Jean-Baptiste Bouillaud and the dogma of the left third frontal gyrus
A. García-Molina, J. Peña-Casanova
Neurosciences and History 2023;11(1):33-43
Type of article: REVIEW
AUTHORS
A. García-Molina1,2,3, J. Peña-Casanova4,5
1Institut Guttmann, Institut Universitari de Neurorehabilitació (UAB), Badalona, Barcelona, Spain.
2Fundació Institut d’Investigació en Ciències de la Salut Germans Trias i Pujol, Badalona, Spain.
3Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Bellaterra, Spain.
4Fundación Institut Mar de Investigaciones Médicas (FIMIM), Barcelona, Spain.
5Psychiatric and Legal Medicine Department. Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
ABSTRACT
Introduction. In 1906, Pierre Marie published “Revision de la question de l’aphasie: l’ aphasie de 1861 à 1866, essai de critique historique sur la genèse de la doctrine de Broca.” In the article, he postulated that the findings presented by Paul Pierre Broca to the Société d’Anthropologie de Paris in April 1861 had become a dogma due to the mediation of Jean-Baptiste Bouillaud. The purpose of this article is to analyse Marie’s hypothesis through a review of Bouillaud’s works on the localisation of articulate language.
Development. In 1825, Bouillaud postulated that the organ of articulate language is located in the anterior lobes of the brain. He again defended this hypothesis in 1839 and 1848. Broca’s 1861 findings motivated him to address the topic on another two occasions (1864 and 1877). In the latter two lectures, Bouillaud praised Broca as the discoverer of the neuroanatomical substrate of the faculty of articulate language.
Conclusions. Marie accuses Bouillaud of infecting Broca with localisationist ideas and of promoting the dogma of the left third frontal gyrus. Based on the documents reviewed, we may hypothesise that the influential Parisian physician used Broca’s findings to consolidate his modular view of brain physiology.
KEYWORDS
Language, aphasia, phrenology, Paul Pierre Broca, Pierre Marie, Jean-Baptiste Bouillaud
Neurosciences and History 2023;11(1):33-43
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