Vesalius's Fabrica
An anatomist corrects Galen, who had dissected apes
Andreas Vesalius did his own dissections and showed that Galen had described human anatomy from apes and pigs, with hundreds of errors doctors had repeated for over a thousand years. The book came out in 1543, the same year as Copernicus's.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 16th century
Did you know
1543 overturned ideas about both the heavens and the body. Copernicus published that the Earth goes round the Sun, and Vesalius the first accurate human anatomy based on dissection rather than ancient books. Share →
For nearly 1,400 years doctors learned human anatomy from descriptions of monkeys. In the 2nd century Galen dissected macaques and pigs, and his errors were repeated until Vesalius checked against real human bodies in 1543. Share →
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Whole world
- 1526–1867 Atlantic slave trade — 17 years earlier
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1526 Battle of Mohács — 17 years earlier
- 1547 Ivan IV crowned Tsar — 4 years later
- 1555–1561 Saint Basil's Cathedral — 12 years later
Middle East
- 1520–1566 Reign of Suleiman the Magnificent — 23 years earlier
Africa
- 1529–1543 Ahmad Gragn invades Ethiopia — 14 years earlier
Asia
- 1526 First Battle of Panipat — 17 years earlier
- 1556 Shaanxi earthquake — 13 years later
- 1556 Akbar and the Second Battle of Panipat — 13 years later
Americas
- 1519–1522 Magellan's circumnavigation — 24 years earlier
- 1521 Fall of Tenochtitlan — 22 years earlier
- 1532 Capture of Atahualpa at Cajamarca — 11 years earlier
- 1542 Orellana sails down the Amazon — 1 year earlier
- 1545–1548 Cocoliztli epidemic — 2 years later
Alive at the time
- Nicolaus Copernicus (aged 70)
- Michelangelo (aged 68)
- Martin Luther (aged 60)
- Ivan the Terrible (aged 13)
- Elizabeth I (aged 10)
- Akbar the Great (aged 1)
- Tokugawa Ieyasu (aged 0)
- Bartolomé de las Casas (aged 59)
- Hernán Cortés (aged 58)
- Francysk Skaryna (aged 53)