A Body of Evidence: An Art Historical perspective on Eighteenth and ...

models were closely modelled on actual dissections and demonstrated anatomy
without the problems <strong>of</strong> decomposition.
Decay was <strong>of</strong> particular concern as <strong>of</strong>ten the universities were only permitted to
use a limited number <strong>of</strong> bodies each year for dissection. 29 The progressive
relaxation <strong>of</strong> laws governing dissection meant that it was no longer illegal to
perform dissections in many countries, but it was still closely regulated because
<strong>of</strong> the continuing fear that corpses would be stolen from graveyards for this
purpose. 30 Added to this was the difficulty involved in both clearly viewing the
parts <strong>of</strong> the body and preserving them over a number <strong>of</strong> dissections. A solution
to this was to create realistic but bloodless models.
Gaetano Zumbo
In the late seventeenth century, the Syracusan artist Abate Gaetano Giulio
Zumbo (1656–1701) was among the first artists to create anatomical models from
coloured wax. 31 A younger son, Zumbo at first entered the priesthood and then
later set about teaching himself sculpture. He was particularly influenced by
29 Sawday, 1995, p. 35.
30 The activities <strong>of</strong> the ‘Resurrectionists’, or grave robbers, were <strong>of</strong> particular concern throughout the
history <strong>of</strong> dissection in Europe. This came to note particularly in Britain with the case <strong>of</strong> Burke and Hare
who were found to have murdered sixteen people and then robbed their graves to supply anatomists in the
early nineteenth century. Thereafter body snatching was called ‘burking’ in Britain. Burmeister, 2000,
p. 26.
31 Lightbown, 1964, 486. Information relating to the life <strong>of</strong> Gaetano Giulio Zumbo is extensively drawn
from R.W. Lightbown’s illuminating articles in The Burlington Magazine. There is a lack <strong>of</strong> other
information regarding this artist; as such most other references have in turn used this article as their source.