Public Dissection Was a Gruesome Spectacle

The intricate details of the body revealed the perfection of God’s design; studying anatomy allowed you to discover the divine workings of the universe within the microcosm of your flesh. This era saw the rise of “flap anatomies,” which used cutouts to reveal the successive strata of the human body. There was an inherent cruelty in the spectacle of public dissection, and yet it was in these bodies that they uncovered the working of God’s hand—and the minute perfection of the human form.

Source: daily.jstor.org