A GLIMPSE OF OUR PAST

Phillip V. Tobias as an Anatomist{

GORAN STRKALJ1* AND NALINI PATHER2

1Department of Chiropractic, Macquarie University, New South Wales, Sydney, Australia2School of Medical Sciences, The University of New South Wales, New South Wales, Sydney, Australia

The article outlines the career of the renowned South African scientist PhillipVallentine Tobias. While he made substantial contributions to a number of sci-entific disciplines, Tobias spent most of his career teaching anatomy at hisalma mater, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and saw himselfprimarily as an anatomist. The first part of this article presents Tobias’ majorcontributions to science and demonstrates that his profound knowledge ofanatomy was the basis of many of his groundbreaking research accomplish-ments. The second part of the article focuses on Tobias’ career in anatomy andhis significant contribution to anatomy teaching and administration, particu-larly in establishing and organizing the Anatomical Society of Southern Africa.The article also demonstrates how Tobias’ academic career was constrained bythe oppressive system of apartheid South Africa and how social engagementwas an integral part of his intellectual activities. Clin. Anat.2012. VVC 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Key words: Phillip V. Tobias; University of the Witwatersrand; South Africa;history of science; anatomy education

INTRODUCTION

Professor Phillip Vallentine Tobias (Fig. 1) is one ofSouth Africa’s most renowned scientists. He has of-ten been described as a ‘Renaissance man’ becauseof his many interests and contributions to a wide va-riety of scientific disciplines. In addition, he was wellversed in the arts and humanities and was politicallyand socially engaged from his student years. Indeed,it would appear that only a few contemporary scien-tists would qualify better for the title.

It is this versatility that makes it difficult todescribe and analyze Tobias, his scientific output andacademic profile. Above all, one wonders which fieldof research or sphere of interest best defines him asan academic and scientist—what discipline did heregard as his ‘home’ and from which radiated all hismany accomplishments? Tobias, however, providedthe answer to this question himself. In a lecture, inwhich he pondered upon his career, this famous sci-entist noted, ‘‘although my life has been spent in thehalls of academe where I became known as cytoge-neticist, physical and palaeo-anthropologist andjack-of-all trades, let me now confess that I am basi-cally an anatomist!’’ (Tobias, 2004).

In the present article, a contribution to the historyof contemporary science (cf., Doel and Soderqvist,

2006; American Association of Anatomists, 2012),we will first outline Tobias’ scientific biography andthen, in more detail, focus on his career as an anato-mist. In the field of human anatomy sensu stricto,Tobias produced comparatively little research. Mostof his contributions represent anatomy as it isapplied to other related disciplines, most prominentlyvarious branches of physical anthropology. Indeed,profound knowledge of anatomy enabled Tobias tomake some of the key breakthroughs in the domainsof human evolution, development, and diversity. Itwould appear that Tobias’ most important contribu-

{Three weeks after this paper was submitted for publication wereceived the sad news that Phillip Tobias passed away in Johan-nesburg on 7 June 2012. Although he had not been well for awhile, his demise came as a real shock. We dedicate this paper tothe memory of the eminent South African scientist, humanist andteacher, Phillip Tobias.

*Correspondence to: Goran Strkalj, Department of Chiropractic,Macquarie University, NSW 2109, Sydney, Australia.E-mail: goran.strkalj@mq.edu.au

Received 17 May 2012; Accepted 15 August 2012

Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com).DOI 10.1002/ca.22163

VVC 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Clinical Anatomy 00:000–000 (2012)

00:000–000,

tions in human anatomy are to be found in teaching,administration, and scientific organization, and thesewill be the main focus of this article.

A LIFE IN SCIENCE

Phillip Tobias was born in Durban on 14 October1925 (for more detailed biographical accounts seeTobias, 1991a, 2004, 2005; Strkalj et al., 2005;Tobias et al., 2008). In Durban (with a three-yearspell in Bloemfontein) he completed his primary andsecondary education.

