Charles Bell (1774–1842)

Sir Charles Bell: The artist who went to the roots!

Sir Charles Bell and the anatomy of expression.

The Reverend William Bell of Edinburgh (died 1779) had four distinguished sons. Two (George and Robert) became professors of law. John (1763-1820), who was Edinburgh's most distinguished surgeon at the turn of the eighteenth century, was a brilliant teacher and writer and an excellent draughtsman. But the youngest, Sir Charles Bell (1774-1842), was the most famous, remembered today for his cont...

Sir Charles Bell and the Mysteries of the Brain

The heart and the brain had for thousands of years been considered the "noble" organs, organs shrouded in the deepest of mysteries, highly organized masses of tissues properly hidden from man's prying eyes and curious fingers. They were not to be touched under any circumstances ; they held the secrets of life and death and for that reason were sacred in the sight of God. So it was that for two ...

Sir Charles Bell was not affected by facial paralysis himself!

Despite our recent commentary on the article by Resende and Weber, the authors still seem to believe that Sir Charles Bell (1774-1842) himself was affected by facial paralysis. They came to this erroneous conclusion from a paper by Jongkees and by “neurological examination of the photograph of Sir Charles Bell” (Fig 1). However, had they taken the effort to check Jongkees’ German translation wi...

Charles Bell, The anatomy of expression (1806): Die Ausdruckstheorie des Anatomen und Chirurgen Sir Charles Bell (1774–1842) und ihre Beziehung zur Ästhetik des 19. Jahrhunderts

RECENT WORKS ON THE HISTORY OF MEDICAL ICONOGRAPHY KLAUS KNECHT, Charles Bell, The anatomy of expression (1806): Die Ausdruckstheorie des Anatomen und Chirurgen Sir Charles Bell (1774-1842) und ihre Beziehung zur Asthetik des 19. Jahrhunderts, (Kolner Medizinhistorische Beitrige 7), Cologne, Forschungsstelle des Instituts fur Geschichte der Medizin, 1978, 8vo, pp. 212, illus., DM. 37.80. MARIA ...