Q HUMAN DISSECTION. ITS DRAMA AND STRUGGLE 



the medical viewpoint, was made some centuries before the birth 

 of Christ, but this practice survived only for a short period. 



After A.D. 1550, with the Dark Ages past, a great struggle, 

 lasting almost three centuries, took place in the British Isles be- 

 tween a handful of men, interested in the dissection of the human 

 body, and the masses of people. A similar controversy was to 

 follow in the United States, but it was of shorter duration. With- 

 out legalization of anatomizing, it became impossible to supply 

 the demands of an ever increasing student body, made possible 

 by the growth of new medical schools. The acceptance of medi- 

 cine as a valuable and worthy profession was the stimulating 

 factor behind this expansion. On the other hand, the populace 

 wanted the institutions to maintain the highest educational 

 standards medically; on the other, they were adamant about 

 permitting them to use dead bodies for dissecting purposes. 



The first legalizations of dissection on the human body were 

 less than halfway affairs. Although permission to perform anato- 

 mies was granted in several of the European countries as early 

 as the 13th and 14th Centuries, it was rarely done. They had 

 to be performed publicly and then on the bodies of a few ex- 

 ecuted criminals. Because of the last, a stigma became associated 

 with the practice which was to endure in the English speaking 

 nations, until the passage of anatomy acts in the early part of 

 the 1800's. 



The most dramatic chapter in the history of anatomy took 

 place between the time of Vesalius, from about A.D. 1543, through 

 the first third of the 19th Century. During the latter part of this 

 period, the demand for human bodies greatly exceeded the 

 supply. This provided the impetus for the development and 

 growth of the flourishing trade known either as "bootlegging 

 bodies," "body snatching," "grave robbing," or "resurrection." By 

 themselves, anatomists, surgeons and students were unable to 

 successfully cope with the shortage. This phase was characterized 

 by the organization of disreputable and piratical groups designed 

 for one purpose, and that was to obtain human corpses to sell 

 to the anatomical departments which were sorely in need of them. 

 Nothing was too low for these men to stoop to, including murder. 

 Great profits in this endeavor could be made with little or no 



