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A Diagram of the Eye drawn by Ibn al-Haytham

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A Diagram of the Eye drawn by Ibn al-Haytham

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This is a drawing from the "Book of Optics" which was made by Ibn al-Haytham in Istanbul between 1011 and 1021. The drawing seems to be showing how light enters the eye and travels through what we know now is pupil and eventually into the optic nerve. While the drawing is relatively simple, it actually contains a lot of accurate detail on how light travels through the eye so it can be useful today.

I specifically chose this drawing because of when it was created and where. This drawing was made in the eleventh century, before a lot of big scientific ideas were even thought about so I thought it was interesting. I also appreciated that this was created in Istanbul. When I think of a lot of early scientific discoveries, I think they are coming from Europe, so I believe it is important to highlight the lesser known ideas coming from other areas.

Source: Tbakhi, A., & Amr, S. S. (2007). Ibn Al-Haytham: father of modern optics. Annals of Saudi medicine, 27(6), 464–467. https://doi.org/10.5144/0256-4947.2007.464

Source used throughout for a timeline of studying the eye: University of Washington. (2013). History of Neuroscience. Washington.edu. https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/hist.html

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This is a drawing made by Leonardo Da Vinci is of what he believed was the function and pathway of the optic chiasm and other visual processes. While people at this time were unsure of the true process of the visual system, they had the right ideas when thinking about the optic chiasm and projections to the brain. This was drawn between 1607 and 1677, and likely drawn in Italy but exact location is not known.

This relates to neuroscience because this was one of the first anatomical drawings of the visual system made, and it also includes the first diagram of the of the cranial nerves which are very important to neuroscience. Another interesting aspect is that his illustrations were anatomically correct.

Source: Costea, C.F., Turliuc, Ş., Buzdugă, C. et al. The history of optic chiasm from antiquity to the twentieth century. Childs Nerv Syst 33, 1889–1898 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00381-017-3564-1

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Descartes and Kepler Drawing of the Visual Field

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Descartes and Kepler Drawing of the Visual Field

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This was created by Rene Descartes and Johannes Kepler around 1604 and was published in the "Treatise on Man." this drawing is relevant to neuroscience because they were the first to discover that the image we see is flipped on our retina, the sent to the brain on the optic nerve.

The idea that the image we see is flipped on our retina is common knowledge to most today but before it was discovered many theorist were confused by the idea of images being produced by light on our retina at all. This discovery was revolutionary in the study of the visual pathway, and it is referenced very frequently today in the field of neuroscience.

Source: Hektoen International. (2019, January 24). Nature telling her secrets: the Kepler–Descartes connection - Hektoen International. Hektoen International - an Online Medical Humanities Journal. https://hekint.org/2019/01/24/nature-telling-her-secrets-the-kepler-descartes-connection/

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This is a drawing of a cataract couching which was done when the lens of a person's eye is displaced and they have cloudiness in their vision. The person preforming this procedure is George Bartisch so this drawing is from the 16th century and was likely created in Germany. This procedure was done for thousands of years, but was eventually evolved to a full cataract removal in 1707 done by Charles Saint Yves. While this may seem like a brutal operation, it is still done today, using a sedative, and with some adjustments.

This is important to neuroscience because this treatment was one of the early developments in treating eye disorders and a version of it is still practiced today. It is not often that a treatment is consistently used for so many years so it is important to acknowledge when the early neuroscientists and ophthalmologists got it right for us today.

Source: Sim, P. (2021, February 9). History of Ophthalmology - EyeWiki. Eyewiki.org. https://eyewiki.org/History_of_Ophthalmology

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It is unsure whether these eyeglasses were used for function or just decoration but it is interesting to look at. This is from the Roman Empire in 1514, and was owned by Henry VIII who was known to be nearsighted, so they may have served another purpose other than just an decorative addition to this helmet. Eyeglasses are a big part of our everyday, especially me as a glasses wearer, so learning that they were used as early as the sixteenth century is very interesting to me.

This is interesting because it could be one of the first uses of eyeglasses in history which is important because it means that the early studiers of the eye were acknowledging that vision issues could be fixed with something used so frequently today like glasses.

Source: Ancient Origins. (2020, October 21). The perplexing horned helmet of Henry VIII. Ancient Origins Reconstructing the story of humanity’s past. https://www.ancient-origins.net/artifacts-other-artifacts/horned-helmet-henry-viii-0014431

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Ibn al-Haytham or Alhazen! He was one of the very first people to study the eyes and how we perceive the world around us through sight. He worked in the 11th century in Istanbul. I previously referenced his "Book of Optics" which was a seven volume book he published the many experiments he completed. His work was often used as the groundwork for making eyeglasses and was frequently cited by European scholars.

He is a good docent for this exhibit because of the extensive research he completed on the visual systems and all that he provided for future research on the eyes as stated above. He is often considered the "father" of the scientific method because his work was systematic and he used experimentation, so he will be a good docent for this exhibit.

Source: Alhazen—called the “World’s first true scientist.” (n.d.). https://www.jw.org/en/library/magazines/awake-no6-2017-december/alhazen-called-first-true-scientist/

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This is a diagram of the visual system that is used in neuroscience classes today. This was created by people currently teaching neuroscience to students.

I chose to show this diagram to compare to the drawings shown previously in the museum. This shows the optic chiasm and the pathway of visual stimuli and is remarkably similar to the drawing made by Da Vinci and Kepler. The early research into the eye done by these people was highly accurate for the tools they had then and it is very impressive. The drawing they made could be used to teach some of the anatomy and describe how our eye receives light waves and turns that in to images on the retina. Without those early images and research, we would never have the detailed description of the visual pathway we have today.

Source: Oiseth, S., Jones, L., & Maza, E. (2024). The Visual Pathway and Related Disorders | Concise Medical Knowledge. Lecturio. https://www.lecturio.com/concepts/the-visual-pathway-and-related-disorders/