Fabricius ab Aquapendente (1537–1619)

Hieronymus Fabricius ab Aquapendente (Girolamo Fabrizi or Fabrici d'Aquapendente) was the Professor of Anatomy and Surgery at the University of Padua from 1565. He obtained the Doctor of Medicine degree in 1559 under the supervision of Gabriele Faloppio (himself succeeding Vesalius). In turn, he was the supervisor of William Harvey as well as of other students. Fabricius was an enthusiastic anatomist who investigated the formation of the fetus, the structure of the esophagus, stomach and intestines, and the peculiarities of the eye, the ear, and the larynx. He has been called 'the Father of Embryology', and credited with several anatomical discoveries (including the Sylvian fissure, wrongly attributed to Franciscus Sylvius).

Famously, Fabricius demonstrated the existence of vein valves in 1579. His claim for the discovery of the valves has recently been contested.1 In any case, his student William Harvey learned about the valves while in Padua, and was eventually able to describe their function as part of his ground-breaking theory of blood circulation. 

Although Fabricius has been described as ushering in an Aristotelian programme at Padua (Cunningham 1985), recent evidence suggests that in fact he was much more inclined toward Galenic teaching. As Stolberg (2018, p. 393) points out, 'the major change in anatomical teaching, in Padua, since the time of Vesalius, was not a turn towards Aristotelianism. It was a shift towards the full Galenic program of linking the structure or fabric of the various parts of the body to their specific utility or uses.'

Bibliography
1Scultetus, Anke, Villavicenio, Leonel and Norman, M. 2001. 'Facts and fiction surrounding the discovery of the venous valves', Journal of Vascular Surgery, 33 (2), 435-441. 

Cunningham, Andrew. “Fabricius and the ‘Aristotle Project’ in Anatomical Teaching and Research at Padua.” In Andrew Wear, Roger French and Iain Lonie (eds.), The Medical Renaissance of the Sixteenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp.195–222.

Stolberg, Michael. “Learning Anatomy in Late Sixteenth-Century Padua.” History of Science 56, no. 4 (2018): 381–402. https://doi.org/10.1177/0073275318794581.