Ezio Sciamanna: The Italian contribution to the origin of cortical stimulation mapping in humans

Influenced by Ferrier's 1873 publication documenting his initial experience with cortical stimulation mapping (CSM) across several species, 19th-century experiments applying electric current to exposed human brain soon followed. Bartholow is commonly credited with the first report of CSM in a conscious human in 1874. What is not well established is that prominent Italian neurologist, Ezio Sciamanna, localized sensorimotor function in a human demonstration of CSM shortly thereafter in 1882. Sciamanna was in the vanguard of functional localization of brain function through direct stimulation of human gray matter. Unlike Bartholow, who has been canonized in the annals of CSM, Sciamanna has remained relatively obscure, despite the fact that his case may represent a better example of true subdural CSM than his better known contemporary.