Le pouvoir du végétal. Sexe et corail dans l’illustration anatomique moderne

In medieval tradition, the uterus was represented as an empty vessel meant to be filled by the phallus or the embryo. In the mid-16th century, however, Andreas Vesalius renewed scientific illustration by presenting naturalistic internal views of the female reproductive system. Yet some of the visual motifs used by engravers to give form to the ‘matrix’ were not based on direct observation. This article traces the history of botanical motifs taken from art history and reinterpreted in early modern anatomical treatises between the 16th and 18th centuries. An analysis of the plants, flowers, and corals integrated in a scientific context reveals that the underlying discourse of these images is less about the biological inferiority of the feminine compared to the masculine, and more about the shared power of life between humans and non-humans.