Tagliacozzi studied medicine under Girolamo Cardano at Bologna, where he later became professor of surgery and anatomy. Although plastic surgery was known to in ancient India and elsewhere,this is the first book devoted entirely to rhinoplasty. The twenty-two full-page illustrations, which Tagliacozzi went to great expense to have printed, show the individual steps of various restorative operations, as well as the instruments and contraptions used. The author also discusses surgical complications such as haemorrhage and acute infections. Tagliacozzi was condemned for 'meddling with the handiwork of God', and after his death his body was exhumed, and reburied in unconsecrated ground. Tagliacozzi's work became virtually forgotten until the revival of plastic surgery in the early nineteenth century.
