![]() Although Gaupp continued to refine his work in later years, this would be his last Ziegler model. The primordial echidna skull model was the physical embodiment of the culmination of Gaupp’s pioneering work in the field of cranial morphology. LDUCZ-Z1103 Tachyglossus aculeatus. ‘Primordial skull of echidna’. His research and advancement of Reichert’s previous 1837 work on the subject occurred during his time in Frieburg in which he worked with Friedrich Ziegler producing several wax models: ‘primordial skull of Rana fusca’ (1895), ‘primordial skull of a lizard’ (1900-1902), ‘primordial skull of Rana fusca’ (mature) (1902), and finally, our Specimen of the Week the ‘primordial skull of echidna'(1908). It is a critical line of evidence in demonstrating mammals’ position in nature. Gaupp is best known for the Reichert-Gaupp theory which explains the evolution of mammalian ear bones from reptile jaw bones – one of the most important evolutionary events demonstrating both transitional forms and the re-purposing of structures during evolution. Gaupp’s research of morphological development of the cranium in vertebrates established the methodology for modern cranial morphological research. Gaupp, a student of Robert Wiedersheim (who had succeeded Ecker as the director of Freiburg’s Institute of Anatomy and Comparative Anatomy) shared his teacher’s inclination towards embryology rather than comparative anatomy to discover laws of form (morphology). The primordial echidna model was a collaboration by Friedrich Ziegler and anatomist Ernst Gaupp. Part of the series ‘Types of cleavage and gastrulation’. Together, the method and the models would shape not only the future of Ziegler’s studio but also change the way embryology was taught. Ziegler and Ecker dissected specimens, then drew and hand-shaped several embryological wax model series such as the ‘development of the heart in man’ (1858), ‘external form of human embryos’ (1858-1861) and ‘development of brain convolutions’ (1868-1869). The wax models were created to not only compliment Ecker’s existing teaching aids (drawings, charts and engraved plates), but were considered essential in order to visualise features in the round. It was here that Ziegler partnered with Alexander Ecker, the university’s new professor of physiology, zoology and comparative anatomy, to produce a series of wax models of the development of frog embryos. The Ziegler’s wax modelling studio had been established by Adolf Ziegler in the 1850’s while he was a zootomical assistant in the physiological institute of Freiburg University, where he had also begun to practice medicine. This magnificent specimen was sculpted from the very best of early twentieth century scientific Freiburgian wax – that is, it was made in 1908 by the Ziegler studio in Freiburg, Germany as a teaching model to be used in university classrooms.
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