Thomas Willis, his Life, Legacy, and the Revolutionary Advances Made in Medicine Including in the Field we now know as Neuroscience

He was the first to describe and name optic thalamus, vagus nerve, migraines, corpora striatum, spinal accessory nerve and internal capsule.

Willis deduced that the medulla oblongata coordinated many of the body’s involuntary functions.

He demonstrated that obstruction to the blood flow to the brain did not always correlate with apoplexy.

Willis was the first to number the cranial nerves in the order we know them now.

He described myasthenia gravis as intermittent weakness that worsens with fatigueor activity.

Epilepsy was redefined as explosive reactions in the brain rather than originating from the muscles, this challenging the assumption of demonic possession.Thomas identified that recurrent seizures could result death.

Thomas theorised the cerebrum as the centre for memory, cognition, imagination, and volition, rejecting the ventricles theory.

Dementia was identified as being either congenital or acquired and linked to age, alcohol abuse, or long standing paly or epilepsy.

He recognised that hysteria was not a disease of the uterus but was cerebral inorigin.

Willis concluded that a traumatic head injury could result in acquired foolishness and stupidity.

He described individuals with inflammation of the meninges with concurrent fever (meningitis), noting that the term meningitis would not be coined until the early1800’s.

Headaches occurred as a result of increased blood flow in the brain.

Thomas characterised diabetes, noting the sweet flavour of the urine, and adding the word mellitus to the diagnosis.

He also wrote on a variety of other topics including fevers, urine, fermentation, scurvy and muscular motion.

Thomas provided a particularly accurate characterisation of epidemics, including detailed descriptions of typhus outbreaks.

The city of Oxford becomes headquarters for the king’s army

First siege of Oxford (May/June)

Second siege of Oxford (May/June)

Oliver Cromwell formally accepts the surrender of Oxford

Charles I flees Oxford in disguise and heads north (April)

Third siege of Oxford (May)

End of the Civil War (June), the Royalists have been defeated, Oxford surrenders, and the King is in custody.

Awarded Bachelor of Medicine Oxford by Royal decreeand was able to begin medical practice (December)

Thomas’ father and stepmother die of ‘camp fever’

Charles I aged 48 is convicted of treason and executed (January)

Accession of Charles II then aged 19, declared king while in exile in Scotland

Charles II makes an attempt to get the English crown back but the Scottish army is defeated at Dunbar (September)

Founding of the Oxford Circle (Philosophers Club)

Oliver Cromwell appointed Oxford University Chancellor (January)

Charles II is crowned with the Scottish regalia (January)

Charles II and his Scottish forces are annihilated in Woster and Charles II is on the run with a warrant of 1000 pounds on his head (September)

Charles II flees to France (October)

Thomas moves out of university accommodation and occupies Beam Hall (Just opposite Merton Collage)

Thomas marries Mary Fell (April)

Charles II returns to England after living in exile in France on the invitation of parliament.

The restoration of the monarchy (May)

The Royal Society established (November)

Elected Sedleian Professor of Natural Philosophy at Oxford (by request of Charles II)

Thomas begins brain dissections with his colleagues Christopher Wren and Richard Lower

Thomas and Mary’s second son Samuel is born

Oliver Cromwell’s body is exhumed from Westminster Abbyand post-humously executed (January)

Charles II crowned king of England (April)

Thomas and his family move to London

Samuel II is born and dies

Thomas and Mary’s daughter Rachel is born

Elected Fellow of the Royal Society (December)

Publication of Cerebri Anatome

Thomas and Mary welcome a son Richard

Elected Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians

Thomas is appointed physician in ordinary to the king

A new chapel at Pembroke Collage is consecrated, marking Christopher Wren’s first completed work of Architecture and career change.

Charles II and the royal court move to Oxford in September, not leaving until January to avoid the plague in London

Mary and Thomas’ daughter Rachael is born

Both Katherine and Richard die

Willis publishes the earliest English work on psychiatry

Thomas marries his second wife Elizabeth Calley (September)

Thomas and Mary’s two daughters Anne and Rachael die

Thomas dies at his home in London aged 54 (November)