Leonardo da Vinci theorized that diseases derived from some imperfection in the structure of the human body. In his drawing The Anatomy of the Old Man written 'In proportion as the Vessels become old their branches lose their straightness and become so much the more bent or tortuous, and their coats thicker, as old age becomes full of years.' Leonardo wrote, "vessels in the elderly, through the thickenings of the tunics, restrict the transit of the blood," and "the artery and the vein in the aged which extend between the spleen and the liver, acquires so thick a covering that it contracts the passage of blood....' This is one of the earliest descriptions of the changes of arteriosclerosis.
The name arteriosclerosis is derived from the Greek words meaning “hardening of the arteries.” Arteriosclerosis is a phenomenon that may have existed since ancient times even in Egypt.
It was in 1575 Fallopius wrote about “a degeneration of arteries into bone,” and anatomists of that era commonly mentioned ossified arteries.
Johann Friedrich Crell, in 1740 said that this hardening was not due to ossification of turning into bone but due to pus.
The Quaker physician, John Fothergill (1 712-1780) gave interesting advice concerning the prevention of coronary disease and arteriosclerosis. On the first appearance of symptoms, he advised the patient to adopt a plan of restricted food, which "might greatly retard the progress of the disorder, and to restrain excesses of passion and anxiety, which perhaps contribute more to the increase of this disease than a combination of all other causes."
Anatomist Antonio Scarpa, who lived from 1752 to 1832, in his book, Sull Aneurisma, Riflession: ed Osservazioni Anatomico-chirurgiche he described the cause of aneurysm as "slow, morbid ulcerated, steatomatous, fungus, squamous degeneration of the internal coat of the artery."
In 1755 von Haller found that these lesions that Crell thought were pus were actually something else. He used the term ‘atheroma’ that in Greek meant a space filled with gruel like material.
Jean Fréderic Martin Lobstein, a pathologist working in Strasburg, first used the terms ‘arteriosclerosis’ while he analyzed the composition of calcified arterial lesions. He refers to arteriosclerosis as a thickening and a hardening of the arteries.
In 1903 Mönckeberg arteriosclerosis was first described and named after Johann Georg Mönckeberg using details from 130 patients. It was also called “Mönckeberg media sclerosis” or “Mönckeberg media calcinosis”.
History of arteriosclerosis