At the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannes-burg (Wits), Tobias studied medicine, but like manytalented students at the time, took a break halfwaythrough to obtain a science degree. He had a specialinterest, sparked by personal tragedy, in medicalgenetics. As a boy, he witnessed the death of his sis-ter from diabetes at the age of 21. The fact that hismother (but not the maternal grandmother) had nosymptoms of the disease was a mystery that no onecould explain to him at the time. At Wits, Tobiasobtained his MB BCh (1950), PhD (1953) and DSc(1967). Three years after it had been defended,Tobias’ Ph.D. was published as his first book Chromo-somes, Sex-cells and Evolution in a Mammal (1956).At Wits, Tobias was strongly influenced by his twomentors, his PhD supervisor Joseph Gillman, andeven more by the then Head of the Department ofAnatomy (now School of Anatomical Sciences), Aus-tralian born anatomist and anthropologist, RaymondDart. It was primarily under Dart’s influence that

Tobias decided to ramify his scientific interests in sev-eral diverse, yet complexly interconnected disciplines(Wheelhouse and Smithford, 2001; Tobias, 2005;Tobias et al., 2008; Strkalj and Tobias, 2008), includ-ing palaeoanthropology, neuroanatomy as well ashuman variation, growth, and development.

Tobias’ student days were busy, both scientificallyand in terms of his political and social engagements.As an undergraduate, Tobias led student expeditionsto Makapansgat, the valley that would later becamefamous for its wealth in paleoanthropological andarchaeological remains. These early student expedi-tions would lead to systematic excavations of thesite that resulted in numerous important discoveriesrelated to southern African history and prehistory.During his student years, Tobias was also the presi-dent of the non-racial National Union of South Afri-can Students, which strongly opposed segregatededucation. Tobias’ opposition to South Africa’s apart-heid regime continued throughout his life, the mostfamous being his involvement in the ‘‘Biko doctors’’affair and the fight against apartheid in education.

Tobias was appointed as a Lecturer in the Depart-ment of Anatomy at Wits in 1951. In 1959, hebecame a Professor and succeeded Raymond Dart asthe Head of Department. In 1993 Tobias retired andwas appointed Professor Emeritus. In addition,Tobias was a member of the Senate and Council ofthe University and held the prestigious position ofDean of the Medical Faculty from 1980 to 1982.

Although Tobias’ PhD and his early career were inthe field of genetics (he established the first humangenetics counseling service in South Africa), hisresearch, postgraduate mentorship, and teachingwould soon spread into other fields such as humangrowth and variation, skeletal biology, paleoanthro-pology, evolutionary theory as well as philosophyand the history of science (Table 1). To all these dis-ciplines, Tobias made significant contributions, whichbrought him many honors including the Huxley Me-morial Medal, the Balzan International Prize, Mem-bership of the National Academy of Sciences of theUSA and the American Philosophical Society, and theFellowship of the Royal Society, London.

Tobias’ research on South African living popula-tions began in 1952 when he joined the French Pan-hard Capricorn Expedition to study the San and otherethnic groups of the Kalahari Desert. In 1956, hefounded the Kalahari Research Committee, whichorganized the annual multidisciplinary scientific expe-ditions to the Kalahari until 1971. This research wascrowned in 1978 by the publication of a monographentitled The Bushmen that Tobias edited and to whichhe contributed. His research on growth and develop-ment of the Southern African populations soonincluded other groups such as the Tonga of Zambia.Tobias also strongly argued that the growth and de-velopment of some of the underprivileged populationsof South Africa was impaired by the adverse socio-economic conditions and introduced the concept ofthe ‘‘negative secular trend’’ (Tobias, 1985).

Although Tobias’ early views on human variationwere based on racial typology, he was soon to acceptmore modern approaches (Morris, 2005). In 1961,he published a short but insightful book entitled The

Fig. 1. Phillip Vallentine Tobias. [Color figure can beviewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyon-linelibrary.com.]

