The Anatomical Wax Preparations in the Josephinum in Vienna, Austria

Abstract

As a teacher in this specialty I would wish that any surgeon-to-be consider the medico-historical museum in the Josephinum in Vienna as a part of his education. 1 Two important anniversaries in 1990 remind us of the establishment of this magnificent collection of anatomical wax preparations commissioned in 1775 to serve as teaching aids for military surgeons: February 20 and July 29. The former date is the bicentennial of the death of Emperor Joseph II (1741-1790), whose private munificence provided the means for this collection 2 and the latter, the 190th anniversary of the death of the first director and protochirurgus of the Military Medical Academy Giovanni Alessandro Brambilla (1728-1800). 3 All the exquisite erudition of medical scholars in Italy back to Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564) in Padua and all the proud tradition of Italian handicraft went into the production of more than 1100 wax preparations 4 over a whole decade. Anyone