124 Scientific Intelligence. 



to the origin of anatomy in the investigation of the human structure, in 

 relation to the relief and cure of disease and injuries; and to the con- 

 sequent creation of an anatomical nomenclature, having reference 

 solely to the forms, proportions, likenesses and supposed functions of 

 the parts of the human body; which were originally studied from an 

 insulated point of view, and irrespective of any other animal structure 

 or any common type. So, likewise, the veterinary surgeon had begun 

 the study of the anatomy of the horse in an equally independent man- 

 ner, and had given as arbitrary names to the parts which he observed. 

 Thus, in the head of ft horse there was the " os quadratum ;" and in 

 the foot the "cannon-bone," the "great" and "small pastern-bones," 

 the "coronet," and "coffin-bones," &c. When the naturalist first 

 sought to penetrate beneath the superficial characters of the objects of 

 his study, their anatomy had often been conducted in the same in- 

 sulated and irrelative way. The ornithotomist, or dissector of birds, 

 describes his " ossa homoidea," "ossa communicantia" seu "inter- 

 articularia," his "columella," his " os furcatorium" and " os quadra- 

 tum," the latter being quite a distinct bone from the " os quadratum" 

 of the hippotomist. The anatomizer of reptiles described "hatchet- 

 bones" and "chevron-bones," an " os cinguliforme" or " os en cein- 

 ture," and an " os transversum ;" he had also his " columella," but 

 which was a bone distinct from that so called in the bird. The icthy- 

 otomist described the " os discoideum," u os transversum," " os ccenos- 

 teon," "os mystaceum," " ossa simplectica," "prima," "secunda," 



" tertia," " quarta," &c. Each at first viewed his subject independently 

 and irrelatively ; and finding, therefore, apparently new organs, created 

 a new and arbitrary nomenclature for them. 



After pointing out the impediments to a philosophical knowledge of 

 anatomy, from such disconnected attempts to master its complexities, 

 and the almost impossibility of retaining in the memory such an enor- 

 mous load of names, many distinct ones signifying the same essential 

 part, whilst different parts had received the same name, Prof. Owen 

 proceeded to demonstrate the principal results of the philosophical re- 

 searches of Cuvier, and other comparative anatomists, in tracing the 

 same or homologous parts through the animal series, as they were ex- 

 emplified in the osseous system, and principally in the bones of the 

 head. When any bones in the human skull, for example, had been 

 thus traced and determined in the skulls of the lower vertebrate ani- 

 mals, the same name was applied to it there as it bore in human anat- 

 omy, but understood in an arbitrary sense ; and when the part had no 

 name in human anatomy, but was indicated, as often happened, by a 

 descriptive phrase, it received a name having a close relation to such 

 phrase; and thus a uniform nomenclature had arisen out of the inves- 

 tigation of the homologies of the bones of the skeleton, applicable 

 alike to the human subject, the quadruped, the bird, and the fish. T he 

 corresponding parts have been sometimes called analogues, and some- 

 times homologues ; the latter being the appropriate term, since the part' 

 are in fact namesakes. The essential difference between the relations 

 of analogy and honiologfj was illustrated by reference to a diagram <>' 

 the skeletons of the ancient and modern flying dragons. The wings oi 

 the extinct pterodactyle were sustained by a modification of the bone* 



