Investigation of "elite brains": A case of Józef Piłsudski (1867-1935)

The Polish Institute for Brain Research was established in Warsaw (Poland) in 1928 by Maksymilian Rose (1883-1937) and later moved to Vilnius (in Lithuania today). Among the most intriguing aspects of the cytoarchitectonic studies performed there were the postmortem evaluations of the cerebra of famous individuals and geniuses (referred to as "elite brains"). Rose's most famous study was the examination of the brain of Józef Piłsudski (1867-1935). Marshal Piłsudski, once a medical student, later became the initiator of the restoration of Vilnius University and its medical faculty and, as minister of military affairs, was the de facto leader of the Second Polish Republic. This article analyzes Rose's anatomical study Mózg Józefa Piłsudskiego (Józef Piłsudski's Brain), published in 1938 in Vilnius, along with the original photographs of the deceased marshal's brain and other primary and secondary sources, to investigate the phenomenon of macroscopic analysis of the brains of famous individuals as a major neuroscience field in the first half of the twentieth century. We also reconstruct the preparation, preservation, and macroscopic analysis of Piłsudski's brain, and report its normal and putative pathological findings in comparison with available data on the marshal's health and illness.