Professor Lady Sue Black, College President, recently appeared as a guest on the BBC podcast, 'History’s Youngest Heroes'.

Presented by Nicola Coughlan, the series spotlights 12 extraordinary young people from across history, exploring rebellion, risk, and the radical power of youth. The President appears as an expert guest in episode 9 (broadcast 3 Feb 2025), which focuses on the life and legacy of one of her heroes, the sixteenth-century anatomist, Andreas van Wesel (Vesalius).

History's Youngest Heroes

With insights from the President and Dr Stefano Sandrone, co-author of Brain Renaissance: From Vesalius to Modern Neuroscience (Oxford, 2015), the programme traces Vesalius’s medical education from Brussels to Leuven, from Paris to Padua. It was as a student, and latterly as Professor of Anatomy and Surgery, at Padua that Versalius made his most significant contributions as an anatomist. Vesalius’s extensive experience dissecting the corpses of criminals enabled him to redefine contemporary understanding of human anatomy, which had largely remained unchanged since the work of Galen (c. 130 – 210 AD).

Vesalius Frontispiece of the second edition of Vesalius’ Fabrica (1555).

Vesalius’s findings were eventually published as De Humani Corporis Fabrica in 1543, richly illustrated by diagrams by Titan–pupil, Jan Stefan van Kallar (c. 1499–c.1546). Within months of its publication, De Humani Corporis Fabrica was a standard text for anatomy students throughout Europe, notwithstanding the controversy surrounding Vesalius’s methods of dissection. As Professor Black says in the conclusion to the programme, the fact that so much of Vesalius’s work still stands today is testament to the meticulousness of his research practice work and justifies his title as the Father of Modern Anatomy.

You can listen to the programme and others in the series via BBC Sounds.