In 1628 the English physician William Harvey published, in Frankfurt, a short book titled Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis. By measuring the volume of blood pumped by the heart, vivisecting animals and tying off veins in the arm, he showed that blood is pumped round the body in a circuit instead of being made in the liver and consumed by the tissues, as Galen had taught. His argument was based on experiment and quantification, a new approach in medicine. The discovery was attacked at first, but the capillaries joining arteries and veins were observed by Marcello Malpighi in 1661.
Before and after
- 3 March 1627First Manchu invasion of Korea
- from 20 June 1627 to 17 July 1627Turkish Abductions
- from 10 September 1627 to 28 October 1628Siege of La Rochelle
- 1628Founding of Royal Armoury
- 1628William Harvey describes the circulation of the blood
- 12 January 1628Birth of Charles Perrault
- from May 1628 to August 1628Siege of Stralsund
- 1629Founding of Lynn
- 1629Founding of Melrose
More in Science & technology
- 1543De revolutionibus orbium coelestium
- 27 December 1571Birth of Johannes Kepler
- 1637Descartes publishes La Geometrie: algebra meets geometry
- 21 June 1646Birth of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
- 15 April 1707Birth of Leonhard Euler
- 20 March 1727Death of Isaac Newton
The era
This moment belongs to the Early modern world (1500 CE to 1760 CE), voyages, printing and new ideas. You can also browse everything in the 17th century.