[Epitome, an ignored work of Andreas Vesalius]

A few days before De humani corporis fabrica libri septem publication, in 1543, from Oporinus' office at Basel, a very large but not too bulky in-folio was published, which Andreas Vesalius, the author; offered as the Epitome or Summary of the seven Fabricae books. This work, written in latin, is divided into two parts: the first of them includes six chapters describing the human body, the second is composed of eleven anatomical plates with indices; the reader is invited to cut up the last two and stick them onto the preceding, so as to make a human three-dimensional figure. This method inserts the work in a modern conception of anatomical learning. Vesalius involves himself patiently gives many explanations for learning the body in dissection order through plates and text as well. But these plates--and most of them are different from those in the Fabrica-, are not simple illustrations, but play an active part in anatomical knowledge acquisition, just as the text does, but through a different access. We will attract your attention on this originality, often ignored, of the Epitome.