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The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 3 (of 6) cover

The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 3 (of 6)

Chapter 70: CHAP. 67.—THE NECK; THE THROAT; THE DORSAL SPINE.
By the Elder Pliny
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Classics of LiteratureHistory - AncientNature/Gardening/AnimalsScience - Biology

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The work assembles systematic observations on animals, insects, and trees, combining natural history with practical notes. It surveys insect forms and habits, including bees, silk‑producing worms, spiders, and parasitic species, and discusses reproduction, classification, diseases, and useful products like honey and silk. It then examines animal anatomy in detail, limb by limb and organ by organ, comparing organs, vital functions, and bodily peculiarities across species. Later sections catalogue trees and exotic plants, describing aromatic gums, spices, frankincense, myrrh, and methods for producing and testing unguents and perfumes, and noting their uses and regions of origin.

CHAP. 67.—THE NECK; THE THROAT; THE DORSAL SPINE.

The neck is found to exist in no animal but those which have both these passages. All the others which have the gullet only, have nothing but a gorge or throat. In those which have a neck, it is formed of several rounded vertebræ, and is flexible, and joined together by distinct articulations, to allow of the animal turning round the head to look. The lion, the wolf, and the hyæna are the only animals in which it is formed of a single262 rigid bone. The neck is annexed to the spine, and the spine to the loins. The vertebral column is of a bony substance, but rounded, and pierced within, to afford a passage for the marrow to descend from the brain. It is generally concluded that the marrow is of the same nature as the brain, from the fact that if the membrane of exceeding thinness which covers it is pierced, death immediately ensues.263 Those animals which have long legs have a long throat as well, which is the case also with aquatic birds, although they have short legs, as well as with those which have hooked talons.