For nearly 1,400 years doctors learned human anatomy from descriptions of monkeys.

160 · 1543 · apart: 1383 years

In the 2nd century Galen dissected macaques and pigs, and his errors were repeated until Vesalius checked against real human bodies in 1543.

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The event

• Vesalius's Fabrica1543 · Basel. 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.

2nd century · 16th century

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