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Contributed greatly to medicine and the understanding of human anatomy
In 1546, Fracastoro, an Italian, published a book stating that disease was spread in the air, or by contact with clothes. He even claimed that each disease had its own germ. But it took three more centuries for his ideas to be proven. Again, it was a start.
The Renaissance's
Inventions and
Medical Discoveries
However, as the Renaissance spirit grew, the inquiring minds of gifted people turned to science and medicine to find some of the answers we take for granted today...
Ambroise Paré (1517–90) was an army surgeon, he learned his trade from working with bodies, not just books. He introduced the method of tying arteries after amputations, to stop loss of blood. The usual method was to seal the stump with a red hot iron, or boiling pitch. The patient received no anaesthetic. Paré also designed artificial hands with moving fingers.
Before this, doctors had not been allowed to cut up a human body. The Church had ruled that the human body was sacred. But if a doctor did not know how the human body worked, how could he treat sickness and disease?
Vesalius is known as the ‘father of human anatomy’. He published a book in 1543, in which he illustrated and explained human anatomy from his observations of a dissected body (see his drawing of a skeleton above). His students collected bodies at night from the gallows for him to dissect. Vesalius did not receive fame and fortune for his work. The Church condemned him. However, he had opened up ideas for future generations. It was a start.
Little was understood about hygiene in the Middle Ages and early Renaissance. Bathing was rare and waste products were thrown out of windows into the street. Rubbish was not collected. It was left to rain to wash mud and filth into nearby rivers, the source of water used for drinking.
Not surprisingly, disease and epidemics were commonplace. Many children died before the age of five, and adult life expectancy was 40.
It took great courage to be a scientist in the Renaissance. Vesalius had trouble getting the dead bodies to conduct his research because many people, the Church in particular, disliked his interfering with the ‘dead’. He had to steal bodies from the graveyard or gallows and sometimes even hide corpses in his bed.
The Black Death (bubonic plague) reached Europe in the 1340s, killing at least one quarter of the population. It was a terrible pandemic. Prayer seemed to be the only answer. The disease was seen as God's punishment. No-one realised the disease was spread by flea-infested rats. The reaction to the shattering disease was evidence of how little investigation there had been in science and medicine to that point. Practical medicine during the Middle Ages was mainly in the hands of the Church, which looked after the sick but did little to inquire into why there was sickness.
Lens maker Zacharias Janssen built the first compound microscope in 1595. It was not as complex as this one, but it was based on the same principles. Janssen's microscope consisted of three sliding tubes and two lenses.
The microscopes of another Dutchman, Antony van Leeuwenhoek (1632–1723), were about 10 times more powerful than Janssen's. They were so good, he was able to see bacteria. However, Leeuwenhoek's microscopes used only one lens. Hence, they were really just very strong magnifying glasses.
Before mechanical clocks were invented, sometime in the late 1200s, people had water clocks and sundials. Water clocks measured time via the steadily rising water level in a special tank.
In 1410, the architect Brunelleschi invented the first portable clock.
The wrist watch did not come into popularity until the 1800’s.
Cornelius van Drebbel built the first submarine in 1620. It was basically a rowboat wrapped in waterproof leather. Flexible leather seals around the oar holes and air tubes kept out water. In its first trial, the craft stayed underwater for three hours in the River Thames.
Cornelius van Drebbel built the first submarine in 1620. It was basically a rowboat wrapped in waterproof leather. Flexible leather seals around the oar holes and air tubes kept out water. In its first trial, the craft stayed underwater for three hours in the River Thames.
The first designs of many things we use, see or depend on today were developed during the Renaissance. These include, among many other things, maps and compasses.
It was a time when people were starting to ask questions and were eager for knowledge. This led many to experiment — and invent.
In 1440 Gutenberg invented the printing press. Letters were cut in relief on tiny brass blocks. These blocks were then arranged to make words within a wooden frame. Ink was rolled over the raised surface of the letters, before the frame was hand-pressed against paper.
Prior to this invention, virtually no-one could read or write except monks and nuns. Being handwritten, books were rare and costly. Gutenberg's invention allowed more and more people to read. By 1500, there were 1000 printers in Europe and some 10 million books.
Lenses were invented around 1280. At this stage they were only for the long-sided. They were set into a metal, bone or leather V-shaped frame, which sat over the nose.
Lenses for the short-sighted were not invented until the sixteenth century.
In 1608, a Dutchman, Hans Lippershey, made the first telescope. Galileo Galilei, of Italy, heard about the invention and designed a better version of it the following year. Through it, Galileo saw the mountainous surface of the moon. He also discovered moons orbiting Jupiter. His discovery made the earlier suggestion by Nicolaus Copernicus — that the Earth and its planets revolved around the sun — more believable. Galileo's telescope was the start of modern astronomy.
The first toilet was the idea of a godson of Queen Elizabeth I, Sir John Harrington. He built it in 1596. Though he and his godmother continued to use the toilet, he never built another one. This was because his bright idea was laughed at.