Chapter 4 - Practical Considerations of the Dissector

Summary

This chapter considers the material and practical requirements of dissection, relying both on Galen’s advice on the subject and on historical and archaeological evidence. After an exploration of the sensory experience of participating in dissections and vivisections, the first section handles anatomical subjects themselves, first monkeys (which Galen considers to be the ideal subjects) then other animals; in each case, the chapter addresses their selection and the probable ways in which dissectors acquired them, covering livestock markets, butchers, trade in exotic animals, and in particular the flow of animals into and out of the arena. It then offers a new and comprehensive consideration of human dissection in antiquity, with a focus on its debated practice in the Roman period. The second half of the chapter considers other requirements for dissection. First of these are the tools, which are presented in terms of selection and acquisition. Next follows a consideration of the books intended to support dissection and their comparative availability. The chapter ends with a look at the people a dissector may have relied on, as assistants in the procedures or as lectors and scribes.