2 Strkalj and Pather

Meaning of Race (Tobias, 1961) in which he master-fully dispersed myths of racial superiority. This bookand its second enlarged edition published 11 yearslater served as main reference texts in many institu-tions in South Africa and abroad (Tobias, 1972a).

In 1959, Tobias established the first SomatotypeLaboratory in southern Africa and 13 years later pub-lished the first account of the somatotypes of Africanpopulations from this part of the continent (Tobias,1972b).

Three years earlier, in 1956, Tobias’ superb reviewof the morphology of the controversial Kanam jaw ledLouis and Mary Leakey to invite him to describe theirfind of Australopithecus (Zinjanthropus) boisei. Thatwas the beginning of a long-lasting and scientificallyproductive friendship with the Leakey family, andTobias’ engagement in the interpretation of East Afri-can hominin fossils. In 1964 together with Louis Lea-key and John Napier, Tobias identified a new homininspecies Homo habilis (Leakey et al., 1964). Tobiaslater completed two classical monographs on the EastAfrican (Olduvai Gorge) material—on Australopithecus(Paranthropus) boisei (Tobias, 1967) and Homohabilis (Tobias, 1991b). Both these monographs arebased on a superb knowledge of anatomy and consti-tute paradigmatic examples of insightful and meticu-lous research.

In South Africa, Tobias was in charge of excava-tions at well-known hominin sites such as Sterkfon-tein (from 1966), Taung (early 1980s), Makapans-gat, and Gladysvale. As a result of these digs, morethan 600 hominin specimens have been recoveredand catalogued. The field and laboratory studiesunder Tobias’ leadership allowed for the develop-ment of the Wits’ School of Anatomical Sciences into

a major world centre of paleoanthropologicalresearch and teaching. Most of this work has beencompleted through the Palaeoanthropology ResearchUnit (later Sterkfontein Research Unit and now partof Wits’ Institute for Human Evolution), which Tobiasestablished at Wits in 1979. Tobias also contributedmany theoretical insights to palaeoanthropology fo-cusing on different subjects such as systematics,brain evolution, and evolutionary theory.

THE ANATOMIST

When Tobias was first appointed as a staff memberin the Department of Anatomy at Wits, his main taskwas to teach anatomy to medical students and thosestudying allied medical disciplines (this part of the ar-ticle is based on Tobias (1991a, 2004, 2005) andStrkalj et al. (2005) as well as the series of interviewsthat the authors, together with Jane Dugard and QianWang, carried out with Tobias; edited transcripts ofthese interviews were published in Tobias et al.(2008). Indeed, Tobias’ predecessor Raymond Darthad built a small, provincial Anatomy Department atWits into a world class teaching and research institu-tion providing instruction to medical, dental, nursing,pharmacy, occupational therapy, and physiotherapystudents as well as several groups of science stu-dents. Teaching anatomy remained Tobias’ main taskfor almost half a century (Fig. 2).

In order to improve the teaching of anatomy,Tobias and his colleagues from the department com-piled lecture notes outlining their own system ofanatomy dissections. These notes would later growinto a three volume dissection manual authored by

TABLE 1. Phillip Tobias: Some scientific career highlights

1950 MB BCh (Wits)1951 Appointed as a lecturer in the Department of Anatomy (Wits)1953 PhD (Wits)1956 Carried out the first proper census of the San, which put the population at 50,000; Published his first

book, a classical monograph Chromosomes, Sex-cells and Evolution in a Mammal.1959 Appointed Head of the Department of Anatomy (Wits)1959 Established the first Somatotype Laboratory in southern Africa1961 Published The Meaning of Race in which he deconstructed racial typology and dispersed myths of racial

superiority1963/4 Together with Maurice Arnold published the anatomy textbook Man’s Anatomy (an abbreviated,

new edition entitled Practical Anatomy is still used in many universities); with Arnold introducednew methods of anatomy teaching including the Living Anatomy

1964 Initiated a series of Anatomy Colloquia which would lead to the establishment of the AnatomicalSociety of Southern Africa (ASSA)

