GEGENBAUR, Karl. - Born in Würzburg on 21 Aug. 1826; died in Heidelberg on 4 June 1903. A pupil of Kölliker and Virchow, he graduated in 1851. For three years he studied the fauna of the Mediterranean in Sicily, and in 1855 he obtained the chair of anatomy and physiology at Jena.
He had a most flourishing school. He gathered all the problems and considerations that had emerged from the study of phylogeny and enriched comparative anatomy with them. He carried out fundamental studies on the comparative anatomy of vertebrates; his is the theory of archetype (the search for the typical form of the vertebrate limb); he studied the skull of selachians and refuted the theory of Goethe and others, demonstrating the clear morphogenetic distinction between the precordal and chordal regions of the skull in vertebrates. His most important works are: *Untersuchungen zur vergleichenden Anatomie der Wirbeltiere* (Leipzig 1864), *Das Kopfstiel der Selachier* (1873), *Vergleichende Anatomie der Wirbeltiere* (1901).