Printed Works and Unpublished Manuscripts. G.F. D’Acquapendente on the Nervous System

Abstract

Fabrici gives limited description of neurological interest only in the treatises (De visione voce auditu, Pentateuchum Chirurgicum and Operationes chirurgicae). Therefore, apart the collection of 21 coloured paintings preserved in the Marciana Library, neither a systematic description nor an iconographic record regarding the nervous system have been published by Fabrici. However, two lists of manuscripts, respectively contained in the testament of 1615 and in a letter of 1622 written by the Rettori to the Riformatori dello Studio di Padova, demonstrate that Fabrici had composed neurological works. We found three manuscripts bearing the name of Fabrici d’Acquapendente. The first is titled Consilia medica; the second De ulceribus; the third De methodo anatomico ExcellentissimiAquapendentis and De anathomia quaedam excerpta sub Excellentissimo Aquapendente. The authors began studying the latter of them. It probably deals with a collection of notes taken at a lecture by an unknown student, but its interest remains noticeable, because it constitutes the only written description, although indirect, of neuroanatomical structures by Fabrici.