This image was painted around the time of the first modern skin grafts.

The new judge’s chair is a gift from the king, who, for reasons of poetry and deterrence, had it upholstered in Sisamnes’s skin. You can see him enthroned on the top right of the painting. After the flaying, the king appointed the judge’s son to replace his father at court. The action is freeze-framed just moments before his identity and humanity are peeled away like the skin of a rabbit, leaving only impersonal flesh and bone. His clenched teeth and veins popping in agony differentiate this still-living person from a body on an anatomist’s table. Sisamnes is tied to a table, his modesty covered by a towel lest the sight of a penis should offend us as we witness four knife-wielding torturers peel the skin from his legs, arms and torso. The flaying of Sisamnes, a corrupt Persian judge, comprises one half of ‘The Judgement of Cambyses’, a 1498 diptych by Gerard David. Martin's Press.Figure 1 Gerard David: the flaying of Sisamnes from ‘The Judgement of Cambyses’, 1498, oil on wood.

Witty, entertaining, and at times delightfully macabre, Spare Parts shows us that the history - and future - of transplant surgery is tied up with questions about not only who we are, but also what we are, and what we might become.Ī Macmillan Audio production from St. Bringing together philosophy, science and cultural history, Spare Parts explores how transplant surgery constantly tested the boundaries between human, animal, and machine, and continues to do so today.

Paul Craddock takes us on a journey - from sixteenth-century skin grafting to contemporary stem cell transplants - uncovering stories of operations performed by unexpected people in unexpected places. But transplant surgery is as ancient as the pyramids, with a history more surprising than we might expect. We think of transplant surgery as one of the medical wonders of the modern world. Why did eighteenth-century dentists buy the live teeth of poor children?Īnd what role did a sausage skin and an enamel bath play in making kidney transplants a reality? How did an architect help pioneer blood transfusion in the 1660's? Paul Craddock's Spare Parts offers an original look at the history of medicine itself through the rich, compelling, and delightfully macabre story of transplant surgery from ancient times to the present day.

Spare parts by paul craddock