344 



Comparative Anatomy — Its History, Aim, and Method 



BASISPHENOID 



ALISPHENOID 

 ORBITOSPHENOID 

 PRESPHENOII 



BASIOCCIPITAL 



SUPRAOCaPITAL 

 lOCCIPITAL 



Fig. 278. One of Owen's figures illustrating the Goethe-Oken vertebral theory 

 of the skull. The mammalian skull was conceived to be constituted of four enlarged 

 and modified vertebrae. (After Wilder. Courtesy, Neal and Rand: "Chordate 

 Anatomy," Philadelphia, The Blakiston Company.) 



built on the same plan. In the lower part of. the trunk is a cavity 

 (abdominal) occupied mainly by organs which are concerned with food. 

 Above is a cavity (thoracic) in which are organs (lungs) concerned with 

 breathing. Between the two cavities is a partition, the diaphragm. 

 Similarly, in the head, the mouth cavity below and the nasal cavities 

 above are, respectively, "abdominal" and "thoracic." The palate, 

 between mouth and nasal cavities, is the "diaphragm" of the head. So 

 far, we follow easily. But, to make the uniformity complete, it is neces- 

 sary to discover, in the head, the equivalents of the two pairs of append- 

 ages of the trunk. Under urge of necessity many a discovery has been 

 made, and so Oken discovered that the right and left halves of the 

 lower jaw are the "legs" and, similarly, the lateral halves of the upper 

 jaw are the "arms" of the head. Granting this, it is obvious that the 

 lower teeth are "toes" and the upper teeth are "fingers." All of this 

 and much more of the same sort was put forth by Oken and his dis- 

 ciples as serious anatomy. It is not surprising that a hard-headed man 

 such as Cuvier lost patience with speculative anatomy. 



Study of the history of anatomy makes it clear that the earlier 

 development of the science took place in close association with medicine 

 and surgery. Man's primary interest in anatomy was in himself and 

 with reference to his own physical disabilities. In Aristotle and occa- 

 sional others, we see men of broader interests. The rapid progress of 

 anatomy in the four centuries following the twelfth took place almost 

 entirely in the medical schools of Italy and France. In earlier times, 



