We reproduce the text in full, and the passages on the head, on the eye, and on the heart, are rendered into English. All are similar to the accounts of Mondino. We are able to illustrate them by figures from contemporary works, and thus to give an idea of the limits of the anatomical knowledge of the day.
V. Translation of Selected Passages from the Anatomy, with Commentary
(a) THE HEAD
Tractate i, Chapter 2
(folio 5 verso) There are ten layers of the head.
The first is the hair made by nature for the better protection of the head from external things, and also for beauty.
The second part is the skin, which has here to be very thick, so that the hair may be firmly embedded, having its roots thick and long; and also to be a better shield and covering for the bone and brain, since there is no muscular part here.
The third part is the flesh, developed only on the face, the temples, and about the jaws, not on the other parts.
The fourth part is an external membrane called almochatim [Arabian term for cranial periosteum] which, when the skin is raised, appears to be continuous and covers the whole cranium. And nature made this membrane firstly so that the skin which is soft should not come into contact with the hard bone, secondly that the bone of the head should have sensation through it, and thirdly that the internal membrane of the head, called dura mater, should, by means of this membrane, be attached to the bone of the cranium by certain nerves and ligaments. These, issuing through the commissures of the bones, have thus their origin in the aforesaid internal membrane, while on emerging through the bone, they weave themselves into or rather compose the external membrane called almochatim.
The fifth part is the skull. This is a bone like a cap, inside the cavity of which is located the brain. In the skull are four bones sutured together. Nature made the skull not of one but of many pieces, firstly, so that if harm should fall on one part it might not spread to the others; secondly, so that by their joints or rather sutures [Italian cusiture=sewings], the humours of the brain might be the better exhaled; and thirdly, so that when there is need of applying medicines, these might the better penetrate to the parts within.