Antique Print, Science, Medical, Anatomy, Schadellehre (Phrenology)-Naturwissenschaft

The Skull alone is illustrated, without the jaw bone. The top illustration is the left side profile, bottom left is the front view and bottom right the rear view. Identified area of importance are numbered that relate to the accompanying key supplied.

Original copper-plate etching, hand coloured. Key to the numbered areas of the brain, in German, supplied.

Published Germany, c.1820

Size of image = 19.5 x 24cm (7 2/3 x 9 1/2 inch)

Condition = Printed on "Wove Paper". The paper is consistently discolored throughout. There is no foxing mold.

Phrenology

Phrenology is a pseudoscience primarily focused on measurements of the human skull, based on the concept that the brain is the organ of the mind, and that certain brain areas have localized, specific functions or modules. The focus of the phrenological concept was that measuring the contour of the skull can predict an individual's personality traits. This has been discredited by empirical research. As a field of medicine, it was developed by Franz Joseph Gall, a a German physician, in 1796. As a practiced discipline, it became popular between 1810 until 1840. The principal British center for phrenology was in Scotland, where the "Edinburgh Phrenological School" being founded in 1820.