Alfonso Giacomo Gaspare Corti

Who was Alfonso Giacomo Gaspare Corti?

Alfonso Giacomo Gaspare Corti was born at Gambarana, near Pavia in 1822. A famous friend of Corti's father, Antonio Scarpa, may have kindled his boyhood interest in anatomy and medicine. As a medical student he enrolled first at the University of Pavia. Corti's favorite study there was microanatomy with Bartolomeo Panizza and Mario Rusconi. In 1845, against paternal wishes, Corti moved to Vienna to complete his medical studies and to work in the anatomical institute of Joseph Hirtl. There he received the degree in medicine in 1847 under the supervision of professor Hyrtl, with a thesis on the bloodstream system of a reptile. He was then appointed by Hyrtl to be his Second Prosector. With the outbreak of the 1848 Revolution he left Vienna, and after brief military service in Italy made visits to eminent scientists in Bern, London and Paris. At the beginning of 1850 Corti had received the invitation of the anatomist Albert Kölliker and had moved to Würzburg, where he made friends with Virchow. At the Kölliker Laboratory he began to work on the mammalian auditory system.