4(10 



ZOOLOGY 



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wliich politics and the social organization dominated, science 

 slumbered. The intellectual centre was transferred to Alex- 

 andria and here mecUcine, \\i\\\ its stimulus to careful studies 

 in human anatomy and physiologj', flourished. The most 

 famous of the anatomists who studied at Alexandria was Galen 

 (second century of our era), who 

 made numerous dissections on man, 

 monkeys, ruminants, rats, and e\-en 

 man}' kinds of birds, snakes, and fish. 

 ^ h- ^^ .^ H \^ ^^^ anatomy was for ele\-en or twelve 

 "* ' centuries the most esteemed work on 



the sul:)ject, being by some apparently 

 regarded as more reliable than nature 

 itself. During the INIiddle xlges of 

 Europe, the age of constant .strife, 

 central and northern Europe gradually 

 acquired the culture of the south. At 

 this time all science languished, but 

 with the Renaissance, whose opening 

 may be put at the discoA'ery of 

 America, we note the first stirrings of 

 a return to nature. The epoch from 

 1500 to the present time may be divided into four periods, as 

 follows: the Encyclopa?dic period, 1500 to 1650; the System- 

 atic period, 1650 to 1800 ; the Morphological period, 1800 to 

 1890; the Dynamic period, 1890 to the present. 



The encyclopiedic period is opened by Gesner (born in Zu- 

 rich, 1516), who had the aim of coUecting all facts concerning 

 animals, of examining them criticallj', and of writing a compen- 

 dium that would show th(> position of the science and obviate 

 the necessity of consulting the okler authors. His book was 





Fic. 41.3. — Galen. From 

 Loo>-. "BJriloKy anil its 

 Makers," New York, 

 Henry Holt and Company. 



