAL 

 BASIOCCIPITAL 



A. MAMMAL 



ALISPHENOip 

 ORBITOSPHE NOIP 



PRESPHENOI 



PREFRONTAL. 

 VOMER 



SUPRAOCQPITAL 

 OCCIPITAL 





B.MAN 



Fig. 502. — Owen's figures illustrating the Goethe-Oken vertebral theory of the skull. 

 Owen believed that he could find in the mammalian skull four enlarged vertebrae, the 

 components of which he identified with the elements of a trunk vertebra. Not knowing 

 the embryology of the skull, he did not realize that vertebrae lack the membranous 

 elements which are so conspicuous in the skull. (Redrawn from Wilder.) 



In England, the distinguished anatomist Owen adopted Oken's con- 

 ception and attempted to demonstrate in the bones of the skull all the 

 t^-pical elements of a trunk vertebra. Owen's familiar figure of an 

 "archetypal vertebrate," with four vertebrae in the skull and each cranial 

 vertebra with typical vertebral elements, is shown in Fig. 503. During 