1964 Described a new hominin species, Homo habilis, with Louis Leakey and John Napier1966 Initiated the Wits University excavations at Sterkfontein1967 DSc (Wits)1967: Published a monograph on Australopithecus (Paranthropus) boisei, based on Mary Leakey’s

fossil discovery in Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania1978 Published, as an editor and contributor, a multidisciplinary monograph The Bushmen1979 Established Palaeoanthropology Research Unit (later Sterkfontein Research Unit and now part of

Wits’ Institute for Human Evolution)1985 Research on the South African populations challenged the ‘‘secular trend’’ that height in humans

increased generationally and introduced the concept of the ‘‘negative secular trend’’1991 Published a monograph on Homo habilis1993 Retired as the Head of Department and was appointed Professor Emeritus1998 Together with its discoverer Ron Clarke, announced the ‘‘Little Foot,’’ the most complete

australopithecine skeleton (found in Sterkfontein)

3Phillip V. Tobias as an anatomist

Tobias and a fellow Wits anatomist/surgeon MauriceArnold. The manual entitled Man’s Anatomy was firstpublished in 1963–1964. The three volumes coveredthe anatomy of (1) thorax, abdomen, pelvis, andperineum, (2) head and neck, including the centralnervous system, and (3) back and limbs. They wereillustrated by numerous, black and white drawingsproduced by local artists Phyllis and Deirdre Samson.

The name of the book came, after considerabledeliberations, from the famous South African writerSarah Gertrude Millin. In the process, severalpossible titles were discussed, including Millin’s flam-boyant proposal Once ‘twas a Man. Tobias later remi-nisced the events when he told Millin ‘‘. . . well youknow Sarah, we’re dealing here with hard-headedand often very materialistic medical students, I can’timagine them saying ‘Take out your Once ‘twas aMan . . . or Once ‘twas a Man page 73’’’ (Tobias et al.,2008).

Tobias and Arnold (1963–1964) emphasized thatthe manual had ‘‘a twofold function’’ as it was ‘‘aguide to the dissection of the human body’’ and itprovided ‘‘a systematic account of human anatomy.’’

The text combines regional and systematicapproaches in an ingenious way. While the chaptersfocus on particular regions, each of the chapterspresents the structures in these regions according tothe systems they belong. This approach enables stu-dent to learn detailed anatomy of different regionswhile, at the same time, adopting a holistic approachto the body systems and their integration.

Following the philosophy of their mentor, Ray-mond Dart, Tobias and Arnold instructed the dissec-tors to induce minimum ‘‘damage’’ to the cadaver.This way, the cadaver and various structures couldbe preserved for a longer period of time, to be usedfor further instruction and revisions. Furthermore,the skeleton of the cadaver could be preserved andused for research and teaching purposes. Indeed,largely as a result of this approach, Wits has one ofthe most valuable collections of human skeletons(Dayal et al., 2009) in the world.

Man’s Anatomy went into three more editions in1967, 1977, and 1988 and several re-prints. In pre-paring the fourth edition of the manual a newauthor, John (Jack) Allan, was introduced who was

Fig. 2. Teaching first-year medical and dental students at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.

4 Strkalj and Pather

another prominent anatomist and surgeon fromWits. Subsequently, and following the global changesin anatomy education and significant reduction ofanatomy hours in medical programs, the three vol-ume edition was condensed into a single volumebook entitled Practical Anatomy (Kieser and Allan,1999). Indeed, in the review of the first edition ofthe book (Joseph, 1966), while it was noted that‘‘the text is accurate’’ and ‘‘the drawings easy tolearn and very useful in teaching,’’ the large amountof detail was called into question. The two originalauthors, however, did not take part in producing thenew book and the revised manual was authored byAllan and Jules Kieser (also from Wits).

