Recherches sur l'Anatomie du Troglodytes Aubryi, Chimpanze d'Une Espece Nouvelle

Paris: Museum d'Histoire Naturelle, 1866. First edition.

SCARCE MONOGRAPH ON A NEW SPECIES OF CHIMPANZEE WITH FINE LITHOGRAPHIC PLATES BY PIONEER IN COMPARATAIVE BRAIN ANATOMY.

23x31 cm folio, red cloth covered boards, gilt title to spine, bookplate of academic physician to verso front cover, ix, 264 pp., 9 lithographic plates. Scattered light foxing, very good in custom archival mylar cover.

LOUIS-PIEERRE GRATIOLET (1815 – 1865) was a French anatomist and zoologist who succeeded Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire (1805-1861) as professor of zoology to the Faculty of Sciences at the University of Paris. Gratiolet is remembered for his work in neuroanatomy, physiognomy, and physical anthropology. He did extensive research in the field of comparative anatomy and performed important studies regarding the differences and similarities between human and various primate brains. He is also credited for introducing the demarcation of the brain's cortical surface into five lobes, (frontal lobe, temporal lobe, parietal lobe, occipital lobe, and insular cortex). He correctly identified most gyri and sulci on all brain surfaces, introduced the term "plis de passage" for some interconnecting gyri, and provided the first description of the optic radiations. In the early 1860s, Gratiolet fought a highly publicized battle against Paul Broca (1824-1880) on the relationship between brain and intelligence. Gratiolet agreed that the brain was most likely the seat of intelligence, but he considered human cognition far too subtle to have any direct relationship with brain size. He argued that a detailed study of the human brain architecture would be more profitable than Broca's vain speculations on the relationship between brain weight and intelligence, which he considered a monolithic entity.