The Arts and the Sciences in the Scientific Renaissance
Man as the Measure
Renaissance arts and scientists explored man's place in relationship to nature, his built environment, and the larger universe.
Working in the final decades of the fifteenth and the early sixteenth century, architects Francesco di Giorgio Martini and Leonardo da Vinci built on the theory of the Roman engineer and architectural theorist Vitruvius, who stressed the relationship between man and his architectural surroundings.
Greek philosopher Protagoras' thought, 'man as the measure of all things,' served as a guiding principal. The relationship to human anatomy is clear, particularly in the work of Leonardo.
Johannes de Ketham. Fasciculus Medicinae. [Venice]: [Johannes & Gregorius de Gregorii], [1491].
Interest in illustrated anatomical works, however, predated Leonardo's by several decades. Johannes de Ketham, professor of medicine in late fifteenth-century Vienna, compiled or owned Fasciculus Medicinae (first printed in 1491), a collection of medical treatises that draws on ancient Greek and Arabic medical texts. It was the first illustrated work on medicine to appear in print and covers a number of medical treatments: the care of wounds, the application of herbal remedies, bloodletting – with its role in maintaining a balance of the four humors – and urology.
'Wound Man,' which appears in this collection, lays out the treatment for various injures: to care for one pierced by sword or lance, for example, a physician should prescribe 'tepid beer with serpent’s fat' (Fasciculus medicine, tr. Luke Demaitre, 1988, 58).
'Zodiac Man' reflects the medieval and Renaissance belief that parts of the body were governed by astrological signs. Though medieval in its origins, these beliefs remained popular, with similar images published in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century American almanacs.
The Fasciculus also features a section focused on gynecology and obstetrics: disorders specific to women, texts related to sexuality, and a woodcut featuring a pregnant anatomical female figure.
Beginning in 1493, the collection received a Renaissance update, exhibiting the classicizing influence of Venetian artists Giovanni Bellini and Andrea Mantegna.
Working in the mid-sixteenth century, Andreas Vesalius was chair of anatomy and surgery at the University of Padua and later imperial physician to the Emperor Charles V.
Like Leonardo, he conducted his own dissections, his anatomical studies improving on the work of the Roman physician Galen. His work aimed to illustrate the idealized human body.
Vesalius' De Hvmani Corpis Fabrica Libri Septem was illustrated with over 200 woodcuts. Sachiko Kusukawa, Trinity College Cambridge, argues that while woodcuts typically produce a print that is inferior and lacking in detail in comparison to prints produced by engraving and etching, this was not the case for those illustrating De Hvmani Corpis Fabrica. Those produced for Vesalius' work are considered be of the highest quality.
In characteristic Renaissance fashion, the artist rendered the figures in Classical poses, with Vesalius' anatomical studies set against a backdrop of the Eugenean hills near Venice and Padua. Any number of artists may have been responsible for the work, including the Flemish artist Jan Steven van Calcar, who trained in the workshop of the Venetian painter Titian. Dominico Campagnola and Sebastiano Serlio have also been named as possibilities. Kusukawa, however, has ruled out Titian himself.