1981/03/01 by R. Glenn Northcutt · 5 citations
Earth and Planetary Sciences · Medicine · #Paleontology and Evolutionary Biology #Evolution and Paleontology Studies #Comparative Animal Anatomy Studies
paper · doi:10.1146/annurev.ne.04.030181.001505
openalex publication_date 1981/03/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/19
Comparative studies of the vertebrate telencephalon began in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries with descriptions of gross mor phology (Cuvier 1 809, Owen 1866); however, not until the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was the internal anatomy of the telencephalon described for a wide variety of vertebrates (Johnston 1906, Edinger 1908, Ramon y Cajal 1908, Papez 1929, Ariens Kappers et al 1936). This period of intensive study yielded a number of hypotheses regarding the evolution of the vertebrate telencephalon. These hypotheses were based on the anatomy revealed by existing methods-methods that allow what is now referred to as descriptive anatomy-and this anatomy could not be con firmed experimentally because the appropriate experimental techniques did not yet exist. In addition, these hypotheses refl ec ted anatomical assump tions grounded in scala naturae, which held that vertebrates form one linear series and reflect increasing complexity. The relatively sophisticated armamentarium of neurobiological tech niques available today allows us to establish more accurately the anatomy of the telencephalon; these data, data from the fossil record, and a more sophisticated view of vertebrate phylogeny allow us to propose and test new hypotheses regarding the evolution of the vertebrate telencephalon.