Anatomy Tower (Jena)
The anatomy tower is a ruin-like round tower and part of the remains of the city wall of Jena . It was the southwest corner of the medieval city limits, is located on the pond and Leutragraben as well as in the immediate vicinity of the Anatomical Institute and the Collegium Jenense .
The part obtained is the low-window base. An anatomical theater with windows many meters high was built on top of it. Sloping towards the middle, rows of wooden benches surrounded the morgue. Here preparatory demonstrations took place for medical teaching and scientific purposes, especially for medical students. On the one hand, the anatomy tower provided the body donor with good exposure through the high windows, and on the other hand, it preserved discretion both through the location of the anatomical theater at a height of a few meters and through the lecture-hall-like slope.
In the anatomy tower, Johann Wolfgang Goethe and Justus Christian Loder researched the intermaxillary bone of the human embryo and the elephant. The intermaxillary bone was already known to the scientific world, so that Goethe and Loder's research - contrary to their erroneous view - did not represent a new discovery.
Anatomy Tower Jena, 2005
Anatomy tower with cover, 2013
Web links
- Exhibition on the history of the anatomical section at the Alma mater Jenensis Flyer
- Anatomical collection - Museum anatomicum Jenense
- The Jena anatomy tower is to be restored Anne Zeuner, TLZ, April 11, 2014
- History of Jena in the Middle Ages - city gates, houses & squares
Coordinates: 50 ° 55 ′ 40.7 " N , 11 ° 35 ′ 1.3" E