James Macartney (anatomist)
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James Macartney (born 8 March 1770 in
Armagh Armagh ( ; ga, Ard Mhacha, , "Macha's height") is the county town of County Armagh and a city in Northern Ireland, as well as a civil parish. It is the ecclesiastical capital of Ireland – the seat of the Archbishops of Armagh, the Pri ...
, died 6 March 1843 in
Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...
) was an
anatomist Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having its ...
. He began life as an Irish volunteer in 1780, and was afterwards educated at the endowed classical school at Armagh, and then at a private school. He was associated for a time with the
Sheares brothers The Sheares Brothers, Henry (1753–98), and John (1766–1798) were Irish lawyers and republicans. After witnessing revolutionary events in Paris, in 1793 they joined the Society of United Irishmen for whom they organised in Cork and in Dubl ...
and
Lord Edward Fitzgerald Lord Edward FitzGerald (15 October 1763 – 4 June 1798) was an Irish aristocrat who abandoned his prospects as a distinguished veteran of British service in the American War of Independence, and as an Irish Parliamentarian, to embrace the caus ...
, the
United Irishmen The Society of United Irishmen was a sworn association in the Kingdom of Ireland formed in the wake of the French Revolution to secure "an equal representation of all the people" in a national government. Despairing of constitutional reform, ...
but, being dissatisfied with their programme, he cut himself adrift and began to study medicine.


Biography

He apprenticed himself to William Hartigan (1756?–1812) on 10 Feb. 1793, his master being president of the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland in 1797. Macartney also entered as a pupil in the college school, Mercer Street, Dublin, where he made some dissections for the museum, and he attended the Lock hospital and the Dublin dispensary. In 1796 he came to London to attend the Hunterian or Great Windmill Street school of medicine, and he became an occasional pupil at St. Thomas's and Guy's hospitals. He also attended the lectures of
John Abernethy John Abernethy may refer to: * John Abernethy (bishop), Scottish bishop, died 1639 * John Abernethy (judge) (born 1947), Australian judge *John Abernethy (minister) (1680–1740), Presbyterian minister in Ireland *John Abernethy (surgeon) (1764–18 ...
at
St. Bartholomew's Hospital St Bartholomew's Hospital, commonly known as Barts, is a teaching hospital located in the City of London. It was founded in 1123 and is currently run by Barts Health NHS Trust. History Early history Barts was founded in 1123 by Rahere (died ...
, and through his influence was appointed a demonstrator of anatomy in the medical school in 1798. He was admitted a member of the
Royal College of Surgeons of England The Royal College of Surgeons of England (RCS England) is an independent professional body and registered charity that promotes and advances standards of surgical care for patients, and regulates surgery and dentistry in England and Wales. The ...
on 6 Feb. 1800, began to practise in London as a surgeon, and was appointed lecturer on comparative anatomy and physiology at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, a post he held from March 1800 to 1811. On 21 Feb. 1811 he was elected F.R.S., and from 1803 to 1812 he served as surgeon to the Royal Radnor Militia. In May 1813 he was admitted M.D. of St. Andrews University, and on 21 June 1813 he was elected professor of anatomy and surgery in the university of Dublin, and physician to Sir Patrick Dun's hospital. These offices he resigned in 1837, after he had raised the medical school to a much better position than it had ever before occupied. During almost the whole of his residence in Dublin Macartney was subjected to a very singular exhibition of petty persecution and open insult at the hands of some members of the board of Trinity College. He was denied the privilege of election to the fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons, though he was made an honorary fellow of the
Royal College of Physicians of Ireland The Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (RCPI), ( ga, Coláiste Ríoga Lianna na hÉireann) is an Irish professional body dedicated to improving the practice of general medicine and related medical specialities, chiefly through the accredit ...
in 1818. He also received an honorary M.D. from the university of Cambridge (31 Aug. 1833), to which he sold his museum in 1836, the university of Dublin having refused to purchase it. He died at 31 Upper Merrion Street, Dublin, on 6 March 1843 (Gent. Mag. 1843, i. 554). He married on 10 Aug. 1795 a Miss Ekenhead. An ill-used and greatly misunderstood man, "he was," says Professor Alexander Macalister,
an expert anatomist and a philosophical biologist far in advance of his period. His description of the vascular system of birds has in many respects not been surpassed, and his account of the anatomy of mammals may be read with more profit than many modern works. In his account of the brain of the chimpanzee compared with that of an idiot, as well as in many others of his papers, there are glimpses of a morphology far beyond Cuvier, whose works he edited. His book on inflammation may be placed side by side with any pathological work of the period, while his researches on animal luminosity form the basis of many subsequent researches on the subject.
Macartney discovered the fibrous texture of the white substance in the brain, and the connection between the subcortical nerve fibres and the grey matter of the cerebral hemispheres. He gave, too, the first satisfactory account of rumination in the herbivora, and he discovered numerous glandular appendages in the digestive organs of mammals, especially of rodents. As one of Warburton's advisers and as a practical anatomist of great experience in teaching, he had much to do in shaping the
Anatomy Act of 1832 The Anatomy Act 1832 (2 & 3 Will. IV c.75) is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom that gave free licence to doctors, teachers of anatomy and bona fide medical students to dissect donated bodies. It was enacted in response to public revu ...
.


Writings

* ''Lectures on Comparative Anatomy'' (Cuvier's lectures translated by W. Ross under the inspection of J. Macartney), 1802, 2 vols. * ''Observations on Curvature of the Spine'', Dublin, 1817, 4to. * ''A Treatise on Inflammation'', London, 1838, 4to; reissued in America, Philadelphia, 1840. He also wrote numerous papers in the ''Philosophical Transaction'' and his articles on comparative anatomy are published in
Abraham Abraham, ; ar, , , name=, group= (originally Abram) is the common Hebrew patriarch of the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In Judaism, he is the founding father of the special relationship between the Jew ...
''
Rees's Cyclopædia Rees's ''Cyclopædia'', in full ''The Cyclopædia; or, Universal Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and Literature'' was an important 19th-century British encyclopaedia edited by Rev. Abraham Rees (1743–1825), a Presbyterian minister and scholar w ...
'' London, 1802–1819. These were: * Anatomy, Comparative and Anatomy, Vegetable, (Vol 1), 1802 * Bezoar and Beast (Vol 2), 1802/3 * Birds, anatomy (Vol 3),1803/4 * Branch, Bud and Bulb, all vegetable anatomy (Vol 5), 1805 * Classification of animals for comparative anatomy (Vol 8), 1807 * Fish or Fishes, Anatomy of (Vol 14), 1810 * Incubation in comparative anatomy (Vol 19), 1811 * Mammals, anatomy of (Vol 22), 1812 Macartney noted in his diary that he was now engaged as a regular contributor at a higher rate than any other because at that time no other person understood the subject. William Lawrence, FRS, a fellow lecturer and surgeon at St. Bartholomew's and a former pupil of Macartney, wrote articles on Insects, Reptiles and Vermes that Macartney did not have time to do.


Bibliography

* James Macartney, a memoir by Professor Alexander Macalister, F.R.S., of Cambridge, London, 1900; * Sir Charles A. Cameron's History of the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland, pp. 371, 372; * ‘ Erinensis's’ account of the appearance and methods of Macartney in the Lancet, 1825, viii. 248–52.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Macartney, James 1770 births 1843 deaths Irish anatomists United Irishmen People from Armagh (city)