A head containing over thirty images symbolising the phrenological faculties. Wood engraving, c. 1845, after O.S. Fowler (?).

[Place of publication not identified] : [publisher not identified]

1 print : wood engraving

Symbolical head and phrenological chart by Drs. Gall & Spurzheim ... Lettering continues: "Explanation of the cut: the design of this cut is to show the natural language of the mental organs situated in the various parts of the brain. For example - veneration is represented by a devotional attitude: Benevolence, by the good samaritan: Secretiveness, by the cat catching the rat: Destructiveness, by the tiger destroying his prey: Sublimity, by the Niagara Falls: Acquisitiveness, by the miser weighing and counting his money: Causality, by Newton philosophising on the falling of the apple: Alimentiveness, by two persons eating and drinking: Firmness, by the donkey, &c, &c.". Lettering continues at great length with list and short analysis of each of the 35 faculties and 4 temperaments. There follows a note of explanation on the "comparative development of the respective organs" on a scale of even numbers from 2-24

The design seems to originate with one of the Fowlers (probably Orson Squire Fowler), a family of popular phrenologists operating in the United States in the last half of the nineteenth century

Wellcome Collection 27755i