A wax model showing the heart, viewed from behind. It was made in the eighteenth century by Clemente Susini in Florence, and was part of a collection of more than a thousand models shipped to Vienna to be used for teaching at Joseph II’s new academy of military medicine.

‘Exquisite Pain’ - Damien Hirst’s take on the flayed figure of St Bartholomew, brandishing a scalpel in homage to those people whose skin had been removed for anatomical study in neighbouring St Bart’s hospital. In the gloriously beautiful Romanesque church of St Bartholomew the Great

Cat's talks ARE FUCKING AMAZING. She's the most knowledgeable person on death I know. Get tickets and watch her!!

Who wants to hear me talk about the Dance of Death? That’s what I’m going to be doing on Thursday - it’s online, and you can get tickets here: thelasttuesdaysociety.org/event/will-y...

Being back in Bavaria reminded me of this church I visited last time I was there in 2023. The Purgatory Chapel of St Michael’s Church in Untergriesbach has a small collection of skulls, some of which are painted

It was an absolute honour to give a talk with the fabulous @anatomicalcat.bsky.social in collaboration with the also fabulous @drtrishbiers.bsky.social in a session chaired by none other than the @hunterianmuseum.bsky.social ‘s Dawn Kemp, at #iammc2025!

I’ve had an amazing week in Ingolstadt for two inspiring conferences with wonderful people. And, of course, the Münster has this amazing transi tomb of Johannes Permetter, showing his corpse consumed by worms. Permetter died in 1505

This arm was amputated from Antonio Alessandrini in the mid-19thC. He was Professor of Comparative Anatomy in Bologna, and the amputation was a result of an injury during a dissection. The arm was then preserved and displayed in Alessandrini’s own museum. You can see it in the Palazzo Poggi

Part of a scene in the Spreuer Bridge, Lucerne, Switzerland, a medieval covered bridge which had 67 scenes from the Danse Macabre painted in its rafters between 1626 and 1635. This would show travellers that death comes for everyone.

Looking at this 18thC model of female pelvic anatomy, you see three foetuses. This isn’t showing pregnancy with triplets - it’s an intended to show different types of ectopic pregnancy. You can see ovarian, tubal, and peritoneal. It was produced by sculptor Francesc Citarelli to teach obstetrics

This is a pig with syncephaly, a condition where there is one head but two bodies - and four ears, though here the extra ears have fused together, and can’t be seen from this angle. It was prepared for the collection of anatomist and obstetrician William Hunter in the nineteenth century.

‘Pray for us’. - The ossuary of Marville in France.

When you can’t afford £7k for a life-sized Auzoux, there’s always the cheaper option of Dimensional Man, a six foot tall pop up anatomy, now living in my study…

The heart in papier-mâché, from the workshop of Dr Louis Auzoux. This one’s in the Flaubert Museum in Rouen

A model of the brain made in Vienna around 1925, showing the cytoarchitectonic areas according to Constantin Economo. Economo was a Romanian neurologist based in Vienna who looked at the different cell types in the human brain.

Four film scenes that made you the way that you are.

‘Wound Man’ is a type of illustration that started to appear in medical texts in the 15thC. The figure is covered in injuries but he’s still alive (not a good day). It showed the different injuries the human body could receive - and how to treat them. This one is from the 1495 Fasciculus Medicinae

A small anatomical figure produced in Paris in the second half of the 19thC. It was made by Jules Talrich, official model maker for the Faculty of Medicine of Paris as well as producing models for other medical institutions, side shows, and opening a museum of wax effigies akin to Madame Tussaud’s.

Just published! You can read it here: static1.squarespace.com/static/620cb...

The capela dos ossos in the beautiful town of Alcantarilha in Portugal. The photograph doesn’t convey how peaceful it felt here on a November day.

A twentieth century model showing the anatomy of the foot

In the Danse Macabre in the Beinhaus of Leuk, Switzerland, the figure representing Death lifts the mitre off the head of the bishop, showing him that his important position in life is of no importance now…

A model of the female reproductive organs made from wax by eighteenth century wax modeller Anna Morandi. Her anatomical models were based on her own dissections.

Angiogram showing a cerebral aneurysm carried out by Egas Moniz. Moniz pioneered this method in 1927 - the first way to visualise the brain without surgery. It is done by injecting radiopaque sodium iodide, and then taking an x-ray image. It is still an important diagnostic tool.

