Phrenology 1796 – The Birth of Neurology
In 1796, German neuroanatomist Franz Joseph Gall proposed that the brain consisted of 27 organs, each associated with a mental ability or personality trait. Although different brain regions are now known to specialise in different functions, Gall's approach held that the relative sizes and activities of these 27 hypothetical organs could be inferred from the size of areas and bumps on the skull.
From the 1820s to the 1840s, many people took phrenology seriously, and the idea entered novels and popular culture. People consulted phrenologists about hiring, their children's futures and marriage; even Queen Victoria had her children's heads analysed. A trained phrenologist was thought able, simply by feeling the bumps and contours of the head, to infer traits associated with the 27 “organs”, such as “love of offspring”, “affection and friendship”, “pride”, “a sense of language and speech” and “religiosity”.
Phrenology is a pseudoscience popular in the 18th and 19th centuries, holding that particular brain regions correspond to specific mental abilities and character traits. It was introduced by Austrian physician Franz Joseph Gall.
Pseudoscience or false science (in English, pseudoscience) is the collective name for claims, beliefs, knowledge and practices presented using scientific arguments but lacking standards required by scientific work, such as materials, methods and testability, or not supported by sufficient scientific research.
Phrenology rests on the idea that different brain regions have different functions. Phrenologists believed that the shape and bumps of the skull indicated the development of these regions and provided information about their functions. They therefore assessed personality traits and abilities by analysing skull structure.
In dividing the skull into regions, Gall examined skulls of people at society's “extremes”, including writers, poets, criminals and people with mental illness. To support his correlations, he collected more than 300 skulls.
According to Gall, the trait of “violent behaviour” lay above the ear; he linked it to a shared bump he noticed in a student who tortured animals and an apothecary who became an executioner. Interestingly, he believed that 19 of the 27 traits could also be demonstrated in animals.
German physician Johann Spurzheim, known for his phrenology lectures, made Gall's theory more acceptable by treating the “murder” and “theft” organs as “removed” and adding several more phrenological regions.
Although phrenology is now regarded as false science, its focus on specialisation of brain regions gave it an important role in the history of neurology.
Description of the article image: A phrenology diagram from People’s Cyclopedia of Universal Knowledge (1883)
Historical figures mentioned in the article: Franz Joseph Gall (1758–1828), Johann Gaspar Spurzheim (1776–1832)
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