14th Century Painting Depicts Limb Transplant That Occurred 1,500 Years Ago

Researchers say they have found the earliest representation of transplant surgery in a painting that depicts a scene from somewhere around the 5^th century AD, at least 1,400 years before modern medical practitioners first theorized transplantation.

The 14^th century painting, which is in the North Carolina Art Museum in Raleigh, North Carolina, United States, shows the story of a purported miracle by the physician Saints Cosmas and Damian, who, according to legend, took a healthy leg from a deceased man and replaced the gangrenous leg of a living man.

The Italian researchers say it is the first representation of a limb transplant. The painting, done in tempera and gold leaf on panel, is an altarpiece depicting the miracle of 474 AD by the Italian artist Matteo di Pacino.

A YouTube video on Ss. Comas and Damian

The researchers are Antonio Perciaccante of Gorizia hospital’s department of medicine; Frank Rühli, director of the Institute of Evolutionary Medicine at the University of Zurich; Francesco Maria Galassi, principal investigator of the Italian Paleopathology Project at IEM; and Raffaella Bianucci, a bio-anthropologist at the University of Zurich.

These medical and anthropological researchers analyzed the painting and determined the patient suffered from what Seeker.com called “a peculiar disease.”

The researchers published their findings in the Journal of Vascular Surgery, writing: