Gautier d'Agoty, 1746, Paris: a Coloured Plate of Six Dissections of the Upper Limb

Abstract

Gautier d'Agoty is very famous for his engravings with four passages of coloured inks; this procedure gave several colors with an excellent rendering of the human dissections during the 18th century in France. We have analyzed the anatomical veracity of the plate #17 “demonstrated by Duverney, painted and engraved by J. Gautier”. In november 2015, It belonged (#64747) to the Scientific Library Alain Brieux ‐ Gillot. It represented the dissections of a left human upper limb: the hand with the posterior (x1) and anterior (x2) aspects, the forearm with the hand on their posterior and anterior aspects, and the deltoid muscle. The anatomical veracity was excellent. The dimensions of the frame of the plate were 72 × 55 cm. The editors were Gautier, Quillau and Lamesle, in Paris, 1746. The exact title was: “ Suite de l'essai d'anatomie en tableaux imprimés représentant au naturel tous les muscles du pharinx, du tronc et des extrémités supérieures (...) par M Duverney (...) comprenant 12 grandes planches par le Sieur Gautier (...) ‐ Myologie complète en couleur et grandeur naturelle, composée de l'essai et de la suite de l'essai d'anatomie, en tableaux imprimés, par M. Gautier d'Agoty, père (1716–1785) de l'Académie des Sciences des Belles Lettres de Dijon et Pensionnaire de sa Majesté”. These plates were so large that they were commonly fold; for this sample, there is only one fold perpendicular to the middle of the length. These plates are so wonderful that they are commonly used for decorative puposes especially in the libraries of the medical schools; this spectacular aspect is excellent for the gross‐anatomy field but the main thing is their scientific exactitude.