The discovery of new land in the West-
ern Hemisphere and Asia also had an im-
portant impact on Renaissance medicine,
bringing new treatments and medicines to
Europe. University professors and doctors
put dissection and the new microscope to
work to explore the human body, while
artists such as Leonardo da Vinci under-
took their own investigations in order to
render the human body as realistically as
possible. The first translation of Galen’s
workOn Anatomical Proceduresinto Latin
was accomplished in 1531 by Johannes
Guinter. In this book Galen recommends
human dissection, a stand that promoted
the practice by doctors and scientists in
the late Renaissance. A new age of investi-
gation was opened up, led by anatomists
such as Andreas Vesalius, a professor of
surgery at the University of Padua, the aca-
demic center of medicine in the Renais-
sance. Vesalius was the first to practice
public dissection before students on hu-
man corpses. His bookOn the Structure of
the Human Body, first published in 1543,
offered detailed and accurate anatomical
drawings. These investigations culminated
in the discovery of the circulation of the
blood by William Harvey, an English doc-
tor who publishedOn the Motion of the
Heart and Blood in Animalsin 1628.
SEEALSO: Paracelsus
Médicis, Catherine de ......................
(1519–1589)
Queen of France as the wife of King Henry
II, and a woman who wielded a powerful
influence on French politics and on the
violent religious conflict that was dividing
the realm into hostile camps of Protes-
tants and Catholics. Born in Florence as
the daughter of Lorenzo de’ Medici and a
French princess, Madeleine de la Tour
d’Auvergne, she was orphaned soon after
her birth and then raised in the midst of
stormy conflict between France, the Holy
Roman Emperor, and the popes over con-
trol of Italy’s wealthy cities and principali-
ties. In 1527 the Medici dynasty in Flo-
rence was overthrown, and Catherine was
taken hostage for the good behavior of her
family. She was freed by her uncle, Pope
Clement VII, who was temporarily de-
throned before being restored by Emperor
Charles V.
Clement arranged the marriage of his
niece to Henry, the Duke of Orléans, in- A member of the Valois dynasty,
Henry became King Henry II in 1547. Al-
though Catherine remained his wife, her
influence over him was overshadowed by
Diane de Poitiers, who became the king’s
confidante and mistress. As a foreigner,
Catherine’s loyalty to France came under
suspicion, and she had little influence to
match that of her rival Diane. At a festival
to celebrate the betrothal of their daughter
Catherine de Medicis, queen and regent of
France. THELIBRARY OFCONGRESS.Médicis, Catherine de