The manual has become a classic in South Africa—alocal version of Gray’s Anatomy. (Richardson, 2008).It provided a meticulous and detailed presentation ofanatomical structures and superb guidance throughthe complex labyrinths of the dissection of humancadavers. Furthermore, it proved especially valuableto students who did not speak English as their firstlanguage as it was written in simple, yet clear lan-guage. This is undoubtedly one of the main reasonsfor the manual’s extensive use in South African uni-versities in which there is a high number of studentswho have a mother tongue other than English.

In his department, Tobias was not only continu-ously trying to improve the teaching and learning ofanatomy but also to add a variety of novel elementsto the educational process. Thus, he strived to incor-porate aspects of the humanities into anatomy andmedical education—a process that has gained mo-mentum in recent years (Vannatta and Crow, 2007;Canby and Bush, 2010). Tobias, for instance, initi-ated a dedication service in his department, whichwas devoted to the body donors. The service, whichhas now became a tradition at Wits, is carried out atthe beginning and the end of the academic year,with all staff and students involved in dissectionattending. As South Africa is a multicultural society,the service is led by a different cleric each year, withthe denomination also changing each year. The cere-mony aims at initiating student reflection about thephilosophical and ethical aspects of studying humanbodies through dissection and paying respect to thedonors.

Philip Tobias was also known as a meticulous aca-demic administrator. Apart from numerous adminis-trative duties at his alma mater, he played a key rolein establishing an anatomical society in southernAfrica. The idea of initiating such a society was bornin 1955 during his stay at Cambridge University as aNuffield Dominion Senior Travelling Fellow in physicalanthropology. During this visit he attended a meetingof the Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland,where he presented his first paper to that society. Inhis reflections of this experience, he wrote in his jour-nal in 1955 ‘‘I foresee the day when such a societyshould be brought into existence in South Africa’’(personal communication, interview with the authors,2005). His thoughts were that the departments eligi-ble for membership to such a society would be theanatomy departments at medical schools of which, atthat stage, there were only four (Universities of CapeTown, Wits, Pretoria, and Stellenbosch).

In 1964 Tobias initiated a series of Anatomy Collo-quia incorporating the anatomy departments in whatwas then the Transvaal Province of the Republic ofSouth Africa. These included Pretoria, led by Profes-sor Tobie Muller, Onderstepoort, a veterinary anat-omy department with a strong emerging researchprofile, led by Professor H.P.A. de Boom and Wits.Funds to arrange a wider meeting were scarce. Aca-demically, however, the Colloquia were very suc-cessful and a number of research papers were pre-sented. In his opening address to the Colloquia,Tobias confidently stated that it would not be longbefore an anatomical society in South Africa becamea reality.

The news of the Colloquia soon reached theUniversities of Cape Town and Natal and at theirrequest, colleagues from Natal and Cape Townwere invited as visitors to the Transvaal AnatomyColloquia.

At the fifth meeting of the Anatomy Colloquia inDurban, Tobias proposed the establishment ofASSA—an Anatomical Society of South Africa (thatlater changed to Southern Africa). This proposalwas unanimously accepted. Professors Tobias, deBoom and John Allan (Tobias’ colleague from Witsand future collaborator on Man’s Anatomy) wererequested to draft a constitution for the Society,while de Boom took on the task of drawing an appro-priate logo. The Constitution was approved at theInaugural Conference held in Durban in 1968. TheAnatomical Society of Southern Africa thus came intobeing with Tobias as the first president, an office heheld from many years.

The colloquia and the subsequent meetings of thesociety were an enormous boost to fosteringresearch in anatomy departments in South Africa. Inthe early years, more than half of the papers pre-sented at these meetings were from Wits, but thissoon started to change as Tobias encouraged otherdepartments to participate in research. Ever mindfulof the fact that there was an Anatomical Society inWest Africa and he himself being well connected withanatomy departments in East Africa (Nairobi, Kam-pala in Uganda, and Dar Es Salaam), Tobias encour-aged colleagues from medical schools in Angola,Luanda, Lourenco Marques (now Maputo, Mozambi-que), Harare in Zimbabwe and others, to attend theSociety meetings.

