The muscles of the arm, elbow and shoulder and the bones of the lower arm. Engraving after G. de Lairesse, 1739.
- Lairesse, Gérard de, 1640-1711.
- Date:
- 1739]
- Reference:
- 27954i
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Description
The verism of this plate of the muscle arms, which includes the detail of the grain of the wood and the pins holding back the muscles, is typical of De Lairesse's plates for Bidloo. The clavicle is at the top of the plate, marked "B". The pectoralis is below it to the right, marked "D". The biceps is marked "I". The function of the subscapularis, marked "E", is described by Cowper as drawing the arm to the trunk of the body. He cites its use by players of the Bagpipe when compressing the bellows of the instrument under the arm
Publication/Creation
[Lugduni Batavorum [Leiden] : Apud Johannem Arnoldum Langerak, 1739]
Physical description
1 print : engraving ; platemark 47 x 33.5 cm
Lettering
Divers muscles du bras et du coude. ; Tab. 65
Manuscript notations in brown ink in French on recto and verso
Bears plate number: T. 65
References note
L. Choulant, History and bibliography of anatomic illustration, tr. and ed. by M. Frank, Chicago 1920, revd ed. 1945, pp. 250-253
K. B. Roberts and J. D. W. Tomlinson, The fabric of the body. European traditions of anatomical illustration, Oxford 1992, pp. 309-313; 412-415
F. Beekman, "Bidloo and Cowper, anatomists," Annals of Medical History, n.s., 7, 1935, pp. 113-129
P. Dumaître, La curieuse destinée des planches anatomiques de Gérard de Lairesse, Amsterdam 1982
Reference
Wellcome Collection 27954i
Reproduction note
The plate originally appeared in Govard Bidloo's Anatomia humani corporis (Amsterdam 1685), one of one hundred and five plates after drawings by G. de Lairesse which survive in the collection of the Bibliothèque Interuniversitaire de Médecine in Paris. Bidloo's Anatomia appeared in a Dutch translation in 1690 after which Bidloo's publishers sold the remaining pulls of the plates to the Oxford publishers (Smith and Walford) of William Cowper's Anatomy of humane bodies (Oxford 1698), in which Bidloo's plates plus an appendix of nine new plates appear. Cowper added a new text and extra lettering, by his reckoning "above 700 references", to the plates. This new lettering was applied in red ink. Cowper's Anatomy of humane bodies was successful enough to appear in two further editions: one in English (Leiden 1737) and another in Latin (Leiden 1739) In these editions, Cowper's added letters are in black ink. The manuscript notation is a French translation of Cowper's description of the plate: Repraesentat diversos brachii & cubiti musculos
Type/Technique
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Location Status Access Closed stores