A very nice pair of skulls in the Church of St Michael’s and All Saints in Bishops Cleeve.

An écorché figure in the anatomical collection in Naples

Garlands of skulls and long bones in Sedlec Ossuary in the Czech Republic. The bones were arranged by František Rint in 1870, who had been employed by the family who owned the chapel to do so.

A large anatomical ‘fugitive leaf’ from Cassell’s People’s Physician, Vol. 5, published in the 1930s. These kind of anatomical illustrations with fold out sections functioned as paper dissections, and were intended to help non-medical audiences learn about anatomy.

A large anatomical ‘fugitive leaf’ from Cassell’s People’s Physician, Vol. 5, published in the 1930s. These kind of anatomical illustrations with fold out sections functioned as paper dissections, and were intended to help non-medical audiences learn about anatomy.

The spirit of hornéd Pan manifests on the mantelpiece of Castle Pieterstein’s North Hall

Visiting @anatomicalcat.bsky.social at Surgeons’ Hall Museums in Edinburgh. Incredibly knowledgeable, Cat is a passionate advocate for the collections, insuring that, in the stories told, fundamental humanity is not lost, and is greater than the mere sum of its parts. @surgeonshall.bsky.social

Fascinating 😅! (As always.) A brilliantly navigated vividly wild learning experience. The relief for medical advancements was deeply felt through this conversation. Thank you @anatomicalcat.bsky.social and @k8lister.bsky.social on #BitwixTheSheets. shows.acast.com/60032060-080...

I mentioned our Elsie Inglis banner at the front of the college during this event tonight - here it is!

For our next ‘Dissecting the Author’ event at @surgeonshall.bsky.social I’ll be discussing this wonderful book with Prof. Claire Brock. This is online this Thursday, and you don’t need to have read the book to attend. Come and join us! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/dissecting...

Another excellent talk from @anatomicalcat.bsky.social. I don’t often get to see her do her thing live so this was a treat!

Delivering the keynote at the Haunted Modernities conference at the University of Falmouth yesterday

Detail of stained glass in Gloucester Cathedral. It was part of a series installed in 2014 by artist Tom Denny.

Really enjoyed presenting my thoughts on memory and personhood in Severance, alongside great papers on Terry Pratchett and Elden Ring, at Haunted Modernities ( @ruthheholt.bsky.social ). Now I can kick back and look forward to @anatomicalcat.bsky.social’s keynote tomorrow!

A wax model showing syphilitic pustules, an occasional presentation of secondary syphilis. Moulage like these would be used to teach about the way various conditions presented on the skin. Syphilis can be treated with antibiotics, but its numbers have been on the rise in recent years.

Corrosion cast of the lungs in the Leiden Anatomy Museum. These kind of casts are made by injecting a wax mixture - and later plastic resins - into vessels, then dissolving the surrounding tissue away using an acid. This leaves behind the framework of the vessels.

I visited the ossuary of Custoza two years ago. It developed out of the parish priest’s desire to commemorate those who had died in the Italian wars of unification through the 19thC. Don Pivatelli had become priest in 1872, and hated the idea of so many soldiers lying in mass graves around his town

A 3D printed model of a baby heart used by Marc Hazekamp in 2014 to plan surgery for a baby girl born with a complicated heart defect. It was the first time 3D printing had been used this way to walk through the surgery in advance so that the real operation could be done as efficiently as possible

Mutual!

In church with Budgie…

One of Clemente Susini’s wax models in the Josephinum in Vienna, showing the structures of the neck

One of my favourite pictures of @anatomicalcat.bsky.social, exploring the old graveyard at Kilmahog.

It’s a replica of one of the painted skulls from the beinhaus in Hallstatt, Austria. @anatomicalcat.bsky.social wrote a blogpost which explains in more detail. thesewanderingbones.wordpress.com/2021/02/11/t...

The monument to Henry Willoughby in the church of St Leonard in Wollaton, Nottingham has a depiction of him as a cadaver on the lower level. This is known as a transi tomb, and it was considered a way to show humility - even though such monuments were hugely expensive. Willoughby died in 1528.

Another scene from the Totentanz - Dance of Death - in Bleibach, Germany, which dates to 1723, and still has all 34 scenes - made up of 33 couples and a skeletal band - along with the accompanying text. Here are some of the musicians providing the music for the dance!

What everyone wants in their weekend!