During his office as President of the Society,Tobias set up the Society’s annual eponymous lec-ture, the Thompson-Stibbe Lecture, in honor ofSouth Africa’s first two professors of anatomy:Edward Phillip Stibbe from Wits and Robert BlackThompson from the University of Cape Town. Tobias,who delivered the first of these lectures, devoted hisdiscourse to the contributions of Thompson andStibbe in heading the first Anatomy departmentswith the rights to dissect the human body anywherein Africa, south of Egypt (Tobias, 1990a,b).

All this happened during the time of the interna-tional academic boycott of South Africa and althoughcolleagues from neighboring countries wanted toattend the congresses, they could not accept theSociety’s invitation. The boycott and its impactplayed a prominent role in Tobias’ career. He was

5Phillip V. Tobias as an anatomist

torn between leaving the country in protest andstaying and trying to fight the system of apartheidfrom within. Notes from Tobias’ personal diary showthe emotional and intellectual turmoil he was goingthrough: ‘‘Is it selfish to regard it simply as a matterof conscience? Would I be salving my own con-science and letting the University down? Would I bebetraying the very principles I hold most dear?’’(Tobias, 1991a). He decided to take the more diffi-cult road—stay in South Africa under the regime ofapartheid and try to change the system. That meant,however, that he would often be misunderstood,unappreciated, and even ostracized by colleaguesfrom overseas.

The academic boycott of South Africa delayed thegrowth of the Anatomical Society. Members of theSociety were not permitted to publish in some jour-nals and were even refused attendance at certainconferences. Tobias recalled one such event whilehe was still president of the Society in which SouthAfrican anatomists were invited to attend an inter-national anatomical conference in Leningrad (perso-nal communication, interview with the authors,2005). About 18 members led by Tobias acceptedthe invitation and duly applied for travel visas toLeningrad. Very shortly before the meeting, theSouth African delegation was informed that theywere not to receive visas. Tobias, who was in Am-sterdam at the time, went by train to the Consulateof the Soviet Union at The Hague to submit anappeal on behalf of the South African delegationwhich he led. The decision was reiterated. Tobiasthen produced his British passport and was granteda visa. In protest against the boycott, loyal to hiscolleagues (most of whom shared the same anti-apartheid sentiment), he refused to attend theconference.

Tobias reflected with a sense of pride (very muchlike that of a father watching over his child) that withthe dawn of the democratic era in South Africa (thefirst democratic elections were held in 1994), theSociety had attracted anatomists from other coun-tries (personal communication, interview with theauthors, 2005).

In more recent years, Tobias strongly supportedthe Society’s bid to host a conference of the Interna-tional Symposium of Morphological Sciences (ISMS).At an AGM of the ISMS, Tobias addressed the meet-ing saying: ‘‘. . .it is inconceivable in this day and agethat this society (ISMS) has never met in Africa. . .We do have anatomists in Africa!’’ (personal commu-nication, interview with the authors, 2005). In 2001,ASSA successfully hosted the meeting of the ISMSand in 2009, the International Federation of Associa-tions of Anatomists, coinciding with ASSA’s 40th an-niversary.

Four decades from its inception, Tobias was stillkeen that the Anatomical Society of Southern Africashould aspire to publish its own journal. Heenvisaged that this would be a tremendous boost toanatomy in South Africa and maybe an impetus foranatomy to play an integral role in medical curriculain South Africa. He was optimistic that the Societywould continue to actively promote the subject thatremained close to his heart!

CONCLUSIONS

Anatomy has traditionally been one of the corefoundation subjects in the education of many medi-cal and scientific disciplines. A profound knowledgeof anatomy in many ways defined Phillip Tobias asan academic and a scientist and enabled him tomake groundbreaking insights into many complexissues of human evolution, development, and diver-sity. Tobias was well aware of his roots in anatomyand throughout his long and productive career hecontinued to contribute toward the discipline’s devel-opment as an educator and administrator, oftenworking in adverse social and political circumstances.He was, after all, ‘‘basically an anatomist.’’

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7Phillip V. Tobias as an anatomist