MORGAGNI, GIOVANNI BATTISTA

MORGAGNI, GIOVANNI BATTISTA, one of the greatest physicians of the eighteenth century, was born at Forlì in Italy on the 25th February 1682. He studied medicine at Bologna, and subsequently proceeded to Venice and Padua, where he pursued his investigations both in physics and in comparative anatomy with great ardour. At the age of twenty-four he published his Adversaria Anatomica prima, a work of great originality; and in 1712 was appointed professor of the theory of physics at Padua. He then occupied himself with the continuation of his Epistola Anatomice, in which he described the structure of a number of organs which had been ill observed before his time; refuted the criticisms of Bianchi, who had disputed some of his views; and exposed the errors which had been committed by Manget in his Théâtre Anatomique. This work, which was completed and published at Padua in 1719, was applauded by the greatest anatomists of the time, amongst whom may be mentioned Ruysch, Boerhaave, Heister, Winslow, Hoffman, Mead, Senac, and Meckel. Morgagni was now promoted to the first chair at Padua, and successively admitted a member of the Royal Society of London, of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, and of the academies of Petersburg and Berlin, besides several learned Italian institutions. Morgagni continued to labour till the close of his long and honourable career, which terminated on the 6th of December 1771, at the age of nearly ninety. The knowledge of Morgagni was not confined to the medical art. His vast erudition,

embraced philology, criticism, history, and antiquities, as may be gathered from the following list of his works:—Adversaria Omnia, Padua, 1719, 4to; Nova Institutionum Medicarum Idea, Padua, 1712, 4to; In Aurel. Cornelium Celsum et Quintum Serenum Samonicum Epistolæ quatuor, Hague, 1724, 4to; Epistolæ Anatomice duæ, Leyden, 1728, 4to; Epistolæ Anatomice xviii., Venice, 1749, 2 vols. 4to; Miscellanea Opuscula, Venice, 1763, folio; and, finally, his most celebrated work, De Sedibus et Causis Morborum per Anatomem indagatis, libri v., Venice, 1761, 2 vols. folio. This treatise is still a standard work of reference on pathology, and has been translated into most of the European languages. The works of Morgagni were collected and published by his disciple Antony Larber, under the title of Opera Omnia, Bassano 1765, 2 vols. folio; and his Life was written, first by Fabroni in the Vita Italorum, and next separately by Mosca, Naples, 1768, in 8vo.